You have days where everything goes perfect and you have days where everything seems to conspire against you. This was one of those days. Not that it really affected the guests for their Canal experience but a few things occurred that made the shipboard operation run less smoothly than I like it, and nothing I could do about it. We were scheduled to receive the pilot on board at 0545 with the first locks at 0800. I prefer that to be a bit earlier as I need my time on the other side but I can only ask. The Pilot came on board nice and timely and then told us that 17Z; the ship scheduled in the convoy ahead of us was still at anchor, as far south as possible, with 8 lengths of anchor chain out. (4 is normal at this anchorage) On my question, why anchored so far out and in that way, we found out that the Chinese captain was so scared of the other ships that he did not want to come closer, was afraid of the weather that he put 8 lengths down (best weather in the world today) and on top of that refused to heave up the anchor without the pilot on board. On my request to go first, the pilot did not wanted to push Control in swapping pennants (e.g. go as 17 instead of being nbr 19) and thus we had to wait 40 minutes until 17Z came chugging by with a speed of 10 knots. That brought us in the locks around 0830, so I lost already 30 minutes on a late schedule. Continue reading

With again wind still weather the good ship Statendam sailed along the South Coast of Panama towards the Panama Canal Zone. Until 10 am we were on a 90o easterly course and we met several ships going in the opposite direction, coming from the Panama Canal. Guessing at their time of passing us where we were, they either had had a night crossing or came from the anchorage and had been loading fuel. We got our confirmation for the schedule and we were allowed to pick up the pilot at 16.45 near the Canal Seabuoy. Although the area is monitored by Flamingo Signal Station which is the Traffic Control for everything on the Pacific side of the canal; the anchorage area of Amador itself does not fall under it’s jurisdiction and thus we have to sail all the way around all the ships at anchor towards this anchorage. I prefer to cut through as it is great sightseeing for the guests but the authorities do not like it. So we go around. Continue reading

I woke up to a bumpy ship caused by a local wind field laying over Nicaragua. It was in the forecast but the forecast gave less than what we saw outside. In a similar way to Teheantepec, the wind here is caused by weather in the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico. As soon as a hurricane goes north, or as now during the winter, a weather front comes south and it invariably creates a high pressure ridge and the wind starts blowing. Nicaragua is a low country as well and thus there is no high mountain ridge which can stop the air flow. Remember, the country side of Nicaragua is nearly flat hence it has always been mentioned as a good alternative to the Panama Canal. Those plans never came to fruition but it is certainly feasible as there is not much of a central mountain ridge to deal with. The cold front coming down over Cuba stretched in this instance all the way over Nicaragua and this strong wind could nicely whip up the seas into a short and unpleasant swell. The long Pacific swell was going against it, so on occasion the two troughs would enhance each other and then the resulting high wave would catch under the bow with a nice bump. By 10 am  we passed the border with Costa Rica and there the mountains started to rise again and that meant that by 11 am it was wind still again. The brown boobies and Starlets returned to the ship and started their “bow dance” again, floating on the air pressure and wind flow created by the bow pushing forward. As usual they marked their presence by leaving white spots on the deck and that resulted in a very unhappy bo’sun. Continue reading

Puerto Quetzal is always fun in the early morning, when you are trying to extract information out of Port Control. I have been coming to this place on and off for the last 10 years and I still have not figured out what the function of Port Control is. When you call the pilot an hour or so before arrival it is invariably Port Control who answers and never the pilot. They always have the standard answer: “pilot on arrival” and that is as far as their knowledge goes. Questions about wind in the port, swell at the entrance, ships movements around that time, are either met with a deep silence or with the remark, “ask the pilot”. And the pilot never answers. If you have never been there and are not used to it, it is very irritating. Especially for a cruise ship that runs on a tight schedule. After a few calls you get used to it and approach the issue from another angle. Just block the port entrance. That does have the required effect. Suddenly the pilot finds a VHF and a whole flood of information is coming out. Wait at the sea buoy, ship coming out passing port to port, no wind, no swell, pilot transfers from outgoing cargo ship to incoming cruise ship. In the mean time port control is advising the outgoing cargo ship that it has to go anchor, something the captain of that ship already knew, as the pilot on his ship had just told him so. I hope that before I retire, I will one day find out what this Port Control exactly does. Continue reading

By 06.30 we were approaching the Puerto Chiapas sea buoy and by now it is standard procedure that the pilot boat was already bobbing around on the swell. This is the only pilot in the whole of Mexico that I know of who is early at his station. Most are on time, some meet you half way in, some on the dock but this one is there at least 30 minutes before the ship arrives. Good reason to take advantage of and so instead of adjusting the speed for 0700 at the sea buoy, the OOW let the ship continue and we had the pilot on boat 15 minutes early. As mentioned before, I sail the ship into port here myself as with the current and the swell it is a tricky operation, but the pilot is very useful for an update about the last changes. The port entrance is nothing but a widened and deepened river estuary. Near where we are docking there are 3 rivers coming together and they deposit a large amount of silt in the river. That brings a challenge to the port as the entrance is continuously silting up and two dredgers are fully employed with keeping the fairway open. That means the deep water is only there where the dredgers have been. When you sail in, you try to stay on the leading lights which give you the centre of the channel. However with the silting and the dredging that is not always the best option. So the pilot sometimes advises to favor the red buoy side or the green buoy side, depending where the dredger has last been. Continue reading

With a long swell rolling towards the shore we arrived at the Huatalco pilot station. However the angle was just right and the dock itself only had a gentle wave running of no more than a foot, so the ship would lay steady alongside the pier when inside. No moving gangway and thus no danger to the guests. There was a lot of swell in the little bay where I normally turn the ship around to go stern but I prefer to dock stern in, as it is easier to leave in an emergency and also because the bow “cuts” the swell when it comes in, while with the stern exposed it “bangs” under it. The only danger is, that during the swing, the swell gets hold of the ship and makes it roll. There is a simple cure for that; swing so fast that the swell does not get the chance to get a grip on the ship and start that pendulum motion. Luckily the S class swings the best of all the cruise ships I have been on or seen and thus we spun around like a caroussel on a high. The pilot is still amazed everytime he sees me doing it. 45 minutes after he was on board, we had swung around, backed up to the pier, put out the ropes and the gangway and got the authorities on board. The latter is always the hardest one, because invariably there is one among them who seems to be convinced that if not all 10 lines have been made fast, the ship will drift away and he/she might fall in the water due to a shifting gangway. So the faster we are, the quicker the ship gets cleared and the quicker our guests can “invade” the port. Continue reading

Until noon time it was completely wind still with just the occasional ripple. We call that in the nautical language “still of wind”, varying to “a light air”. Expressions dating from the days of sail that we still try to use, although it is slowly fading. Now with modern instruments we can measure wind forces of more than wind force 12, so a wind force 16 does exist in principle although it is not on the Beaufort Scale. Mr. Beaufort was from the sailing days so he could only go as far as he could observe changes with the naked eye. That meant for him it all stopped at wind force 12.  “Such winds that no canvas can withstand”. In other words; if it is all blowing to pieces then that is the worst wind you can have and he was of course completely right there.  Now with ships of steel, the chance of having things blown to pieces is much smaller. Now the danger comes more from the swell that comes along with the wind. That also means that we approach bad weather in a slightly different way.  Strong winds do not affect the ship very much as long as everything is properly secured and we keep everybody inside. Only with a moving ship there is the chance of accidents and if the ship starts taking over water, then there is the chance of damage and danger to the ship. Continue reading

Because Puerto Vallarta is such a quick arrival, we do not have to arrive that early and so I could set my pilot ETA for 0700 in the morning.  Sunrise is about the same time and that is always a perfect time to arrive. Although Puerto Vallarta does not have the problem; there are many ports where quickly after sunrise the wind starts blowing and that makes docking less easy.  The air gets heated up over land and creates a sort of local high pressure system and a strong wind blows for as long as the sun is shining. It is a typical phenomenon in Greece, where they call it the Etesian winds. Although the Greek islands can be a windy affair anyway, especially around ports such as Rhodes and Mykonos, it really pays off here to try and dock before sunrise. Dubrovnik & Kotor Montenegro are similar places where the local “Bora” wind can really make your life difficult. The problems with those two ports is that you want to arrive in day light because going in and out is so scenic. Puerto Vallarta is protected by mountains and that means that the wind funnels over the mountain tops and only touches the sea surface about 3 to 4 miles from the shore. We saw that again this morning. 8 miles from shore it was blowing 25 knots but at the pilot station 1 mile offshore it was wind still. Continue reading

 The weather remained the same as yesterday; with a strong Northerly breeze and a following swell. Only by mid day, when we were almost at Cabo San Lucas did the wind die off and the swell lose its strength. There was a very good reason for this. Cabo and Cabo Falso quite often referred to as the “Cold Cape, did honor its name this time. Today it really separated  two weather systems. The boundaries were so sharp that I could point it out to the guests and even the most inept weather observer could see it. Behind the ship wave tops were indicating NW 4 to 5 winds; around the ship it was nearly wind still and ahead of the ship the wave tops were E to ESE 4 to 5 winds again. It is seldom that you can see this phenomenon so clearly defined. For us it was good, as although it being a Sunday, it kept all the six pack navigators tucked away in port and we could just sail around the Cape for a bit of sightseeing without having to keep changing course to avoid them. For Cabo itself, things where not so pretty. Easterly wind is only observed here when there is a strong cold front coming over and that does not happen too often here. If it happens then wind and the waves generated as a result of it, run straight over the anchorage into the harbor and then you have a problem. Continue reading

With a following swell we spent the day sailing southwards along the Mexican coast. Our average speed to maintain for a 0700 arrival at Puerto Vallarta is 17.5 knots and is just too slow to completely surf away from the influence of the swell. So on occasion the ship made this heaving movement that we call the corkscrew motion. Not rolling, not pitching but this swaying motion. Not very bothersome but just enough to remind you that you are on a ship and not in a land based hotel. Our speed was just enough to create a very pleasant weather condition on the deck. We had a following wind of 21 to 26 knots and with a ships speed of 18, it created a gentle breeze of about 6 knots. With sailing in the cold California current and the cooler northerly air flowing through the outside temperatures just touched the mid 60’s so it was a pleasant day, before we have to brace the warm weather of the tropics again. The weather forecast for the coming days looks good as well, until we come to Tehuantepec. In the Gulf of Mexico the weather is horrible at the moment and that wind funnels through the gap in the mountain range near Salina Cruz. Thus it is not very pleasant there and that will have my undivided attention for the coming days. Continue reading