Well the wind did not die off and the frontal system did not diffuse or move away. Instead the flow around Cabot San Vincent only got stronger and whipped up a nice South Westerly swell. What made things worse was that the wind shifted about 2 points more to the South and was thus running in line with the approach course to Portimao. Approaching with the swell in the stern is never pleasant because when you start slowing down the swells tend to overtake the ship and then it feels as if you get a kick in the……. every few minutes when a wave hits the underside of the stern. However it turned out that that was the least of my troubles. Continue reading

As mentioned yesterday we arrived with glorious sunshine but an hour later dark clouds started to gather on the horizon. That had not been planned at all in the forecast. However the weather does not always follow the predictions. The weather front that created the overcast weather before we arrived in Lisbon, stalled and tilted a little bit instead of moving north and deposited a rather large amount of rain over Lisbon in the course of the afternoon of the first day. Then it remained drizzly during our over overnight stay. Only today the weather started to improve with sunny periods. Continue reading

During the night the swells from this weather front high up the North Atlantic reached us. A very long swell with a clocked time, from crest to crest, of about 12 seconds. The ships stabilizers could easily cope with this and thus the movement of the Prinsendam was minimal. The weather forecast for today was very good, with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid to high sixties although it turned out that that forecast had to be corrected later in the day. Continue reading

This was the last full day of our crossing and un-expectedly we came under the influence of some bad weather all the way to the North. A rather heavy system with lots of wind is moving towards the United Kingdom and that pushed a minor system, near the Gulf of Biscay, a bit further down. As a result the wave field generated by that minor system made it all the way down to our area and thus we had a Prinsendam that moved a little bit more than in the past few days. Still for an ocean crossing, not much movement at all. Later in the day the sun even came out and that was not predicted either. Continue reading

As the weather forecast had predicted, it was an overcast day with rain showers in the distance, but it remained dry where the ship was and that was in port today. After 6 very good days at sea. The Great circle that we had been travelling on came to an end just under the West point of the island Sao Migual (St Michael) on which Punta Delgada is located. A Great Circle line with a bit of a hic-up in it due to our deviation towards to Bermuda. Just West and South of the Azores is a bank, called the Alice Bank. This is basically an Azores island, a mountain top like the other islands, but one which did not make it to the surface. According to the chart there are a few shallow spots there, so we had to make certain that our course went just under it. From there it was one straight line to the pilot station. Continue reading

06 May 2009, Crossing the North Atlantic Ocean.

This is our last day at sea before we arrive at Punta Delgada in the Azores. The weather is still holding, overcast as predicted and with a low to moderate swell (4 to 5 feet), which makes the Prinsendam gently pitch. It does not look like this weather will change very much in the coming period and that will mean that we have had a very good crossing, especially for the time of year, as summer has not arrived yet. As mentioned before, we have made up the time lost from our crew medivac in Bermuda and that means that we will arrive on time. I am even planning to be a little bit early so that we have time to clear the ship and set everything up before our official arrival time. Continue reading

We continued our crossing with good weather. Partly Cloudy skies with a little swell that kept the ship just pitching a little bit. The weather is supposed to remain good but a broad band of clouds is coming over the North Atlantic so it is expected that from this evening until Lisbon we will have cloudy skies. No rain is expected although we see on the radar occasional small rain showers in the vicinity. Rain does reflect on the radar. Especially a dense rain down pour acts as a reflector to a normal radar beam. We can boost the radar waves so that they penetrate rain clouds. However most of the time we keep the radars on a nice weather setting as that setting gives a better reflection of normal targets. However, with seeing the rain clouds on the radar comes the option (if they are not too large) to sail around the clouds and in that way keep the ship dry. Continue reading

We were blessed with yet another day of good weather. Due to the new wave field coming in from the North the ship was moving a little bit more compared to yesterday but it is still a very smooth crossing. Also the light Northerly Breeze brings cooler air to the ship and thus the temperatures are about a degree less at noon time than they were yesterday. All and all it is fabulous weather for a spring crossing. Continue reading

This is the 3rd day of our crossing and the weather is holding fine. The sun is shining and with the temperatures in the low seventies it is very pleasant on deck but not too warm. The waves have changed direction again today thus the ship is riding very steady. Tomorrow there is another wave field coming from the north and then the ship will move again a little bit. This is relative as we only talk about waves varying between 2 and 3 feet instead of 4 or 5 feet. It is expected that the weather will remain nice for the foreseeable future. Continue reading

This was the second full day at sea and again we had glorious weather. A gentle breeze was blowing from the southeast, a low swell was running from the northeast and there were just a few clouds to the North of us. As we were heading into the wind with 20 knots (that is a wind force 5) it was a bit breezy in the bow area but it was perfect at the stern. Everybody was settling down in a nice routine, enjoying the ship and its amenities, and I was hoping for a “boring” day so I could deal with the last of the hand over paperwork. However sailing a cruise ship is never boring, even when you hope for it. Murphy is always around and as we sail with people things will always happen un-expectedly. Continue reading