We are on one of those stretches again that are too long for a one night crossing and too short for a full two days. Thus we got one sea day in the schedule and sailed with an average speed of 13 knots from Casablanca to Cartagena, where we will be tomorrow.  It gave the opportunity for some sightseeing as we passed through the Straits of Gibraltar during daylight. When we left from Casablanca I went a bit further off the coast than the optimum course line required but if the optimum course line runs over multiple shoals of fishermen, then that course line is not so optimum any more. By staying about 30 miles offshore and away from the 200 meter line of water depth we avoided all those fishermen. Some other ships that did for the shortest route had to contend with long fishing nets and their owners and that can give rise to some stressful situations. So we heard the exclamations of the fishermen quite loudly over the VHF: “captain, captain, think about my children…..” etc. etc.  So I thought about “his children” and stayed away as far as possible.  As a result the officers only had to deal with a few strays that were chasing fish off the beaten path but they were easily dealt with. Continue reading

The economy must be booming in Casablanca and surrounding area as I had never seen the anchorage area so full of waiting ships. They were not in lay up; they were all indeed waiting for a docking space and their shippers to have the cargo available. Thus the air was full of voices of the most exotic accents, all trying to convey their needs and queries to Port Control and the Pilot station. Some voices clearly affected by too many cigarettes and then some voices trying to grapple with the unusual consonants of the English language and then trying to speak it with their own language syntax. Especially Koreans, Chinese and Indians are very creative in producing conversational English that is wonderful to hear but at the same time mind boggling to understand. Still port control spoke excellent English and dealt with all the questioning, pleading, moaning, groaning and lack of understanding in a very patient way. Every captain thinks his ship is the most important floating object in the world and acts accordingly when approaching a port. To their utter dismay, cruise ships normally get preference, as they are under time constraints for the tours. Continue reading

From pilot station to pilot station we had to cover the magic distance of exactly 222 miles with an average speed of just over 17 knots. I kept the speed a little bit up to be able to go slow the last two hours, as the Moroccan coast is notorious for fishing boats that sometimes venture up to 20 miles off shore. Some of them are tunny fishers with long running nets and they tend to try to move in front of the bow as they know that we cannot see their nets during the night. That moving in front of a ships bow is quite a dangerous activity and they should not do it, but the fact that they do so does not exempt “that ship with the bow” from any blame if it runs them over. Going slow gives more time to change course, or even stop if needed. Still you do not want to arrive to late in the port and thus I arranged it in such a way that we built up a little plus in speed during the night while we were in open water and could then approach slowly to Agadir pilot station.  We were scheduled for the pilot at 06.00 hrs. with the plan to be docked by 06.30 so the ship would be cleared by 07.00 hrs. The port has a very simple entry with a 90o turn into the port entrance and then less then a mile to the dock. With all of that in mind we returned to the African continent. Continue reading

It is only a short hop from Tenerife to the more Eastern island of Lanzarote, where we were going to visit the port of Arrecife. The island of Lanzarote is even more barren than Tenerife and at day rise; we only saw brown barren mountains all around us. The deep sea cargo port is mainly made up of two long piers leading north to South in the direction of the prevailing winds. Not very exciting but very functional. To the South West is the old port but with depths of only 5 meters it is too shallow for us and basically only used by fishermen and pleasure boats. The cruise ships are all directed to the deep sea cargo port and dock at the inside of the Eastern sea wall. That is a pier of 834 meters long, so multiple ships can visit at the same day. With cruising being so popular it meant that we were not alone. The Corinthian II popped up again and following us from Santa Cruz was the MSC Fantasia. The harbour master had found a creative solution this time for the docking, with the Corinthian in the forward corner, followed by the Prinsendam, followed by the MSC Fantasia. Thus: small, bigger, BIG.  We docked first and were happily alongside by 07.30 followed by the other two. So by 08.30 nearly the whole pier was occupied. Later on the Island Escape arrived as well but she docked at the container terminal. Continue reading

This was our 2^nd day in this beautiful port, although today we had to share it with about 12,000 other cruise guests. The morning started with rain showers gathering at the horizon near sunrise and we were all fervently hoping that they would come over the ship. We have problems getting the salt and sand off the decks and a good downpour is much more effective than a sailor with a small garden hose. Plus rain water is free and our own water we have to pay for. Either by loading it from the shore side, or by making it ourselves. However our hopes were in vain, the clouds drifted away to the south, missing the island altogether. No wonder that the islands are so barren here.  For the guests it turned out to be another great day. Not too warm, due to the northerly breeze and that made it perfect sightseeing weather. Continue reading

It was still blowing 25 to 30 knots and I decided to take a tugboat as the weather information received from the shore side was: let’s say inconclusive.  Traffic Control advised that it was wind still in the port and port control talked that it blew “about 15 knots”. Thus we are better safe than sorry and a tugboat is cheap insurance against bumping into something when swinging around in the docking basin and going astern to the berth. To get to the port of Santa Cruz you approach via a Vessel Traffic Separation scheme.  That is a sort highway at sea that was implemented a number of years ago for very good reasons. The body of water, with the island of Tenerife to the West and the island of Lanzarote to the East, is used as a thoroughfare for ships that are on the North/South routes from Europe to Africa and vice versa. On top of that, Santa Cruz is a bunker port with many ships at anchor and thus there is a lot of traffic moving all over the place and not always in regular patterns. On top of that there is a lot of ferry traffic and thus enough reasons to implement these highways at sea to keep the opposing traffic flows apart from each other. So we were coming up, being Northbound, on the starboard side of this system and had to cross over to the West to get to the pilot station for a 06.00 pick-up. Continue reading

This was our second windy day at sea. Wind caused by this high pressure ridge near the Azores and of course also by the ships speed going against it. 30 knots of wind speed and another 15 of ships speed, gave a “stormy feeling” on the outside deck of 45 knots. Thus we had the signs up not to go on the outside decks as the combined wind force would blow you straight over. However that was the whole extent of what the elements were doing to us. The sun shone all day and the ship rode the waves nicely so for everybody it was a nice day at sea. We were sailing about 90 miles from shore and most of the day we were busy with over taking two ships that were going at almost the same speed. So it took a looooong time. On the port we had a fully laden tanker on the way to Rotterdam and on the starboard side a bulkcarrier heading for Tenerife, most likely for loading fuel. Each ship about a mile away from us; so we could safely sail in the middle. Continue reading

Thus after our experiences in Dakar we have two restful days at sea, time to plan for our next port of calls, Santa Cruz de Tenerife. Here we will stay two days and then we will visit Arrecife on Lanzarote.  As was forecast the wind did not diminish but grew even stronger during the day and by noon time we had a good force 7 to 8 blowing, right on the bow with combined swells and waves of 12 to 14 feet. However as we are doing this stretch of our cruise with a scheduled speed of about 16 knots, the ship did not have to plough into the waves to maintain it’s schedule. With the lower average speed needed we could ride the waves nicely and have a steady ship. Still with the current and the wind against us, I had to run an extra engine, which otherwise would not have been needed. That is not good for my average fuel consumption but there is not much that I can do about it. This is the one of the reasons why captains only like following winds and nothing else. Continue reading

Dakar is a major deep water port located on one of the most western points of Africa. It has always been an entry point for all sorts of commerce going to and coming from Africa and has about 30 docks available that can take most of the world size ships. It is fairly sheltered from the sea and as most winds are North East or South West the majority of the large docks are situated that way, so that it is easier for the ships to dock. As it had been windy in the past few days, with little sign of getting less, I had set my ETA for 06.45 with the eye of being docked by 07.15, so that when the wind increased after sunrise I would be happily tucked away in the port. And with that plan we approached the pilot station. We made our mandatory call to Port Control who confirmed our ETA and advised that the pilot would be boarding upon arrival. So the whole arrival machinery was put into action and everybody went to stations. All went according to plan, with one exception, no pilot. Not exactly a minor detail as Pilotage is compulsory in Dakar which means I am not allowed to go in without one. Continue reading

 As planned we arrived at the fairway buoy at 04.30 in the morning and slowed down to 10 knots. That brought our squat down to about a foot (At full sea speed it can be over 10 feet in the stern) and then we followed the buoys over the shallow estuary. It is 20 miles from the fairway buoy to the dock and thus it took us 2 hours to travel this distance. Contrary to previous information received (Br. Admiralty sailing directions), all buoys were in position and all but one was also lit. That made life a lot easier. So with taking frequent bearings off the land, we sailed over the bar while keeping a close eye on the depth. We had calculated that the minimum depth under the keel should not go below 1.5 meters and with a lowest observation of 1.6 meters (just over five feet) we were not that far off. The pilot station is about 3 miles north of the town but we quickly found out that he prefers to board just before docking. Although we were here in the dry season, there was still a strong current running and together with an even stronger wind it was quite a challenge to bring the ship to the dock. However the compulsory tugboat helped out and by 07.30 we were happily docked. Continue reading