In beautiful sunshine and with a very gentle breeze blowing we arrived at the Thames Estuary Pilot station at 08.00 for our 4 hour journey up river. Tilbury is located about half the distance up the river of what it would take to get to Greenwich and thus we could arrive just after 12 pm, near the dock instead of 16.30 for Greenwich. As it was my intention to swing on arrival and dock nose out the expected gangway time out would be just before 1 pm. We were going to arrive with the flood tide and that meant that by the time we started our docking procedures at Tilbury I would have to contend with about 3 -4 knots of current in the river and about 2 knots when giving the ropes ashore. So I was planning to take it easy as I had not been to Tilbury since 1988. At that time I was 2nd officer standing aft and not really involved with the maneuver itself. When in unknown territory it is better to go slowly slowly until you understand exactly what the river is doing to your ship. The river does not have the same depth everywhere and as a result there are eddies and back currents that can push the ship all over the place if you are not careful. So I was going to take my time and had built this time into the schedule. Continue reading

The North Sea is one of the busiest shipping areas in the world. Dover Strait to the South, together with Malacca Strait near Singapore are two of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Bottle necks connecting major industrial area’s with the larger open oceans. To avoid collisions, near misses and or other havoc the North Sea has assigned shipping lanes for traffic to follow. A sort of highway on the open sea. These highways ensure that ships can follow the most economic and safe route and at the same time not stray into the areas with the oil platforms and the wind mill farms. The first oil platforms appeared in the North Sea in the 1960’s and the windmills are an increasing occurrence since the 1980’s. There are still several wind parks under construction at the moment and more are planned with the general reluctance of embracing nuclear energy both in the Netherlands and in Great Britain. Continue reading

The nice thing about Oslo is, that it is located all the way at the end of the Oslofjord and that means that while it can be very nasty weather in the Skagerak/North Sea, it is still very nice and wind free inside. That is what also the weather forecast given for today. Increasing inclement weather outside but nice and sunny in the port. To get the pilot onboard I had to bring the Prinsendam bodily onto the wind and waves and even then it was a wobbly affair for the pilot boat. However the pilot made it onboard safely and without getting wet. It turned out that it was the same pilot as during our previous visit. What was more special was that he had selected the Prinsendam for his final voyage before his retirement. There were two other cruise ships coming in and obviously those did not qualify as being “a nice ship”. His words, not mine. The Prinsendam IS a nice ship and I am glad we qualified also in his eyes. Continue reading

Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen pretty old girl of a town, as the song goes. And so it was. When we started to approach the city from the South around 5 am in the morning, the wind was gone and the sun was shining. This was going to be the best day of the cruise, since Warnemunde in the beginning. The bridge was full with happy faces when we sailed into Copenhagen and we saw the sun brightly shining over the city. Although the navigators are not as closely connected to delivering a good product to the guests as the Hotel department; none of them likes the idea that the guests will have a bad day ashore. Not today, it was great. On top of that we were the only cruise ship in the port and that gave me the whole length of the Lange Linje to park the Prinsendam. The Lange Linje is the pier that runs for nearly a mile along the edge of the down town area. It is about 5 to 10 minutes to walk to the Royal Palace, depending on how fast you walk. This used to be the main pier of the city in the old days. Now more docks and quays are located to the North, including two new passenger terminals for ships that have change over day in Copenhagen. But for regular calls the Lange Linje is still the best. Continue reading

The island of Gotland is not that far away from Stockholm so we could make the passage on slow speed. Staying in Stockholm longer because of that slow speed is not an option as the transit to open sea through the Archipelago has to be done during day light and that means you have to be out in open waters near sunset. So once we were outside we traveled at the sedate speed of 10 knots towards our destination Visby for a 0700 to 1400 call. We were allocated the anchorage just outside the breakwater. There is one dock inside where we could fit in, just, but that was given to the Silver Shadow. This ship had a shorter call staying only until noon time. With nice weather being at the anchorage is not much of a problem. The tender ride is not that long and the tender dock is directly opposite the charming down town centre of Visby. However the weather was not looking that good. Continue reading

The summer is coming to an end and this time we did not approach the pilot station in daylight, as was the case during last call. No it was still dark at 3 am. When I arrived on the bridge and twilight only came by the time we were well inside the Archipelago that protects Stockholm from the open sea. The darkness was lit up considerably through by several cruise ships all approaching the pilot station at the same time. Ahead of me were the Celebrity Solstice and the Rotterdam of our own company. Far to the south were several other cruise ships that had planned to use the south (Sandhamn) entrance but were diverted due to the wind as the entrance was closed by the port authorities and the Pilotage Association. Two pilot boats were on station to serve the incoming stream of cruise ships. The wind was still blowing strongly with about 30 knots from the West. The good news for that was that a westerly wind at sea, blows half the speed in the harbour where there is shelter from the city. Further on it was blowing in line with the dock, so I could keep the wind on the bow. Things were looking good. Continue reading

It was raining, blowing, drizzling etc, sometimes in separate occurrences, sometimes all at the same time when we arrived at the pilot station. The weather looked like late autumn not August mid summer. According to the pilot it was not so bad, and if you look at it in reference to mid winter circumstances or autumn gales, he was probably right. However it was only August and I was not happy at all. So I was fully prepared to swing the ship around and to go back to open sea if I did not like what the weather was like inside near the dock. However Vaasa is quite a bit inside, it takes 3 hours by ship, at 12 knots speed to get there and in the harbour is was fairly quiet with only 10 knots of wind. More was expected later in the day, but the wind direction would be all day long in line with the dock and that meant that I would also be able to leave later. The 3 hrs. sailing in meant that we had the pilot ordered for 04.00 in the morning. Continue reading

Although most people refer to the entire water surface around Finland as the Baltic, this is not really true. The Baltic or Baltic Sea has a North West arm that is called the Bothnic or the Bothnic Sea. With Sweden to the West and Finland to the East it goes as far up North to a place called Tornio where eventually Sweden and Finland meet. The Bothnic is separated from the Baltic by a small passage called Alands Hav, named after the largest island just to the right of it. Vaasa is located about half way up the Bothnic and just too far away from Helsinki, to sail the distance in one night. Thus we spent a day at sea going slow speed. Not that the guests minded this; after Warnemunde, Tallinn and two days St. Petersburg most of them were ready for a quiet day at sea. We had a nice and sunny day to support the relaxation as today we sailed between two frontal systems. Tomorrow it will be overcast and rainy again. Continue reading

We saw a full port in Tallinn, a full port in St. Petersburg and now the Helsinki berths were also all occupied. The harbour masters, keen on getting as many ships in as possible, try to park as much ship as they can get per length of quay as possible. Most of the time that means that for a smaller ship as the Prinsendam there is a little corner left in a nice spot in the downtown area. Unfortunately not this time. Therefore we ended up in the West harbour which is about 15 minutes by bus from downtown. For me it is easier to dock here than in down town; the approach is much easier and the docks are newer and better laid out. For the guest the downtown option is better as you can walk to town within 10 minutes. However the agent can only request the best berth. The port decides which customer gets what. Today we did not get the best place for a change. Continue reading

In Russia we bunker fuel because the prices are good and we can get the low sulpher version that we normally burn during these cruises. One of vague things in St. Petersburg is the organization of when the bunker barge will arrive. We always try to get the barge in the morning, when most of the guests are ashore as the barge tends to make quite a bit of noise. The pump room aboard the barge can be quite loud and during the night time it would disturb the guests whose cabins are on the sea side. However finding out and getting a schedule is nearly impossible. Thus the announced time of early (last) evening did not materialize at all. By 11 pm. I decided to give the agent a call to find out what was going on. Due to the language barrier all communication has to go through the agency and they have a set up for this a 24 hrs. Dispatcher with his own VHF channel. It works extremely well. He made another call and suddenly the hours of waiting were reduced to 20 minutes. 20 Minutes Russian time has to be multiplied by 3 and indeed just before midnight the barge was alongside. Continue reading