12 July 2010; Bordeaux, France.

With dark skies and intense lighting in the distance over the land we arrived at the pilot station. It has been very warm in the Bordeaux area in the last few days and now with the air cooling down we were entertained with extensive “light shows” somewhere inland. It lasted until day break and then it somehow suddenly stopped. With the pilot onboard we proceeded up the estuary of the La Garonne” and as the flood current was just starting to run, we made almost 20 knots with the engines on maneuvering and that meant close to 4 knots of current running with us. Once we were entering the river itself we had to slow down to avoid squat but still with 12 knots of engine speed, we made 15 knots over the ground. That really helps with the fuel consumption as the current basically provided the power of one engine free of charge. By sunrise we were a good 3rd distance up the river but for sightseeing it only gets interesting when you are about half way; when the river banks come closer.

A river barge carrying a full wing for an airbus 380. The letters on the ships hull read: AirBus onboard.

The Bordeaux region is of course famous for its wines and you can see many of the chateaus along the river banks. Mainly 18th and 19th century manors surrounded by undulating country side filled with rows and rows of vines. Under a dark sky it was this time not so exciting but the weather is supposed to improve while we are in Bordeaux itself and if so, then when sailing down river it should be very good as the sun will be behind us. About halfway up is the town of Pauillac, which is of course in the middle of wine country, but has for us sailors something else of interest. There is a little Ro-Ro dock that is being used to transfer air plane parts for the AirBus from a deep-sea vessel to a river barge for further transport. The parts for the planes are being made at various factories, not only in France and are then assembled at a factory somewhere up the La Garonne. We saw a wing being unloaded and later in the afternoon the barge came by the Prinsendam going up river, transporting the wing.

About 2/3 up the river, the Dordogne merges with the Garonne but this river is not really navigable; at least at low tide, unless you have very shallow drafted ships. At high tide things are possible but it has much less options than the Garonne. Where the two rivers merge, there is an island opposite, one long island which has for some reason three names. Ile de Verte, Ile du Nord and Ile Cazeau. Every time I pass by, I am amazed about that, as I thought that only we in Holland could come up with double names for the same thing. But the French do better, with 3 for 1. This is also the area of the great wine names, as Lafitte, Beychevelle, Rothschild etc etc. located just a little bit further inland.

We approached Bordeaux by 8 am. and I was greatly interested in the “new bridge under construction”. This was the reason we were docking an hour later than planned but the pilot was not able to exactly explain what the problem was.
Well Bordeaux is having traffic problems and all local traffic has to join the main road that connects France with Spain. Thus the bright idea was to have a ring road going around the city with its own bridge. The not so bright idea was, to project that bridge just past the bend of the river. That means that when you line up the bow, the stern is being set over by the current still running under another angle because of that bend. Understandably the pilot did not want to go through here with too much current as the whole width is only 80 meters. Hence aiming for this passage when there is less then 2 knots of current remaining. We floated nicely through and then started our swing about a mile below our docking location.

While you are swinging the remainder of the flood is pushing you up river and so you experience the peculiar sensation of seeing the city moving by in front of the bow, where normally you expect open water. Once at the dock, the river has less strength and that makes docking not so complicated. Our dock is about as far as a large ship can go, as a mile further up, there is a fixed old bridge, de Pont de Pierre and that only lets barge traffic through. Most of the city is on the left bank and hence we docked at the Quais de Rive Gauche. It remained dry all day and overcast, so not too warm and it made for a splendid day for sightseeing.

Update for docking location in Amsterdam 14 Aug. 2010.

My head office responded and a revised letter will be sent out to all travel agents who made bookings.

Quote:

This notification corrects a notice that was recently sent regarding the embarkation pier for the August 14, 2010 ms Prinsendam sailing. Please be advised the ms Prinsendam will be docked for embarkation at the Amsterdam Cruise Terminal (PTA) on August 14, 2010, as originally scheduled.

We sincerely regret any confusion that was caused by our previous notice regarding a pier change. If you have any questions, please contact us at 1-800-577-1728.

Unquote: