Upon arrival the whole port of kusidasi was confused. In one of my previous blogs I explained how well organized the port was, and they are. So everything is planned to go smoothly and then suddenly another cruise ship arrived that was not planned in the sequence arranged the day before. I do not know whether the cruise ship company forgot the book the arrival or something else happened but suddenly the Perla of Louis Cruise Lines showed up. For them it must have been a regular call as there were people with suitcases waiting on the dockside to board, but it was not known to the pilot and port control.

Thus my pilot time of 0600 had to be pushed back with 20 minutes, not a big deal for me, but it got the pilot in a real tizzy. On top of that the captain of the Perla decided to swing on arrival, docking with the stern in and that took another 10 minutes. In the mean time I was told to come closer and closer, and by the time the pilot was on the bridge, the Veendam was almost poking its nose between the piers. The pilot is not needed for the docking sequence but he is very handy to have on the bridge to talk to the locals on the dock side. My grasp of the Turkish language is limited to one word, namely Korfezi. That means Gulf in Turkish and I only know that one as it is printed in the chart when we approach. Kusidasi Korfezi, the Gulf of Kusidasi.

Today was a quiet day for the port, only four ships, the Sky Wonder, the Veendam, the Perla (in the morning) and the Ruby (in the afternoon). The last two are owned by Lois Cruise Lines of Cyprus. This company operates mainly older tonnage and names their cruiseships after precious stones. Thus there is the Emerald (1957 ex Santa Rosa), the Ruby (1974 ex Ocean Countess), the Perla (Southward 1971), the Sea Diamond (sunk), the Topaz (1960, ex Empress of Britain), the Sapphire (ex Italia 1967) and the Coral (ex Cunard Adventurer 1971). The latter is not exactly a precious stone, although black coral is extremely expensive as well. Apart from that they have other ships that are chartered out or they act as a manning agency for other companies.

Most of these ships are operating in the Mediteranean, except for the Topaz, who is currently sailing as the “Peace boat” in charter for a Japanese company and going around the world. As far as I understand the peace boat idea is that by going around the world, the company tries to improve worldwide relations. This by stimulating the interaction between the guests on board (mainly Japanese) and the local population in the various ports of call. This “peace boat company” does that every year and for the last few years they have used the old Topaz for this purpose. The topaz was originally built as an North Atlantic Liner for Canadian Pacific and sailed between England and Eastern Canada. It is one of the few steamships left in the cruising trade. (The Emerald is another one)

For a ship lover as me, the ports in the Med are great as there is a continious coming and going of ships. Also most of the docks are lined up in such a way that the ships are docked with at least one side of the ship exposed to the sun, so that you can take a photo from another dock opposite.