When you come to this area of Costa Rica, Puerto Caldera is the main cargo port here. A long time ago, in the late 1980’s Holland America started to call at Caldera and docked at a new cargo pier which was nicely protected by a breakwater meant to keep the sometimes very unpleasant swell out. Then cruise ship tourism expanded greatly and it caused in spring and autumn such a congestion with cruise ships that there was hardly any chance for a cargo ship to dock; as every day there was a cruise ship coming in. So the local authorities decided to build a cruise terminal, a pier which runs straight into the main street of Punta Arenas. Puerto Caldera is just a cargo port and there is not much of anything else there. Now the guests could walk straight into the local town.

This was a great idea but they forgot or ignored the concerns of the professionals at sea and did not built a breakwater to protect this dock from the swell that comes in at times. and took for granted the current which comes in at an angle of 90o onto the pier and can run up to four knots. Thus the ships now have to arrive near slack tide when the current drops under two knots otherwise the ship either gets slammed against the dock or cannot get alongside. All depending whether it is flooding or ebbing and at which side of the pier you are at.  Then they made the pier so small that there is hardly any room for the buses to come in and go out. They have to back in or back out of over distance of half a mile and when loading needs to take place, it is getting very cluttered. As the dock is located at the end of the Golfo di Nacoya, it forms an estuary tidal situation where the sea water is pushed up to considerable height and that means that there are long gangways/ramps and platforms and all sorts of other clutter on the dock.

An un ending stream of “invaders” marching into Punta Arenas.

So it is always with a certain trepidation that a cruise ship captain calls here. Yes we want to go as the guests really like the tours but operationally it gives quite a headache. Today was no different. The tide today was slightly different than the predictions and we had to postpone docking by half an hour and when we finally could it took all the ships power and the aid of a tugboat to dock against the still remaining current. We were joined by the Norwegian Pearl which was docking after us and also struggling with the remainder of the current, and she had to put all the brakes on to make a soft landing against the dock. By the time both ships where safely docked and the gangways were out and platforms in place, we were an hour late and nothing we could do about it. Thus from both ships all the tours left an hour late, making the tour dispatch a bit challenging as well. 10 am. means that all guests had had their breakfast and now wanted to go ashore all at the same time. So for about an hour 2000 people streamed from each ship and thus a total of 4000+ guests marched into town or invaded the country side by tour bus.

On the bridge they had their own challenges, as the swell was running in which caused the ship to slowly move up and down and with the waves once in a while creating a shudder in the ship when one slammed under the stern. When a ship is moving along the dock a little bit it means that the deck department has to continuously adjust the mooring ropes so that all 12 of them take the same tension when the ship moves. For us, when it was ebbing it was easy, yes the ship moved but the ebb pushed the ship back against the dock. When the flood came through, it started to push the ship away from the dock so the captain put on the thrusters and the Azipods and kept the ship alongside that way. A very safe operation but it meant the bridge was on battle stations all day.

As the dock is very tidal, the port provides long ramps and platforms. Ramps ensure that rollators, scooters and those who have difficulty going up and downs steps can still get ashore. To the right the Norwegian Pearl who docked the other way around.

Ashore they had their own fun and games with the return of the tours. Unbeknown to all involved there had been mudslides on the new highway to San Jose, the capital of Costa Rica way up in the mountains. Thus all traffic had been diverted back to the old road and things were slowed down to single lane traffic. Then there was a fatal accident somewhere down that road and as a result all traffic came to a grinding halt. As a result the last tour group stepped back on board by 10 pm. As ships crew you feel really helpless then, as against nature there is nothing you can do while you still feel responsible as it is your company’s tour.

We had one final piece of luck, because it was 10 pm. we just fitted in the tidal window of being able to sail and were not more delayed because of the tide being too strong. We have some leeway in the schedule so by going up to wrap speed we can still make the Panama Canal pilot station by 05.00 hrs. the day after tomorrow. But now we have of course a very unhappy chief engineer as his fuel budget is going to take a hit. Tonight we are going an hour forward to get in sync with Panama time and tomorrow we should have an overcast day with some rain clouds. For the guests there should be things to see, as wildlife will now be playing around the ship.

But we are ending the day with a smile………………. from the kitchen department.

Our guests have been indicating that they enjoy Corinto and thus Holland America is now having more ships calling here during Trans Canal cruises and re positioning cruises to and from Alaska. My first time here was in 1979 when I was cadet on a container ship just after the revolution and things where rather hairy. I was there with a container ship which sailed for a company that was once the cargo part of Holland America until it was split off on 1 January 1973. The management of the remaining passenger ship part of Holland America wanted to concentrate on cruising. These were most interesting calls as the ship was very advanced for that time and the local longshoremen could not handle the equipment (Or those who could had run away during the political changer over, I never found that out) and thus it fell upon us, cadets, to run either the ships cranes or the large shore crane which had been installed a few years before.

The Dock at Corinto. This is an air photo of the port from 2 years ago and also then the crane was already out of order. Currently they are tearing down the two sheds on the dock.

Routine was then that the Engineers would check over all the shore equipment including the large fork lifts before the deck officers would and could get the show on the road. And so there was little me, sitting there in the crane, with a sleeping longshoreman beside me who was supposed to do the job but could not, and at times a gun toting Sandinista behind me, ensuring that the whole unloading procedure was carried out in a sufficiently revolutionary way. The crane is still there, albeit a long time out of order; but every time I see it I have to remember my activities as a budding crane driver. During subsequent calls we used our ships cranes as that worked a bit faster as long there were sufficient trucks to drive the goods away.

Sailing into Corinto can be unpleasant due to the swell running across the entrance channel and yes we rolled a bit but it was not too bad. I was having breakfast in the Lido and being incognito it is fun to listen to all the experts around me, explaining and complaining about why we were “tipping sideways”. As usual very few people had listened to the Captains announcement about this, so the most wonderful theories and nautical expressions (mostly out of context) were bandied around. Now I have learned that when a ship goes into port, it does not roll; it can only list because the stabilizers are not out; moreover it can list to both sides at the same time. Who says that breakfast in the Lido cannot be educational?

This is the forward tricing pendant from a tender on the Koningsdam with a rigger in action. It holds the lifeboat to the ship to make embarkation possible and then it has to be disconnected before the lifeboat can be lowered.

While on education, I promised yesterday to explain about Closed Loop Communication. I have a whole series of training going on at the moment, to educate the lifeboat crews in using this technique as it reduces misunderstandings. We have it in use on the bridge for a few years now and it works very well as soon as you start using it routinely. Closed Loop Communication is simply a repeat and confirm exchange which eliminates assumptions and half understood orders or announcements. It is great for situations where the sender and receiver are a certain distance away from each other, or cannot see each other. Even more so, when they belong to different nationalities and they have to work together for safety routines. Such as in a lifeboat where the crew member in the bow and in the stern is completely hidden from the view of the commander if there are 150 people sitting in the boat.

It goes like this:

Commander: Release tricing pendant forward (that is a line that keeps the lifeboat bow to the ship)

Boat rigger forward: Releasing tricing pendant?

Commander: Yes

The commander now knows that the boat rigger has understood the message and is ready. The boat rigger (the person in the bow or stern of the lifeboat) knows the commander has understood he/she is ready as the repeat of the command is acknowledged.

Tricing pendant is released. (Something the commander cannot see)

Boat rigger: tricing pendant released

Boat commander: tricing pendant released?

Boat rigger: Yes.

It is very simple and it reduces mistakes. It can and should sometimes be used in civilian life as well. How many people forget to put the trash can out at night and the other half, most of the time the better half, just assumes it has been done………….. because it always gets done. That is an assumption and a form of complacency and a little closed loop would sort that one out.

Tomorrow we are in Punta Arenas Costa Rica. We are there with two NCL ships so it will be busy and it will be as warm and as sunny as it was today.

Puerto Quetzal is only 200 miles south of Puerto Chiapas and has the same weather and sea conditions. That means we can also suffer there from a swell running into the port. For this purpose the port has constructed the entrance to the harbor with a 90 degree turn in it and that prevents the swell from reaching the docks. Still while going in you might get it until you are inside the protection of these breakwaters. Puerto Quetzal is a very busy cargo port with always a lot of ships at anchor, waiting to load or discharge. When you approach you can see if the swell is there as those ships are then rolling on that swell. It cannot be fun for the crew on board those ships to be sitting there at the anchorage for a number of days and just have to cope with the constant rolling of the ship. It must be even less fun to see one of those “fur coat boats” taking preference over them and going in without waiting.

The new cruise terminal dock when built. The middle is a pontoon that goes up and down with the tide, so the gangway is always under the same angle.

Today we did not have any swell to be concerned about but we did upset a few cargo ships I think as we pinched their berths. Normally we go to the cruise terminal but two days ago the dock or the dolphins (we do not know exactly) was damaged by a departing cargo ship. This had been docked further in and when departing had clipped the edge of the pontoon or the dolphins. The authorities wanted to investigate first to see if there was a structural damage or just dents and scrapes. Until a diver had been down nobody was certain about what the damage might be or not might be. Until the full assessment has been made the cruise terminal is not available.  And thus two cargo ships were bumped to the anchorage so we could get in. And that we did; and by 07.30 hrs. we were happily docked at the Commercial Berth no 1.

That terminal was opened a number of years ago by Captain Werner Timmers when the Zaandam was the first ship docking there.

Not that we like it, the pier is too high during low water to have our gangway in place in the best way possible and the guests have to be bused first with shuttle buses to the Cruise Terminal if they are not on tour. Walking on the pier is not allowed, which makes sense as it is a cargo terminal and traffic acts accordingly. (And our guests do not act in general in a way that makes a cargo pier supervisor very happy) On top of that it was a very warm day. The sun was happily shining and the gentle breeze that was blowing was not bringing refreshing sea air but warm air from the interior.

But there is nothing we could have done about it; we could not even decide to run a tender service as this port is absolutely not feasible for such an operation. Too long a distance, too much swell, no proper landing dock and too much traffic going in and out. So the Commercial pier it was and we made the best of it.  The port authorities made 2 buses available for the shuttle service to the cruise terminal and Holland America added a few more to ensure that we provided a good service all the time.  The cruise terminal is similar as the one in Puerto Chiapas, the main building is a sort of square beehive and around it is a small flea market with trinket shops and beverage stands.

The extra shuttle trip our guests had to take, just because a cargo ship drifted over a bit too far. All photos courtesy of the Puerto Quetzal Port Authorities.

Most of the crew wisely decided to stay on board as the shuttle service would have taken quite a bit out of their leave time and no doubt they will all be back again sometime in the future. I kept a number of that crew from getting bored with training in proper communication. We have learned through the years that most mistakes from humans, who worked in groups under stressful circumstances, happened because they did not communicate properly. Either they assumed that somebody would do something, or thought they heard somebody saying something and acted upon that without verifying it, also because somebody did something (most likely something good) but never gave it a thought that somebody else needed to know what he or she had done. And the result of that action would have an impact on the next step that somebody else was going to take. It is called Closed Loop Communication and as I cannot remember that I have ever blogged about that, I will explain how it works tomorrow.

We sailed from Puerto Quetzal, slightly late as we had to wait for a tour bus. I have never been inland here but it seems that they have one of those roads near the port which everybody likes to use when our buses are on it, as the tours are seldom back on time. Not that it matters very much this time as we have some leeway in the schedule to make Corinto tomorrow on time.

Weather for tomorrow: even warmer that today 89oC / 32oF partly cloudy with a 90% chance of rain around noon time. Maybe not so nice for the guests, but it will cool down the ship quiet nicely.

Our aim for Chiapas is always to arrive at sun rise at the pilot station. Then you can see the way the swell runs into the port and if it is not too high for safe entering. It is more or less standard that the swell increases later during the day when the wind offshore has been blowing for a while. Thus the earlier you are, the better it is, as long as you can see the breakers on the break water.

The entrance breakwaters which is  the most critical point of sailing into port.

Because of yesterday, Captain Van Donselaar could not be that early but luck was on his side, the swell was under a good angle and did not even run into the port. So we had nothing to worry about when we sailed in accordingly. We have a pilot in Puerto Chiapas and his main function is to advise the captain where the shallow patches are in the entrance to the port as the breakwaters are just an extension of the mouth of a river. This river carries a lot of silt to open sea and once it has passed the end of the breakwaters, it loses its momentum as the sea defuses the flow. When the flow stops, the silt settles on the bottom and a bank starts to form. To keep that bank under control, there is a permanent dredger at work. But it cannot dredge everywhere at the same time. So the pilot is letting us know where the best depth is, always in the leading lights but one day at little bit to the port and another day it is a little bit to the starboard.

The electronic chart on the radar and our red dotted route going into port. The light color is shallow water and the silt disperses around the entrance. A dredger is doing its best all the time to keep the water deep on the approach route.

There is always a minimum of 2 meters under the keel, otherwise we will not go in if there is a swell running but every inch helps to make more space under the keel for more water flow and the more water that flows under the ship, the easier it is to sail into the port. And for the rest it is a question of bringing the ship to a standstill on time in the turning basin.

We either have to turn on arrival or on departure as this is not a port where you can back out off by going astern. We did so in Puerta Vallarta but that is a straight fairway and there is no swell that can make your life difficult. In the morning there is always less (or mostly no wind) so the Nieuw Amsterdam swung on arrival and then docked at the cruise terminal. We were the only cruise ship in port and thus the 2^nd berth behind us was taken up by a cargo ship which was very busy with loading Bananas. The ship had the most appropriate name of Chiquita Venture. Puerto Chiapas is, apart from being a cruise port, also an export port for tropical fruit and apart from Bananas I have also seen a lot of mango’s in containers going out; mainly for the North American market. Our pilot is a mango farmer and much to the delight of our quartermasters he always brings a few on board when the harvest is in progress.

How about this for service !! Coming back hot and bothered and there is a crew member with a nice cold towel to refresh yourself, even before you come close to the gangway.

The local Bureau of Tourism is working very hard and as a result Chiapas is one of the places where you can get in touch with local culture very easily. Our main shore excursions are inland to Maya Ruins and to the nearest city but in the terminal there are local shows and all day long they have one or more Marimba Orchestra’s playing. (Not at the same time….. they alternate) When I grew up, I saw it sometimes on television and that was always Marimba’s by themselves and sometimes with a guitar. Here they combine it with saxophones, clarinets, drums and once I even saw an Accordion. Today they played a sort of Jazz and Dixieland style, which sounded amazingly good. Louis Armstrong and Dizzy Gillespie missed a trick here.

I walked ashore briefly to have a look in the terminal as I am hunting Fridge magnets for a good friend of mine but they were out of those which had the name of the place on it. So then I thought maybe they have something exciting inside the fridge but no craft beer, only Corona. Which is not a bad beer for a warm day but I just happen to prefer Ale which has a bit more taste to it.

Tonight we will cross the border to Guatemala to call at Puerto Quetzal. for some reason, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Nicaragua are on a different time zone than Mexico, although the are further east and thus we are going back an hour tonight only to hop forward twice when we are in the Caribbean.

Weather for Puerto Quetzal: no rain, no wind, hardly any clouds and thus the temperatures are going up to 87oF or 31o Celsius. So I am going to keep my bald head indoors.

It is not often that I miss a day with my blog but for the 10^th. of October 2017, it has now happened as it was a very busy day. Thus I am now catching up 24 hrs. later.  We arrived in the beautiful port of Huatalco for what was to be an uneventful day in a very nice resort. And so it remained until just around 11.30 hrs. Then out of nothing a rain squall descended on the ship, literally out of nowhere.  There was wind in the squall, better said a storm and that wind went suddenly from 0 knots to over 70 miles per hour. The same sort of idea you get when being inside the house and then open the door to the garden and get the full blow of an autumn storm in the face. That sort of change in situation

It caught the ship full on the portside and as were docked portside alongside it started to push the ship away from the dock, very fast. There was no way the mooring lines could hold against this impact wind and the bowlines broke free. And thus the bow drifted over to the shallow side of the basin and for a short time touched the seabed. All emergency crews, including yours truly, went to battle stations to contain the situation which was done very well. Kudo’s to all involved. Once the wind and the rain had passed and the tide came back in we moved the ship back to the dock.

While this was going on, we lowered a tender and sent the Hotel Director with a meet and great team to the shore to support the guests who were slowly coming back to the ship after their morning ashore. Those who had ventured into the town behind the resort where absolutely drenched by the sudden deluge. Then we used the tenders to start ferrying back the guests and when the ship returned alongside the rest that followed could just walk back on board. Because we have such elaborate safety and emergency protocols with Holland America, there were no injuries and there was no known damage to the ships bottom. Something our safety inspection afterwards confirmed.

The safety inspection delayed our departure somewhat but as you can see in the next blog the captain managed to dock only 30 minutes later than scheduled. These are the sort of things you hope that will never happen as in a port you are quite defenseless against unpredictable and unexpected weather happenings. I was just glad that all the training that we put our crew through did work; the un-expected happened and the whole ship response worked like clockwork.

A view most people do not see. The dock is nice and sheltered between the mountain ranges but as a result you can also not see anything approaching from the land side. If the two docks are full, then there is an anchorage but it is a bit of a tender ride to get into the resort behind the Dock.

Once we were back to the dock again, we had indeed the most wonderful day in port, with a gentle breeze blowing, sort of overcast skies which kept the outside temperatures under control and a lot of guests who decided to go for an afternoon ashore again, after they had dried themselves out.

I have blogged before about horizontal rain in Ketchikan and that is where you expect it but this was the first time in Mexico that I saw the same phenomenon and that is where you do not expect it. The fact that it was warm rain did not do anything to make it feel any nicer.

Tomorrow we will be in Puerto Chiapas and the weather is again very Mexican. Warm, sunny with very little wind and no rain predicted. I would not be amazed if the temperature would go up to the mid to high 80’s.

Today the ship had to generate its own wind as the Pacific Ocean was really pacific, really peaceful. There was not even a gentle breeze blowing during the day; flat calm as we call it and only the long and low rolling swell prevented the sea from being as a mirror. This swell came from two directions, from the North West indicating past mayhem close to the Gulf of Alaska and from the South West, indicating a less peaceful area of the Pacific Ocean.  But here it was quiet, very quiet. The only thing which brings a little thought of concern is this SW swell that is running, if it runs just under the wrong angle it might enter the port/bay of Huatalco. Not that it will prevent the ship from going there but it might mean that the Nieuw Amsterdam will ride along the pier and that will result in a moving gangway. And moving gangways makes the security officer very unhappy as it increases the chance of accidents.

This part of the coastal sail-a-long is not that exciting. Yes the weather is nice, we can see the shore line, but there is not much activity. For wildlife we have to wait until we are past Puerto Chiapas. Then we will get the starlings and the brown boobies circling around the ship and we most likely will see large numbers of turtles in the water or tortoises (I never know which is what). Turtles swim on the surface and they do not go very fast, not on land and not at sea. They are not a danger to us and we are not a danger to them as they bob up and down like a cork in the ships bow wave and are just pushed aside by it.  I once sailed through a raft (?) of turtles and had about 50 on either side and it was just amusing to see a hundred brown/black corks bobbing on the sides of the ship and never coming close to danger. Their biggest danger is garbage, either in the form of small plastic pieces which they eat or large plastic pieces and nets in which they get entangled.  I am very happy that Holland America already has a zero overboard policy for a long long time, which prohibits anything from going overboard.

My company was the first cruise company who really made this a point of policy. Under Marpol law there were already grave restrictions of what you could dump overboard but it was never a 0% rule. So HAL did that it’self and went very strict, so strict that it even included cigarette buds. We even had crew members fired over this, as they were slow on the uptake of understanding the fact that it also applied to them personally. Now we are 25 years down the road and we recycle about 90% of what comes on board and the rest is processed shore side. The only thing we still do is feed the fishes on occasion. If we cannot burn, dry or compact food we still provide a feast for those living under water and thus they get a bit of an exotic boost to their regular diet.

We do the same with water; by the time it goes back it is as clean as when it came on board. It are just the health rules that prevent us from recycling the water for our own use, in the same was as they do on board a space craft. The technique used there is not much different than what we have on board, it is just smaller. So galley water, shower and sink water and toilet water all gets processed before the filtered water is returned to where it came from. Although we load water in most ports; once at sea we mainly use seawater which we convert into fresh water by means of evaporators which work on the excess heat produced by the main engines.

A diagram indicating how our exhaust gas cleaning system works. The final left over ends up in a sludge tank. Some ships dry the sludge and compact it into bricks before giving it ashore for further processing or it is pumped ashore directly, which is something we do.

The latest technology we now have available are scrubbers; which are a sort of washing machines which filtes out all the soot from the exhaust gases. This is a fairly new technology for the shipping industry and we are at the fore front of having it.  It is one of the reasons that you see less and less colored smoke coming from our ships funnels.  The old days when ships were bellowing smoke while sailing down the river are completely gone. But then in those days everything smoked. From the oven in the kitchen to the steam train at the station. Not to mention that nearly the whole male population also sent smoke plumes in the air on a continuous basis. Holland America also has a Quit Smoke program for its crew but that is a different story.

Tomorrow we are in a resort port which listens to the wonderful name of Huatalco de Santa Cruz and is set in a natural bay in the coast line. It is supposed to be a wind still day, with a chance of showers and temperatures around 77oF or 25oC. There being no wind might make it feel a lot warmer between the mountain ranges so a bit of shade might be a appreciated bonus.

Housekeeping notes:

Some readers have advised that they do not get the automatic notification anymore. The computer experts are looking into it, some links have been replaced but the cause is still being investigated.

I have updated the captains sailing schedules on the blog, which is now up todate (Subject to extremely much change) until the end of 2018. The company has appointed two new captains and their bio’s should be on line in a few days.

Puerta Vallarta is located in a bay, far inland and not directly on the coast line of the Pacific Ocean. One of the pilots told me in the past that this was due to the river that flows through of what is now the town and resort. Or better said a city as PV has grown enormously since he 1950’s. Then it was a quiet laid back little town and was made famous by Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor with their movie the Night of the Iguana. If that resulted in this enormous boom which started in the late 80’s I do not know but it is now very big compared to what it was.

Tender service in 1984 with the ms Noordam (III). As you can see the tender even had it’s own local pilot. Note how empty the background is.

When I came here for the first time in 1984 we could only find the entrance to the port, which is indeed the end of a small river, by trying to see three small apartment buildings against the glare on the rising sun over the mountains. There was no way of recognizing anything that remotely looked like a port as it was all low land and a swampy area where now a large cruise port is located. With only one dock, we had to anchor most of the time as we always had the Star Dancer alongside as she made 7 days trips from Los Angeles and we made 14 day trips. (Same pecking order as I described yesterday at Cabo) That lasted until finally the pilot convinced the captain that we could dock inside with two anchors and ropes from the stern to the shore. Style Mediterranee we call this in nautical jargon as it used to be standard in all the Mediterranean ports and often still is.

The view of the port from the approach channel in 1984. Note the two poles striped red and white. They are the leading lights old version. This is the green channel buoy and the tender is not in the center of the channel as the leading light masts are not in line. The tender hugged the green side to keep the rest of the fairway clear for other boats.

Now there are three docks for cruise ships and quite often they are full, especially midweek when the 7 days ships are in. All three berths full, and sometimes even one more at the anchorage. We did not have any issue, as there were only two of us. They were repairing the cruise terminal, berth no. 1 and it look liked that they were adding more shopping capacity. So we were directed to berth 3 as berth nbr. 2 was occupied by “The World”.

The World. It is about the size of the Veendam or Maasdam but has only 220 apartments instead of 670 cabins which is more standard for this size.

This is a real floating apartment building and for some time now completely owned by the owners of the apartments on board and that qualifies it to be a sort of floating country club as there is no real nautical word for it. Ocean Club??? As far as I understand the process, all the members vote on a proposed itinerary about two years before and the captain takes into account all the highlights of the Jet-Set in the various places in the world. I have seen the ship at Cannes film week, at various Grand Prix and at other locations where anybody who is “somebody” or thinks he or she is somebody, needs to be.  As the ship cannot be everywhere at the same time, there is a sort of voting system. I do not know if there was something special going on in PV or that it was just a regular call on the sailing schedule.  The apartment owners fly in and out whenever they want and as a result the ship is sometimes nearly empty when the location and time does not fit in with the owner’s schedules. In most ports it stays for at least 48 hrs. so there is more leisurely time to explore, meet friends and go out for dinner.

A view of the port from the same location near the beginning of the approach channel, now higher up. Where once the swamps were is now a shopping mall. Note the red and white striped poles. Those are the new leading lights, much higher otherwise you can not see the lights against the background light of the shops. The two masts are exactly in line which means the photographer is in the middle of the channel (and the ship under him hopefully as well)

Because The World was in port, it made it a bit tight for swinging inside and thus the Nieuw Amsterdam went stern in, or backed up as the landlubber would say. To sail in stern first, the ship is swung around just outside the port boundary, lined up on the leading lights and then goes in with about 1.5 to 2 knots stern way and slowly the stern is then moved over until the whole ship is aligned with the dock. In the old days, the officer aft would call out if the ship was in, and stayed in the leading lights and thus in the middle of the fairway, nowadays we have a camera at the stern and we can just look at the screen on the bridge and the nautical chart with GPS position (exact to a foot) does the rest. The Sea Captains from the old days would have been very jealous if they would have known how it is done nowadays; or maybe they would not………… as there is now email………………… and lots of it. Most of the day we had overcast skies which in a way was a blessing as there was no wind and a bright sun would have made it very warm.

We stayed here to until 17.30 hrs. being the all on board time and left when the last crew had returned from their shopping missions at Walmart. Our next port of call is now Huatalco de Santa Cruz but we first will have a sea day as it is more than 600 miles of sailing along the Mexican coast.

The whole ship woke up to a sunny and sweltering Mexican day with not a cloud in the sky. We could thank our lucky stars that we were the only ship in port as that reduced the tender time considerably. A long and hot tender ride to start the port day is something nobody likes. As most ports do, Cabo also uses a pecking order to assign the anchorages. Contrary to Alaska where seniority rights are part of the equation, in Cabo it is all about size and frequency.  Ships that call every seven days get the best anchorage. If there is more than one ship that calls every seven day on the same day, then the biggest one will get anchorage number 1 as it has to transfer the most guests to and from the port.  The 2^nd ship or sometimes even a 3^rd ship is then going to anchorage 2 and 3.  Ships who call less often and ships like our Nieuw Amsterdam which is making a single call, will be given the anchorages not used, or have to stay on the engines.

Thus we were lucky today, as were all by ourselves, something to be expected as we came in on a Saturday. The seven day ships that sail from Los Angeles either leave on Saturday or on Sunday, and cannot make it down to Cabo until Monday or Tuesday. If they call on the way back then they will visit on Thursday or Friday. As a result the weekend is often the quietest for cruise ship calls. Except during the spring and autumn migration of the ships to and away from Alaska, then the pattern falls apart a little bit. So we could have had another “migrating bird” with us but luckily we were alone.

Thus the Captain dropped the hook at anchorage number one under the watchful eyes of the local pilot. There did not used to be a pilot here, it is not really necessary, but since one or two cruise ships did not adhere to the schedule given to them by the authorities …………. E.g. they pinched a better anchorage…… it has been decided to put a pilot on board. So while in most ports the pilot’s main job is to navigate the ship into port, here the pilot’s main job is to represent the government. Not a bad gig, Fresh coffee and fresh rolls every day for breakfast and getting paid for it as well.

A busy day with three anchorages full. Me with the ms Veendam some years ago drifting on the engines in the lee of the rocks.

Apart from the anchorages, there is also the option to stay on the engines. Something we do if the swell is from the wrong direction and we cannot make a good lee while being at anchor. I have done that quite a few times in the past, drifting just south of anchorage number one. Here you can take advantage of being in the lee of the Los Arcos rock formation and you reduce the tender distance to the absolute minimum. Guests on board do not always appreciate how special a treat this is, but I know that on other ships, those at the regular anchorages, the guests were not amused as they were facing a longer tender service and that blasted Holland America Line ship drifted there just outside the port entrance.

This is Cabo San Lucas Marina from above. We dock with our tenders at the big T pier in the middle. (Thank you Mr. Google)

Today the Nieuw Amsterdam did not need to do this as we had anchorage number one and with six of our own and 2 shore tenders running, a very efficient service was conducted. So efficient that the Cruise Director had to beg guests to go ashore as nobody was in a hurry and many guests did not even go. They had been there, had bought the T shirt (2 for 10.95 if white) and opted to stay in the cool air of the ships A.C.

Sailing into the Marina of Cabo San Lucas. The view of the tender driver.

I did the same as I am concentrating on refresher training at the moment for the crew. With the multiple teams we have on board, constant training is needed and I like to take over from the training officer so the crew involved gets a fresh face in front of them and a bit of a difference as I elaborate on the company’s standard curricula. I like to do role play as it hits home much harder than “death by power point” so to say. And it is quite hilarious and good fun for everybody when we act a scene where the Laundry guys have to try and get an angry guest back to the cabin. The Laundry crew is part of the deck clearing team; they remove deck chairs and everything else from the open deck so the guests can stand under their lifeboat stations. In an emergency there might still be guests there and they all have to move. Most will but there is always one……………….. so we train these guys who are seldom exposed to the guests during their regular work, in how to effectively get a non-cooperate guest to leave without resorting to turning the chair upside down.

Tomorrow we are in Puerto Vallarta where we are scheduled to arrive at 10.00 hrs. We will have another ship in port; the real “Apartment of the Seas”. The weather will be the same. Mid to high eighties and very little wind. But the forecasters have spotted a rain cloud so things might cool down a little bit.

It is only a quick hop from Avalon to San Diego. The main part of the operation is to sail safely by the approaches to Long Angeles and Long Beach and then go straight south until we can make the turn and line up for the entrance into San Diego Bay.  This is a very sheltered harbor hence the navy has established a major base here with enough space to get the big carriers in. While we were there, there was one at the dock on the opposite side, completely stripped of everything, so I assume it was going through one of these refurbishment programs for repair and updating with the newest gadgets.

The NOAA chart of the Bay of San Diego. as you can see it is quite a big one and goes on forever to the South East. We stopped right next to the airport, always handy.

We were in port together with the Disney Wonder which was docked to the north of us. With 700 guests leaving and coming it was a bit of a mixture day of regular port call and embarkation day.  That gave housekeeping a bit of a challenge as it uses the Guest lifts to transport the suitcases and with another 1300 guests having a regular day, you cannot simply block everything off.  But with a little bit of extra traffic control to keep the guests out of the blocked off lifts it all worked out just fine.

The day turned out to be warmer than expected and on the outside decks it was a nice and warm, not a hot day, but a nice and warm day. So I grabbed the chance to be outside. I have blogged about it in the past but also here on the Nieuw Amsterdam I am carrying out a structural inspection for the Captain of the ship. The ship is now 7 years old and our crew can sometimes be very creative in utilizing spaces everywhere and not always the space that they favor is the right space for what they favor it for. Plus the ship goes through storms and basically moves all the time and that takes a toll on ceilings and insulation as well. You can see it when there is an earthquake, how many houses develop cracks and have ceilings come down. A ship experiences an earthquake = storm about every two or three months. It is built for that but it does take its toll.

So I am doing a sweep of the whole ship. It being a big ship with many lockers and compartments, it will take me about 10 days to get everywhere while still doing my other work as well. Holland America instigated this program about two years ago and the great advantage is that you might come across something now that only needs a little bit looking after instead of having a real problem a few years down the road. A lot of walking is involved but on a nice sunny day it is not too bad to walk around a beautiful ship and to see that everything is in good order.

Overview of the USS Midway and the cruise terminal next to it. (Photo courtesy, US Navy)

With the Disney Wonder on our port side, we had the USS Midway on our starboard side. I always try to encourage the crew to go and have a look there as it is nowadays not easy to get on board the large Navy ships anymore. When I was a junior in the 80’s, it took no effort what so ever to get on board, as long as you were in uniform, (or the group had at least one uniformed person with them) and it was not during meal times. Most Navy people are very proud of their ship and try to show you all of it and with an air craft carrier that can take quite a while. Once I had it that a Provision Officer had been assigned as tour leader of my little group of Deck and Engine officers and a gaggle of Ladies from the Shops and Casino.  While we were going around it turned out that he was using us as an excuse to take us to areas which were normally off limits for him. Most of the crew that we passed found it very interesting to see girls in high heels and miniskirts stepping through watertight doors and poking their noses everywhere. So we had no shortage of experts willing to explain how everything worked.

But things are more complicated now and also more regulated and you have to wait for Navy Days or Fleet week to get somewhere. But the USS Midway is right on our door step and as crew you get a VERY GOOD discount.

For the coming two days we will sail along the coast of California first for a short time the USA part and then for two days the Mexican part until we arrive in Cabo San Lucas. Weather looks good, sunny and with following winds.

For a few years now the company has been calling at Catalina Island as a short stop while on a re-positioning cruise to and from Alaska. If there is no reason to call at Los Angeles, then this is a very nice call to make. The only concern here is the weather as the anchorage and the small ferry port is very exposed to swell and wind. But today we were lucky it was a bit wobbly during the tender ride but it was a pleasant day for all. From officially 14.00 hrs. in the afternoon to 23.00 hrs. in the evening. Of course the Captain tried to arrive earlier to give the guests as much time ashore as possible and thus we were able to get all the guests ashore with our tenders within 90 minutes time. Not bad when having 2000 guests on board and not all of them as agile as could be.

I had never been to this place so I hopped on the tender to have a quick look and to see at the same time how the tender drivers were performing. They did very well and that means I do not have to embark on a whole string of refresher courses. Avalon has a ferry connection with the main land and the tender dock is part of that ferry setup. As a result the guests have a very professional landing to use for arriving and leaving with the tender.

Avalon Marina as seen from the ferry terminal.

Because the place is somewhat off the beaten track, the ship is not being cleared locally but this is done in Los Angeles. The Port Paper Officer, the person who does all the paperwork to comply with port requirements, had to fly with a helicopter across to make sure she got the stamps and approval before the CBP office closed and then came back with the local ferry. Off the ship with the first tender and back again by 19.00 hrs.  to ensure that we could sail as well. The most important thing that she had to obtain was “The Clearance”. This is a sort of certificate (and in most countries it looks like it; not unlike a share certificate) with a stamp which has to be presented in the next port. So tomorrow in San Diego, the CBP will ask for The Clearance, to ensure that we sailed from the last port legally and did not conduct any naughty business. I experienced it a few times in my career that for reasons unclear this piece of paper was not delivered to the ship and then we had fun and games in the next port, relying on faxed copies and trying to placate upset Immigration Officers.

This is the sort of setup we like. Room for two tenders a wide platform and a long ramp. Not all ports can offer this, but today we were very happy.

The Vista Class and the next version of it the Signature Class to which the Nieuw Amsterdam belongs, have a very good tender system. There are lifts which come out level with the tender platform so also Guests with Special Needs can quite easily get on and off the ship. Today with a low swell running, the ship was at anchor but the Navigators used one Azipod to keep a good lee side against the westerly swell so there was hardly any movement when getting on and off. On the other side the tender dock was a floating pontoon and thus always on level with the tender opening. Then a long ramp to get to the road not a bad setup at all. The port of Avalon is located right under a large out cropping of a mountain range which dominates the island. So once you are off the tender things get a bit steep unless you stay on the road around the marina.

We have sailors on the platform and the dock to tie up the tenders and we have Bar Lounge and Deck staff to assist the guests where needed. Then we have security all over the place to ensure that only those who belong get back on board and to ensure that everything goes orderly.

The port is basically sheltered from all sides, except the north, and guess where wind and swell was coming from.

For the Captain and his officers it is not the greatest stop to make, mainly because of the short period between leaving Avalon and arriving in San Diego. It calls for a short night. Anchor up by 23.00 hrs., the Pilot again by 05.00 hrs. For San Diego we have to arrive early; to be on time to disembark about 700 guests who are only with us for the Coastal voyage. So we have luggage to deal with and to do the final storing for our Trans Canal voyage to Fort Lauderdale where we are scheduled to arrive on October 21^st. luckily the weather looks great, sunny and not too warm.