And thus we are back on board again and shortly back at sea again. This morning I boarded the ms Eurodam for a 3 week visit. I never know what sort of cabin I will get as it depends on how full the ship is. Holland America is doing very well with its cruises at the moment and the Eurodam is full to capacity. As a result I was assigned to the pilot cabin which is located right behind the bridge. The typical thing about pilot cabins is, that most of them are inside cabins. In general this has the full agreement of the pilots fraternity as pilots look enough out of the window while being on the bridge so their interest in having a window or porthole in the cabin is of very low priority. What a pilot wants is a quiet cabin, quiet 24 hours a day so he/ she can sleep when needed and an inside cabin will also ensure that it is dark 24 hours a day to obtain a good sleep. For the same reasons I am always quite content to stay in a pilot cabin but will opt for a guest cabin if there are extra navigators on board. It is more important for them to be close to their work than for me.
MS Eurodam as seen departing from New York earlier in her career. (Photo courtesy Holland America Line)
The ms Eurodam is a sister ship of the ms Nieuw Amsterdam and together they form the Signature Class of the company. These ships are an evolution of the Vista Class and in the same way as the Koningsdam, being the first of the three Pinnacle Class ships has a lot of features which have proven successful on the Signature class. It also goes backwards as the music concept developed for the Pinnacle Class has also been introduced on the Eurodam. Thus the ship has the Lincoln Centre for classical music and the Billboard on board for the duelling piano’s. Also the Northern lights disco has been removed and the Gallery Bar put in its place.
Our schedule for this cruise.
The Eurodam makes a variation of East and West 7 day Caribbean cruises and today the ship will sail with a full house toward Grand Turk Island, San Juan, St Thomas and then on the way back call at our private island Half Moon Cay. Then the next cruise is a West Caribbean cruise. The good ship is under the command of Captain Werner Timmers, who I have known since 1984 as he joined the company three years after me. He will have to wriggle the ship out of Fort Lauderdale today and I use the word wriggle as the port is filled to capacity with cruise ships. When I arrived with the taxi this morning, it was an advanced form of controlled mayhem in the port with a rush hour flow of traffic to get all the guests, crew and supporting people in and out, not to count the provisions, supplies and recyclables.
Because we are actually not in Fort Lauderdale but in Port Everglades, this whole headache inducing organization is being controlled and streamlined by the Sheriff of Broward County. I assume they now have a sort of dedicated and very large Cruise department in their organization as there are always a very large number of patrol cars, motor cycles and even one or two patrol boats out from the early morning to late evening.
In port today in the cruise ship line up is : Eurodam, Carnival Conquest, Freedom of the Seas, Harmony of the Seas, Celebrity Summit, Island Princess, Royal Princess and then last but not least the local cruise ferry the Bahama Express. If all ships would be full then a rough count would indicate that there would be some 24000 guests coming and going today in the port. I wonder how the airport is coping as Ft. Lauderdale airport is a very nice one but the check in area’s are a bit tight for such an influx of guests.
But as usual the port will work its wonders and all the ships will sail today as per schedule. I will spend the rest of my day talking to captain, staff captain and training officer to get my own show on the road and to see where my activities will assist the ship in the best way possible. The weather looks good and we should have a nice start of the cruise.
