I left you in my last post as we headed for Saipan. I expressed my regret on not being able to go ashore owing to pressure of work. Well, we arrived off Saipan in the early morning of the 8th. We were pitching in a steep northerly swell and the wind was a-blowin’, around 30-35 mph. Hmnn, not ideal conditions for entering a port, up and then across a narrow channel, heck, we couldn’t even see the leading lights through the rain.
It’s at times such as these that my senses and experience come to the fore, weighing the pros and cons of attempting an arrival; width of channel, dangers, the swept path, (increase in beam while ‘crabbing’ sideways); stopping distances if I go in faster than we had planned, (decreasing the crabbing), is there another ‘abort’ point, (we always have a ‘commit’ point, where a decision has to be made if we are happy to proceed inward); numerous factors as you can judge. The pilot boat is standing off, I have told him not to close (to embark the pilot) until the parameters are discussed with the Bridge team. After years of taking such decisions, I am a good judge of character, I know how my team thinks and behaves without them even having to say anything; I could tell they had reservations even before I asked their opinion and we ran through the “what ifs”. Still slowly steaming, I called the Port Control and asked for weather conditions in the ‘harbour’, (there is little harbour, it is basically a berth open to the elements). The VHF radio crackles; wind is 25-30 knots and then, out of the blue, “and there is an 11-12 feet swell near the berth”, in other words, even if we had tried to go in, we wouldn’t be able to tie up, let alone stay on the berth. The decision is made for me and I reluctantly tell the port and guests that we are aborting our call and proceeding towards Osaka.
So, we find ourselves heading north-north-west in a long swell and overcast skies. We have a relative lull in the weather, however ahead of us, around 15-hours steaming, a storm is developing. There is no avoiding it, the conditions stretch across our track, all the way from the Chinese east coast to northern Japan, we are unable to deviate. I expect we will have around 30 hours of it, almost to our arrival in the Japanese Inland sea. Yesterday I considered, by way of recompense to guests, for missing Saipan, trying a scenic cruise of Iwo Jima, we pass about 70 miles to the west of it on our track. Unfortunately, the deviation is too far, time and fuel make it impossible.
O well, we have great ship for such conditions, a ‘fine’ bow, she cuts through swells beautifully and it’s not as if we haven’t done this before. They tell me that it was snowing in Osaka yesterday, it will be time to dig out the ‘winter woolies’ soon.
No photographs of Saipan, not that we could see it through the rain anyway, however here is an overview of Saipan chartlet, a time-lapse of arriving Guam and a brief (and not very professional) video outside Saipan, I’m sure you’ll get the gist of it though . 😯
Guam
Saipan.
Thanks for the great vision of your ship going through heavy seas. It looks like Amsterdam handles big seas very well. Sorry you are not coming to Sydney this year. Amsterdam always looks great in Sydney Harbour.
I must be missing something. A great circle website shows the distance from Saipan to the mouth of the strait outside Osaka Bay as 1427 miles. Sailing past Iwo Jima on the way makes the total distance just three miles more, 1,430 miles.
World War II buffs would have loved to have seen Mt. Suribachi, but odds are you would have passed Iwo Jima at night.
Thank you Eugen, we sailed a rhumb-line track, that is 1,281 miles are therefore shorter. I too would have loved to see it too, I am a WW2 buff and have visited most European WW1 and WW2 battle sites. Anyway, it was irrelevant, with the storm we went through, seeing anything was impossible
Good Call… Safety first…
Glad we will be on a southern itinerary for next year’s World Cruise
Hope you get a chance to enjoy Osaka, With some extra time and an overnight now?, it is worth the 45 min drive to Kyoto for the charm of its size and the gardens of the Imperial Palace. I spent 2 weeks there alone
I think you would get a kick out of the food emporium in the basement of the Osaka department stores,,,The Japanese take on Harrod’s—such freshness….
thinking of your effort on behalf of your crew and passengers…That’s why I will be returning next year under your safe passage again. Best regards
sorry that you had to skip a port, but then again you always make the correct decision. Hard to believe that you are headed to winter weather- what we loved about our world cruise with you and Karen was constant summer !!!!
Sitting in my den watching another blizzard drop between 10 to 14 inches of snow…….
regards from Susan.
Jeffrey
p.s. we are now the proud grandparents to Cara Lilly born one week ago
sorry that you had to skip a port, but then agani you always make the correct decision. Hard to believe that you are headed to winter weather- what we loved about our world cruise with you and Karen was constant summer !!!!
Sitting in my den watching another blizzard drop between 10 to 14 inches of snow…….
regards from Susan.
Jeffrey
p.s. we are now the proud grandparents to Cara Lilly born one week ago
Thanks for video of view of the sea and view in the bridge from Saipan. Besides the windshield blade, each window has a wire down to a central dot that we are wondering the function? Ice melting? Or?
Enjoyed seeing Amsterdam in San Diego! Glad the weather turned out so nice that day after our much needed morning rain!
Hello Richard, it’s the pesky sun-shade ring pull, damn difficult, they keep getting in the way ?
Captain Jonathan,
Thanks again for your post. I agree with Pat and Joe, above,
that we blog followers “feel we are traveling with you”.
Hope the weather conditions improve for you. You know I trust your judgement.
Regards and Cheers~
Wow! Too bad the weather didn’t cooperate. Looking forward to each of your posts. Thanks, we feel we are traveling with you. All is great in Florida!
I really like the videos. Thank you.