Well, time to sit here at last.  Our day at sea between Manila and Hong Kong was, for me at least, full of various functions for our departing guests and then, an early night, for the approach to Hong Kong is an intensive one.  Not only do we have one of the busiest ports in the world, we also cross the north-east/south-west bound shipping lanes, with ships going to, or from, northern Chinese ports and the Singapore  Straits.  Thrown into the mix are hundreds, (literally) of fishing boats.

For this reason, I had allowed us time to navigate through this ‘mess’ and had made a faster speed in the open ocean from Manila and then, when within 50 miles of Hong Kong, we had the luxury of taking it slower.

I was pleased that we had done so, when I went to the Bridge in the (very) early morning, the horizon around us was a mass of lights, the radar screens looked as if they had a bad case of measles, spots everywhere and the radar ‘plots’ were coming thick and fast.  Of course, we had tracklines and courses which we intended to steer, however it was seldom that we did.  Increases and decreases of speed and alterations of course were frequent as we weaved our way through the South China Sea towards the eastern entrance off Hong Kong harbour.

Last year we were blessed with fine weather, however this year, the north-east monsoon season, brought us low cloud and drizzle, combined with a north-east wind of 25-30 knots.  We made for the pilot station in the Tathong Channel, off Lei Yue Mun at 6:30 a.m. and, despite all our weaving, made it 2 minutes late.  The pilot boarded, as did the Immigration officials, who were here to clear the ‘Amsterdam’ during our passage to the berth.  Pleasingly, the pilot gave us the choice of either he taking us in, or the Bridge team, there is no need to guess which I chose  😀 .

The channels into Hong Kong are forever busy, ships, boats, sampans, ferries; it is one long and continuous bustle and the morning was no exception.  We also had to deal with a tidal current that was running around 3 knots with us and that pesky wind, which showed no sign of abating even though we had Hong Kong Island on our port side and Kowloon,on the Chinese mainland, to starboard.  We pass the new Cruise terminal at Kai tak, where the airport used to be and where I have landed, the approach being so crazy that one would swear one could see the laundry washing lines on the wings as the pilot weaved between the surrounding skyscrapers…..

Then our berth, the Ocean Terminal came into view.  We were stemmed for the south side and consequently, with the wind still blowing and the tide still ripping, my approach was some what unorthodox.  Using the tide to assist, we looked as if, on the turn to starboard, that we would go in on the north side; however, as the tide pushed us down, as intended, I ended up with the bow tucked in on the south side, while the stern, still in the current, went barreling down at over 3 knots;  the result, using the azipods to brake the stern, was us parallel to the berth with the bow tucked inside the pier, it was just a matter of creeping in the last 200 metres.  I do so love ship handling challenges.

Once docked, we watched with professional interest as 2 other ships went into the north side berths; one used 2 tugs and was careering towards the dock at an alarming rate, fortunately catching and stopping it in time and the other, caught by the current, did the same.  She ended up on the dock, but not quite where she intended and had to nudge herself along until she got into position.

Our guests wasted no time in enjoying Hong Kong, despite the low cloud and chilly temperatures.  I waited for Karen, her flight was expected to arrive at 6 a.m., however I found out that it was 4 hours late.  To cut a long story short, she flew from LA, however the crew were ‘out of hours’ and instead she ended up in Korea, Seoul to be precise, where the crew changed, (after 3 hours) and she proceeded to HK.  O well……….

An evening ashore, wandering the streets of Honk Kong and in particular, we made for Temple Street market, better known as the ‘Night Market’, full of bright lights, stalls and restaurants, (well, stalls with eating facilities would be a more apt term).

I will leave you with the photos and will be doing another short, ‘family’ post as I received 2 new photos from Samantha, (Sam) of the adorable Olly and Emily.