Kite flying

Has anyone ever flown a kite from the ship's stern? I would love to be able to do this.

Gene in Birmingham

No can't say that I ever have, but I have had dreams of being able to fly. I do own a shark kite. When it's real windy it flys in circles before crashing to the ground. It would be cool to see it crash into the water instead!

Big Red Boat

Royal Majesty

Royal Majesty

Sensation

Sensation

Big Red Boat

Majesty

Ecstasy

Ecstasy

Century

Celebration

Horizon

Destiny

Mercury

Century

Voyager

Zenith

Mercury

Horizon

Galaxy

Summit

Horizon

Galaxy

Century

Mariner

I haven't, but somebody did on the Carnivale, way back in 86.

Galaxy 6/03, Carnival Pride 7/02, Voyager of the Seas 7/01, Grandeur of the Seas 07/00, Enchantment of the Seas 06/99, Carnival Destiny 7/98, Grandeur of the Seas 7/97, Sensation 6/96, Imagination 8/95, Carnivale 7/90, Festivale 7/89, Seaward (Norweigan Sea) 7/88, Carnivale 9/86

<MARQUEE>Next up, the Mariner 6/04<MARQUEE>

I would bet it's not allowed. Sure would be fun though. Why can't we shoot skeet anymore?

Navigator of the Seas- 12-13-2003 (7 days) Western

Ocean Princess - 02/2002 (10 days)Southern

Enchantment of the Seas - 02/1999 (7 days) Western

Thats an awesome idea!!!!!!! I have an aft cabin on AOS in august!!! Defenitely gonna try. What's the worse they can do....Cut it free? Awesome idea. Acttually I was gonna try to fish off the balcony in port but the fiance is trying to talk me out of it.

 Untill the honeymoon cruise!!!!

Celebrity Horizon 9/93

Grandeur Of the Seas 9/96

Soverign Of The Seas 10/00

Disney WOnder 9/01

Sensation 2/02

Carnival Legend 5/03

Serenade of the Seas 9/03

Adventure of the Seas 8/04

It has been mentioned on our Brilliance cruise. The point was brought up by an avaid diver what harm the string and plastic can do the creatures that live in the ocean. I must admit I has not thought about that until she mentioned some of the things she has seen happen.

Just somrthing to think about.

Sue in KC

Brilliance of the Seas

Jewell of the Seas

I think it would be too windy. My DH is a avid kite flyer and has a cook PlayHut kite, made of nylon and folds up quickly in to a carrying case. We've taken it with us before (to fly on beaches, not the ship). Last fall it was very windy in Cocoa Beach, too windy to even fly a kite. Open decks on ships often have even more wind so it might be difficult.

Mariner of the Seas

Never done it myself, but I did see someone flying one. This was post-911, either December 2002 or August 2003.

I didn't watch long enough to see if anyone told him to quit.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits" Mark Twain

"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's formal night attire, poolside attire, child rearing practices, walk-talkie usage, chair hogging, seat saving, line cutting ..." Mark_K

OMG cruzorbust...you've sailed many, many times...I'm jealous!!!

RCCL Majesty of the Seas - April 2004

Carnival Inspiration - June 2003

RCCL Monarch of the Seas - July 2002

On our last cruise our meet and mingle group, decided because of the input of a kite flying veteran that we would all bring and fly kites. So we all clandestinely met on the top deck at stern behind the miniature golf course on the legend as we were sailing eastward from New Zealand to Tahiti, and we tried to fly kites. My friend Shelby and I tried for several attempts on a couple of days, but the best we could accomplish was what I refer to as kite dragging. If we could get enough line out fast enough the kite could escape the air pressure coming over the top of the ship causing a downdraft at the back of the ship. Generally the downforce pushed the kite onto the ship or onto a lower aft cabin balcony. I was concerned by a kite with sticks that we could injure someone and I decided not to try my kite with a stick frame, but shelby's was stick less and was all nylon like a parachute. This is normally a great flyer that we fly in the summer from the deck of his boat at the lake. It was not a great flyer on the cruise ship. It would hang a 200' directly behind us and spin in circles, like a parachute on a drag racer. The guy who originally said he had done this many times in the past tried several times too with a wood framed kite (that made me nervous) and it would crash hard into the ship. One time for less time than the Wright brothers first flight he got it up higher than the deck we were on by a couple of decks of height, unfortunately it was brief and pretty soon he was kite dragging it a couple of hundred feet behind the ship. The danger of the kite crashing into the ocean is pretty impossible on these big ships because the ocean is generally at least 100 foot below and their is so much wind that the kite could not drop 100 feet unless you had about 1000' of string, oh OK maybe it could at over 500', but basically it just can't drop that far because there is not enough mass to overcome the wind to drop, pretty much the same as flying. The only way the kite could get to the ocean was if the string broke, so use strong cordage if you want to try. I believe if you were sailing at 10 knots and with a cross or following wind you could probably fly a kite successfully, but on a ship at sea doing 21 knots, not a chance, IMHO. On a side note I ordered my kite on the internet from a New Zealand kite shop and had them ship it to the hotel concierge who held it for my arrival. I can't imagine taking a nice kite on the plane with me. Although a few people flew from the US to Auckland with their kites.

jc

Legend of the Seas RCI 3/03 New Zealand, Tahiti, Hawaii, Adventure of the Seas RCI 2/02 Southern Caribbean, Radiance of the Seas RCI 10/01 Vancouver to Hawaii, Millennium Celebrity 10/00 Eastern Mediterranean, Galaxy Celebrity 12/99 Southern Caribbean, Sensation Carnival 4/98 Eastern Caribbean, Majesty of the Seas RCI 1/96 Western Caribbean

email me at xpcdoojk@yahoo.com

jc,

The person I saw doing it was on the side of the ship, not the aft, and there was a cross wind helping take the kite away from the ship.

We were going at normal cruising speed, but he wasn't really trying to fly it more than 100' out.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits" Mark Twain

"Nothing so needs reforming as other people's formal night attire, poolside attire, child rearing practices, walk-talkie usage, chair hogging, seat saving, line cutting ..." Mark_K

Mark the cross wind would definitely help, but if the ship is travelling at 20knots and the wind is blowing across at 10 knots the kite should fly at a 45 degree angle or so bringing it really close to the ship, plus from the side there is zero doubt the bridge can see you, and I am skeptical that the ships officers are going to condone the activity into todays litigous society, not to mention the environmentalists who don't want anything put into the precious ocean. Not saying it couldn't work, but I would not bother to try again from my experience. It would be neat though if you could do it successfully. Oh well, we had fun planning and executing our nefarious plan, even though the results were far from satisfactory.

jc

Well now I gotta try...let ya know in August what happened. I think I'm going to go with one of the cheap plastic kites. I've had succes flying them in the past!

 Untill the honeymoon cruise!!!!

Celebrity Horizon 9/93

Grandeur Of the Seas 9/96

Soverign Of The Seas 10/00

Disney WOnder 9/01

Sensation 2/02

Carnival Legend 5/03

Serenade of the Seas 9/03

Adventure of the Seas 8/04

You can only fly a kite if you pay the stringage fee.......

Donuts, is there anything they can't do....

Iv'e already included it in my final payment. $2.50 for the first 500' 5 cents a foot after.I was assured though that it was really good string and I wouldn't have to wait long to get it.

 Untill the honeymoon cruise!!!!

Celebrity Horizon 9/93

Grandeur Of the Seas 9/96

Soverign Of The Seas 10/00

Disney WOnder 9/01

Sensation 2/02

Carnival Legend 5/03

Serenade of the Seas 9/03

Adventure of the Seas 8/04

Our meet & mingle group on the 11/23 Radiance actually planned a mass kite flying event ahead of time. Called ourselves the "Kite Pirates". I scouted out a location when on the Serenade a couple of months earlier--starting at the shuffleboard courts to get the kites started, then moving back to the Aft. Well, big day came, and not much wind. Even though the ship was trucking at 20+ knots, we couldn't get the kites up out of the slipstream. We had several different kinds of kites, none worked. We never had a windy day, so we don't know whether that would have made a difference. BTW, we were quite open about the activity, but no one from the ship seemed to care. We consoled ourselves at our failure with a couple of buckets of Heineken.

Golden 11/01

Monarch 12/02

Fantasy 6/03

Serenade 9/03

Radiance 11/03

Mariner 6/04

Enchantment 9/04

Legend 3/05

I would hope it would not be allowed. A wooden stick on a kite flying down and hitting someone on a private balcony, or some where else on deck, could be very dangerous.

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Voyager of the Seas in August 2004

Diamond Princess in February 2005