Windsurfboy

I understand we will miss ports in bad weather at this time of year. However what I'm trying to get my mind around is reason for SoD deciding it's OK to sail though a gale yesterday, but not OK a week before. What has changed, what has made ship more robust and perhaps more comfortable in bad weather. This is all in context of 3 days in port in Lisbon whilst engineers were fixing and recertification of system. Was more work done in Portsmouth.

I completely agree with you, and so did many others. Hopefully everyone is letting Nigel Blanks and Saga know how they feel

The current bad weather in mid Atlantic is not relevant On the last cruise the route from Maderia to UK route didn't take us to mid Atlantic but up coast , through Trafalgar, then Fitzroy/ Biscay border into English Channel. We went early to miss a low , which according to Met office and others was gale/near gale with similiar wind to those you quote for SoD currently. That is what I meant by similiar. The forecasts were for gale not for next level up of wind ie storm force. We had a much smoother trip, but the sacrifice was no Maderia and a curtailed cruise.

The speed on TV always matched what the captain announced. Back to weather, what they are approaching/dealing with now is similiar to that weather they dodged on previous cruise and lost us a port and a day. The cynical amongst us might hypothesize that something has been fixed , recalibrated in Portsmouth. One will certainly never know

This looks just as bad as the weather we dodged.

Changing the subject completely, looks like its going to be a bit bumpy for SoD tomorrow in BoB. Met office shipping forecast Shipping forecast and gale warnings map Loading map… +− © MapTiler | © OpenStreetMap contributors iShipping forecast and gale warnings explained Biscay GALE WARNING Issued: 09:51 (UTC) on Fri 8 Dec 2023 Gale now ceased, but southwesterly gale force 8 later WIND West or southwest 4 to 6, increasing 7 or gale 8 for a time. SEA STATE Rough or very rough. WEATHER Rain. VISIBILITY Moderate or good.

The map is from an open source mapping system , however the longitude and latitude and speed are from ships navigation system . SoD doesn't have to ask someone else where it is or what speed it is going. It puts these numbers directly on the info bar below the map. Then plots it on map for our convience . Yes it only updates about every 5 minutes so is not real time as on bridge

The reason for all the speculation is simple , we were not told why

This was not cruise mapper but straight from ships navigation system.

12.5 knots

It was not wet on Wednesday so people could have had a choice to go ashore if we'd got somewhere earlier. Our speed dropped to 12.5 knots not 14 knots .I will post pictures of the TV screen later

No need rush agree , but could go at normal 16 knots. Depends if they thought giving passengers a full day ashore anywhere was of any value. It seems they didn't . Yes someone asked why go max speed of 18 -19 knots, which the Captain then defended as necessary. SoA and SoD normally cruise at a more comfortable 16 knots, which would have given a full day in a port , even if in Portsmouth. The 12.5 knots is a crawl which meant no useable time in port. The majority improvements in comfort comes from going just that bit slower.

The Captain announced at noon just before we saw SoA on Tuesday that the low pressure was well ahead of us, so no need to go slow because of weather. 3 days in Lisbon, one when not allowed of ship. Information was drip fed to passengers. Only 7 islands in Carribean not 8 as in intinerary. No Trinidad, St Marten instead of St Barts. Didn't get to Azores or Maderia. Arrived in Portsmouth at 2pm after crawling for 25 hours . Suggestion that passengers could have full day in Cherbourg, Falmouth, Fowey once safrly in English channelput Saga by email and to Captain over dinner by Lady we met his response was to laugh. No explanation of why not.

Yes , but it spent 3 days in Lisbon, one when we couldn't get off ship. So one day in Portsmouth is getting off lightly. It raises question when captain said no problems with ship! Perhaps and only perhaps this explains why it took us 25hrs crawling at 12.5 knots to get back to Portsmouth after meeting SoA, yet it took her only 19hs to get there.

Anyone on board can tell us what has been said

Thank you , sounds bad. Spirit of Discovery would have been scheduled to leave BoB and round Brest peninsula at 12 noon, so it may have missed worst if it was Wednesday night. But a close call, can we why Captain was cautious

It depends on which forecast you looked at , Windy was the worst. Weatheronline showed no more than 4.5meter waves, similarly not too bad for stormsurfing and buoy weather. Neither for met office shipping forecast. Unfortunately windy is official saga provider. Clearly the incident the previous cruise made Saga ultra cautious, whether it was the correct decision, depends on point of view. Even the Windy forecast bad weather forecast wasn't in same league as last cruise. Note neither low was ever a named storm, unlike Ceiron and Domingo.

I would like an eye witness account of what it is/was actually like.

Two comments, Siemens engineers were on SoD for the three days in Lisbon. Captain said we could not leave untill it had been recertified. Secondly we were told we had to come back early to miss bad weather. Yet yesterday noon , the SoAdventure passed us going South to Maderia, into the weather we were hurrying home to miss. P&O Ventura currently in mid BoB just where we should have been if kept to schedule asked anyone on board via CC what weather is actually like.

Our ship Saga Spirit of Discovery, has come back early to miss bad weather in BoB. We are in portsmouth , but should have been crossing Bob today. Whay is it actually like.

Agree, I'm sure if anyone wanted an 8.30 or even 8pm slot could go when ever they want, a lot have left by then. The 6.30 to 7 ish seem most popular and would be hard to get more than your "ration" . We've also started going to speciality restaurants on formal nights, if you have an officer hosted table near you in main dining room, they get all the attention, other tables can wait for ages. 😦 Butler had no trouble getting extra reservations.

How many have you managed to book.

It is a personal choice. Only difference is in speciality restaurants. Suggest you look at the menus online. See which suits you best. Two supper club menus are almost identical, but layout of adventure without hole is better. But only you can decide between the other two sets of cuisines. We are very happy to sail on either

Just to confirm situation. On this 30 day cruise, speciality restaurants rationed to 6 , equivalent to 3 per 2 weeks. Which seems just right. No limits for suites , but this will not stop everyone else getting their 6. also last minute bookings on the night are unrestricted but not always available.

SUN 😁😁😁😁