Sea Days

[britinva]

Foe me, the best part of a cruise are the Sea Days!

They are basically days where all you can do is lay out in Sun or Shade...... or to do on ship. When my girls were younger a normal beach holiday was always interrupted by 'I'm bored, can we go somewhere'!! Never got that on a DCL cruise.

Now all my Sea Days on DCL in past have been nice and tranquil with captain setting a smooth, slow course finding the sunny spots.

Recently did a Dream 5 day western cruise with stops at Grand Cayman and Castaway. The first Sea Day was as per.... smooth, slow and sunny.

The 2nd Sea Day between Grand Cayman and Castaway while was smooth and sunny, captain was going at a fair speed.... 20+ knots.....and the wind on deck 13, my preferred deck, made it not pleaseant.

Is this normal for this cruise or just unlucky we were going fast in a head wind?

My next cruise is likely a Bermuda cruise out of New York.... what Sea Days experiences on that cruise like?

 

[Girl of the South]

My guess would be:

1. Weather, prevailing winds. Weather is unpredictable.

2. Deck 13 - winds (and movement) are stronger higher up.

3. Distance. Did you look at a map? Grand Cayman is 408 nautical miles away from the Bahamas. That's 469 "land miles" . 20 knots (which is fast for a cruise ship) is 23 mph. So 469 divided by 23 is 20 hours, assuming the ship goes at full speed all of those hours. It has to go all the way around Cuba. Bermuda is over 1000 nautical miles.

 

[Cheburashka]

Foe me, the best part of a cruise are the Sea Days!

They are basically days where all you can do is lay out in Sun or Shade...... or to do on ship. When my girls were younger a normal beach holiday was always interrupted by 'I'm bored, can we go somewhere'!! Never got that on a DCL cruise.

Now all my Sea Days on DCL in past have been nice and tranquil with captain setting a smooth, slow course finding the sunny spots.

Recently did a Dream 5 day western cruise with stops at Grand Cayman and Castaway. The first Sea Day was as per.... smooth, slow and sunny.

The 2nd Sea Day between Grand Cayman and Castaway while was smooth and sunny, captain was going at a fair speed.... 20+ knots.....and the wind on deck 13, my preferred deck, made it not pleaseant.

Is this normal for this cruise or just unlucky we were going fast in a head wind?

My next cruise is likely a Bermuda cruise out of New York.... what Sea Days experiences on that cruise like?

On our first Eastern Caribbean cruise, two of the sea days were so windy that the pool decks were closed & you couldn't really go outside. Most of that was weather (I've sailed the same ship & itinerary since and it wasn't like that), but there is also a long way to go on that itinerary. Usually on sea days, it's windy enough that they only let doubles ride the Aqua Duck, for example (annoying since I've been sailing solo lately). I'm sure part of the issue is weather, and the other part is the speed needed to get to the destination on time. It is not unusual.

If you're looking for more tranquil conditions on sea days, try one of those rare short cruises that only go to Castaway Cay and do not also stop at Nassau, so there is really nothing for the ship to do but go slow during the sea day. You can never predict the weather when booking months in advance, though.