Valet Parking Only

The small boat shown in the upper left contains the most important person in the whole Caribbean. In fact, he and his brothers all share a name, inscribed on their vessel. He is the harbor pilot, and that is the Pilot Boat.

Whether he is Mister Pilot, Monsieur Pilot or Senor Pilot, his duty is to guide the cruise ships into his port, and arguably without him an entire island nation's economy might collapse. He comes out to meet the cruise ships, and when their visit is complete, he returns to guide them away toward their next destination. All of these large ships have Captains who probably could accomplish docking without help, but all Captains have learned to defer to the expertise of the harbor pilot. He studies daily the tides and the shifting sands that move a shoal from place to place. He IS the local expert, and we always enjoy watching him jump aboard a moving ship with the grace of a ballerina.

The main picture depicts five ships at the pier in Nassau. Two are Royal Caribbean ships (Majesty, the smaller, Oasis the larger), two belonging to Norwegian Cruise Lines (the smaller ships Sun on the left and Sky on the right) and Carnival's Dream in the middle. The behemoth which dwarfs the Norwegian Sky is the Royal Carribean's second newest ship, the Oasis. She and her sister, the Allure, weigh in at over 220,000 tons. Sky is a small ship by comparison, at approximately 75,000 tons. Oasis and Allure are BIG girls to dance with, but the pilot does it well. If I were he, I'd be VERY nervous doing my job, but each Pilot holds a ship masters credential and is clearly the "local expert". In America, he'd probably be listed as a consultant and earn the big bucks. All we do know about these individuals is that without them, we'd never enjoy the opportunity to walk ashore on distant sands, and enjoy our retirement with only fifteen thousand plus friends in town at the same time.

Our ship, the Norwegian Sun, carried just under 2,000 passengers - Royal Caribbean's Oasis carried 5400 guests, and 2,000 crew. Crew numbers generally reflect a two and a half passengers to each crew member ratio. Oasis had a staggering seventy four hundred aboard. No wonder Homeland Security patrols these ports and keeps any and all boats at a distance. And, cruise ships rarely leave port with empty rooms - last minute Internet deals fill those cabins, We are getting emails daily about "deals" and living in Florida we're able to drive to five ports within four hours (Jacksonville, Miami, Port Canaveral, Port Everglades, Tampa). So far, we've not considered Jacksonville, as only the Carnival Fascination is based there. You all remember Carnival - they're the ones who also own Costa - those are the unlucky boats that either crash on the rocks, or leave passengers without power or sanitation for three days as they're towed to the nearest port.......by the French, no less.

One final comment - NCL has positioned a legion of young women with squirt bottles of hand sanitizing fluid all over their ships. You can't turn around without a perky "washee-washee, happy happy". What at first seemed an imposition, became a game, and I'd gladly present palms up whenever I heard that sing-song phrase. But, because of that, no Norovirus to catch, so I came on and left this most recent adventure Happy, Happy. If nothing else, my hands were clean.