Venice to Athens on the Royal Princess

During the recent Venice to Athens cruise on the Royal Princess rookie
skipper "Crash" Nash, having already displeased many
cruisers with his inability to make a call at Rhodes, followed up by
redesigning the pier at Kusadasi, creating a 8 foot rent in the bow of
the vessel, causing it to have to remain at anchor outside of the harbor at
Kusadasi while it was repaired to Lloyds satisfaction, (and to the delight
of the local carpet sellers!). This meant Mykanos had to be missed. Princess
'compensated' with a $100 shipboard credit and a future $100 off a
cruise..Big deal!! but more to the point it was unfortunate for the sold out
cruise, that Princess chose to use an unproven skipper. While everyone needs
to learn, and we all make mistakes, it is a petty that so many people who
expected better were dissapointed, especially on a cruise not blessed by
particularly good weather.

Perhaps the most aggrevating aspects of these incidents was the excuses and
misinformation promolgated by the errant skipper.

After Costa had aborted entering Rhodes with the Romantica Captain Nash
waited 1 hour, then declared the harbour un-enterable, and announced to all
that the pilot had actually given up and gone home. He then sailed off to
the next port. (in rapidly improving weather). It turned out that not only
had the
pilot not gone home, but the weather improved rapidly, and several other
ships, and large ferries docked successfully.

The Kusadasi problem was more worrysome. The Royal appeared to approach the
harbor at Kusadasi at a very fast rate of speed, and it was obvious to
spectators from several hundred yards out that the vector was all wrong, and
he was going to hit. (Several full videos exist to back this up). Not only
did he hit, but he nearly took out a tug which was able to just get out of
the way!

In his announcement to the pax he stated that just as he was entering the
harbor he was hit by an unexpected gust of wind (!!) and forced into the
harbor
wall. He concluded his in-cabin announcement with the protestation that no
matter what our day had been like, his was infinitely worse. Maybe, but he
seems to have forgotten he didnt pay $10 grand or so for a holiday!

The next day his announcement indicated that repairs would take longer than
estimated and consequently he would not be able to make the call at Mykonos.
Anyway, he announced over the in-cabin PA system, the weather in Mykonos was
nasty and he probably wouldn't be able to dock or tender there anyway. A
check on the internet showed that the weather in Mykonos was fine and sunny,
and the seas calm!

Fortunately Captain Andy (Andy Proctor) is due to relieve soon, (and may
probably be sooner than expected!)

Any comments about prior or subsequent cruises with this Captain?