Hawaii,12/7 Weather /crossing

[spendalot]

We have been invited to join friends at the beginning of Dec. to Hawaii ( we are going in April also:) ).

 

We cant commit until we get a better idea of the weather. How rough will the crossing be. 14-16 ft swells and the like? Is the concern justified? We have cruised the carribean and mexico numerous times also out of SF. Has slight rough seas but across the pacific will be new to us.

 

Thanks

[garydm]

Have not done it in December, but we did Hawaii earlier this year (February) and it was pretty rough the first 3 days out of San Diego. We have done Alaska RT San Francisco and the seas on the Hawaii trip were much more significant. But, there is no predicting the weather. You could have smooth sailing!

 

Gary

[Druke I]

I for one think sea state is always a crapshoot. Smooth as a mill pond one time, rough the next.

 

We have done only one crossing, San Francisco to Hawaii (via Los Angeles) in Dec.; Dec 1984 on the late great Constitution, after she had her bottom scraped in drydock at Hunter's Point.

 

We had pretty good sized rollers all the way across - they had to put the lips up on the tables and wet the tableclothes several nights in an attempt to keep the plates on the tables.

 

Rough enough that one night the grand piano on the stage broke its guywires, rolled off the stage, and into the casino, knocking over slots and people along the way. I believe that was the same night we had the man overboard call, and they turned the ship for the search while a head count was conducted. No one missing - apparent bad, but non-malicous call. They had been dumping garbage (legal then) and apparently someone saw it floating by, and called "man overboard".

 

24 hours out of Honolulu, there was a helicopter medical evacuation of an ill person that could not be operated on by ship's doctors due to rough conditions.

 

All in all, a very interesting and enjoyable crossing.

 

5-89, on Sea Princess (originally Kungsholm, later Victoria, now Mona Lisa), very smooth all the way from Kobe Japan to Honolulu to Vancouver BC.

 

2-97, on Pacific Princess (old), Honolulu to Ensenada, mild rollers all the way.

 

Our San Francisco to Hawaii crossing, 9-00, on the last voyage of the Sky Princess as a Princess ship, was smooth as a mountain lake. That trip was actually San Francisco to Sydney, a WW2 Pacific Theater cruise - and a great itinerary.

[mikefang]

Spendalot-DW and myself on the Amsterdam 12/7 to Hawaii also. Sure wish I could predict the seas for you but..............! Having a fair number of deployments to the Western Pacific I can say some trips to Hawaii were fairly rough and others like the mill pond described in another post. I am presuming some seas in December but who knows! Mike