Atlantic crossings

[cassimax]

Looking to book on the grand crossing south next march on the QM2 ,just a quick question for experienced atlantic crossers, are the sea conditions on a crossing from southampton to fort lauderdale likely to be better than on a crossing from southampton to new york.

Cheers.

[Druke I]

I for one don't really think there would be that much of a difference in sea state, which is always very unpredictable.

 

Smoothest trans-Atlantic I've have had was in the South Atlantic, crossing from Recife Brazil to Dakar Senegal, on the late great Royal Princess. Smooth as a millpond.

 

Been on several rough trans-Atlantics, including Lisbon to Fort Lauderdale.

 

Crossing from Dover to New York via Iceland and Greenland, also on Royal Princess, was fairly smooth, although there was some chop off Newfoundland and down into New York City.

[NorthernNeighbour]

Looking to book on the grand crossing south next march on the QM2 ,just a quick question for experienced atlantic crossers, are the sea conditions on a crossing from southampton to fort lauderdale likely to be better than on a crossing from southampton to new york.

Cheers.

I've done crossings from New York to Amsterdam and from Fort Lauderdale to Rome -- both in heavy seas. Actually the southern crossing to Rome was slightly worse than the northern crossing. Southern crossing was in late April (at the time of the US invasion of Iraq) and the northern crossing was just last month, in early May.

 

Oddly enough, on the NCL crossing some passengers were seasick but almost no crew members. On the HAL crossing (less rough) some passengers were seasick but so were many crew members (who had only served in the Pacfic and were doing their first Atlantic crossing).

 

We came back on the QM2 from Southampton westbound (smooth crossing) but were told by passengers who had been on the QM2 eastbound in the same week we were on the MS-AMSTERDAM going eastbound that they had very rough seas going over and many crew members of the QM2 were seasick. This was confirmed by one the officers (a medical nurse) who dined with us. While the QM2 herself handles the rough seas well, not all passengers or crew do.

 

Luckily, DW and I have good sea legs so rough crossings do not us bother (as Jane Austen would perhaps phrase it).