Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
While working on finishing the story of my sea voyage last week down from Canada to Oregon, I was surprised to see that there is a new market in the world of marine “eco-tourism”. This one involves burning thousands and thousands of gallons of eeevil fossil 
fuels so that rich folks can make a futile attempt to traverse the Northwest Passage, over the top of the US from Anchorage to New York. In a giant cruise ship. Not this year, not next year, but in the year 2016. Polar cruises of all kinds seem to be hot right now. As a seaman, I think that there are places where no cruise ship should go. Here’s a picture of an Antarctic cruise that went wrong …
Now, as others have commented, I’ll believe CO2 is a problem when the folks who claim it’s a problem act like it’s a problem. But what intrigued me was, how was the Crystal Cruise line going to deal with the fact that there’s a good chance they won’t be able to make it all the way through the Northwest Passage in 2016? Would they issue refunds if they couldn’t complete the trip? Do you get half the money back if they only make it half way?
So I did some research on the Crystal Cruises site, and found a couple of oddities. First, since the cost of the cruise alone starts at $20,000 per person and goes up from there, we’re gonna assume that most contestants will be well past fifty years old … and as a result, subject to a variety of weaknesses of the flesh, including but not limited to dropping dead without prior notice. So on their “Frequently Asked Questions” (FAQ) page, the cruise ship operators put the following restriction on potential cruisees …
Due to the remote locations, emergency medical evacuation by plane from the Arctic regions can reach costs of $50,000 or more. Therefore, proof of a minimum of $50,000 per person in Emergency Evacuation Repatriation insurance is required to participate in this cruise.
Well, that’ll keep out the feather merchants. However, on either the page advertising the 2016 Northwest Passage cruise or their FAQ page, I couldn’t find one word about too much ice. So I dug deeper, and here’s what I found in their fine print that applies to all cruises:
9. Itinerary/Right To Change/Detention: Crystal Cruises reserves the right at its sole option and discretion and that of the Captain of the Ship without liability for damages or refund of any kind, to deviate from the Ship’s advertised or ordinary itinerary or route, to delay, advance or cancel any sailing, to omit or change ports of call, to arrange for substantially equivalent transportation by another vessel and/or by other means of transportation, to cause the Guest to disembark from the Ship temporarily or permanently, to tow or to be towed or assist other vessels or to perform any similar act which, in its sole judgment and discretion, is justified for any reason. SOURCE
Holy moly, talk about signing your life away. Once you’re on their ship, they can do anything they damn well please, including saying they’re going to Tenerife and taking you to Texas instead, or tossing your poor benighted corpus off the ship if they don’t like the cut of your jib.
Oh, if the cruise is cancelled before it starts they’ll refund the ticket, but otherwise? Once the ship sails, they’ve got your money, and if there’s too much ice … tough. They’ll just shorten the cruise, go to Vladivostok instead, and call it good enough. And if you get sick? Pay for it yourself.
Clearly, we’re all in the wrong business …
Best to everyone,
w.
PS—Care to sign up? Do you have $20,000 to spare? Their web site is here, a news story on their crazy-like-a-fox plan is here. To their credit, the journalists do note the irony of burning fossil fuels in order to save the planet from fossil fuels.
That ship on it’s side in the photo was indeed a small cruise ship. I took a cruise from South America to Antarctica on it (several years before it came to be on it’s side). Nice trip, though it was a bit rough crossing over to the Antarctic Peninsula (20-25 foot seas if I recall). Quite impressive watching a Wandering Albatross (largest wingspan of any living bird, upwards of 13 feet) follow us with no wing beats, just catching a little lift off each wave crest.
Unfortunately one elderly passenger passed in his sleep during the return trip. He was repatriated onto a harbor support vessel at an unscheduled stop in Chile. He always wanted to see Antarctica in his lifetime and got his wish.
Cheers, Kevin
This is one prudent cruise line. The Arctic Ocean should be completely ice-free in 2015, according to many models, but they wait an additional year to be completely safe.
There sure won’t be any passage this year. Things are beginning to freeze up again north of 80.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
I don’t think they should hold out much hope for 2016 either, although the cruise folks don’t have to worry with their reams of fine print. With a contract like this, look to another few hundred arctic cruises to go into business if this ship fills up with its fools. How big a boat can you lay your hands on Willis?
The ‘substantially equivalent’ clause is what says they will not take you to Vladivostok and leave you there. What they will do is get other, better equipped and smaller boats to take you to some place near an airport, and then FLY you there.
As far as the NW passage being open…it is ALWAYS open, has always been open, and will continue to be open. Where open means that if you can keep your boat from being crushed by the ice long enough to thaw where you are…and you eventually comes out the other side, even if it is 20 years later…HEY! It’s a successful transit of the NW passage!
It will be interesting to see in 10 years when the warmists have hired 10,000-strong force of men to go out with an armada of ice-breakers, along with the required giant cranes and other mass movers…to ensure that NOBODY gets turned back in their quest to cross the NW passage.
And the lead will be “incident-free open-water NW passage transit”, and the photo will be of a 24-footer with 20 ice-breakers 600m ahead of it.
NE Passage more likely to be open, but in any event an ice classified vessel would be the safest bet.
I doubt that the advertised vessel is ice classified.
But the whole thing should provide great entertainment. Buy popcorn futures, and shares in an icebreaker that might be conveniently near in the event of an emergency.
Stargazer says:
August 16, 2014 at 12:27 pm
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Deviation clauses (such as the type cited by Willis), and indeed non performance clauses are commonplace in shipping. It is a historical thing, dating back to the days when a voyage truly was an adventure.
It makes you appreciate how very difficult it must have been for the likes of Amundsen, who managed to sail the Northwest Passage, without the benefit of satellite imagery, to see the location of open water/thin ice, and without GPS to know the position of the ship in relation to open waters/thin ice.
I think that a lot of people underestimate how very much more difficult it must have been for sailors who did not benefit from those modern aids. Indeed, it suggests that the ice conditions must have been far more open for them to have successfully prosecuted their yoages, or that they were particularly lucky.
Anyone who wishes to claim that there is significantly less Arctic ice compared to the 1880s/1915 period should perform a voyage with no modern navigational aids (including no helicopters, and without backup from ice breakers and other forms of rescue craft). In that way, one would get a more representative picture of the present verses the past.
The only way anyone is making the crossing for a long time to come will be in a hovercraft or a track-type vehicle, not a boat, & every vehicle will burn tons of fossil fuel & damage the pristine natural environment. Not that the massive Arctic infrastructure won’t shake it off as a miniscule event.
All the rest is marketing-hype & clueless-kook nonsense.
IMHO, YMMV … 😉
Oldseadog says:
August 16, 2014 at 1:23 pm
“NE Passage more likely to be open, but in any event an ice classified vessel would be the safest bet.
I doubt that the advertised vessel is ice classified…..”
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I would be pretty damn sure that it is/will be ice classed. It is an insurance issue.
Of course, that does not mean that the ship is an ice breaker.
Sounds like the perfect venue for an IPCC meeting. Guest speakers to include Algore and Chris Turney.
Whoops, I rechecked my references, the Wandering Albatross has a wingspan up to 11 foot 6 inches, not 13 feet, but still impressive as all get out. Spends almost it’s whole life “at sea”, except for breeding “vacations” on land. Magnificent animal.
And the MS Explorer had a “ice rated” hull, but there are many classes of ice ratings, apparently it when someplace where it was outclassed by the ice.
Cheers, Kevin
Might have forgotten to tell you all that there exist two maps from before Hudson entered today’s Hudson Bay showing not only Hudson Bay but coast all way from Hudson Bay to Berings Straith…..
one of the is engraved on a Royal globe engraved (but NA wrongly mirrored by engraver in Flandern 1560) —– On that map please find Mississippi, Missouri resp. Florida engraved……
Northwest passage was open between 980 AD to 1341 according to contemporary documents I have access to. Not only maps.
Forget the Magical Mystery Tour…. to who knows where. Greens wanting to get to the bottom of things and experience genuine Future Climate Disaster should take the Yellow Submarine tour and live in the submariner’s standard 2500 ppm CO2, NASA’s “our common enemy..the major pollutant produced by humans” http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20090029352.pdf
More fuel efficient and they won’t disturb the polar bears.
@Jimbo
This is the same Peter Wadhams, going by his CV, and he’s still milking the public purse…
http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/pw11/
RE: Zek202 8/16at 12:42 pm
the blog “Northwestpassage2014″ on blogspot follows the current attempts of the sailors and boats trying to make the passage this summer.
Here is the page for WILL THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE OPEN IN 2014? The Itinerary is not Decisive. But the Experience is. Either a Storm or an Icebreaker or both will make the difference in 2014
He posts the Canadian Ice Survey maps for
August 23, 2013 (last year. pretty free with only two choke points)
August 15, 2014 (90-100% blocked for much of the passage).
He also shows weather maps for a predicted Aug 20-26 storm that is the joker in the deck.
At the bottom of his post, he repeats is prediction (from Aug 22, 2013) of 2014
A gutsy prediction a year out.
You now know why Green Peace is loaded with cash reserves. Too much money in the hands of very stupid people.
norah4you says:
August 16, 2014 at 1:38 pm
Northwest passage was open between 980 AD to 1341 according to contemporary documents I have access to. Not only maps.
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norah…this map from 1418 shows the NWP open too
http://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/cf_images/20060114/0206BK1.jpg
@richard Guy 8/16 at 11:54 am
Captian Joe spoke of his years sailing the NW passage.as a Captain. I asked him what was the average depth of the NW passage
I think the minimum channel depth is the more important fact. How shallow must the draft of any ship be to have a hope of making the crossing? And for which passage? I’ve heard there are seven passages mapped for small boat and yachts. But how many are suitable for the Crystal ships? Are tides important?
M/S Explorer, 2007
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MV_Explorer_(1969)
I think they should go from New York to Anchorage. That way if the conditions look bad they can stop off in Bar Harbor for a couple weeks, Issue coupons for unlimited free drinks in all the local pubs and no one will be upset.
@Latitude 8/16 at 2:05 pm
norah…this map from 1418 shows the NWP open too
It also shows a Northeast passage that Portuguese reportedly used to trade with Japan.
is the map authentic? What is the source of the link? (Economist 2006)
But the map also shows California as an island with the Gulf of California connecting with either Puget Sound or San Francisco Bay. I also think the map shows the Saint Lawrence Seaway to be a second path to the arctic. Which just goes to show, what a cartographer puts on a piece of paper isn’t necessarily true and my be conjecture unsupported by observation.
It is amazing how good the early maps were, before the invention of the chronometer. But this map purportedly a 17th century copy from a 1418 original, begs a skeptical eye.
http://www.howardforums.com/archive/index.php/t-825771.html
Curious George says:
August 16, 2014 at 1:05 pm
This is one prudent cruise line. The Arctic Ocean should be completely ice-free in 2015, according to many models, but they wait an additional year to be completely safe.
.
Thank you for a good belly laugh!!
Curious George,
Meanwhile there is, at this point, just a hint of a worrying upwards trend in Arctic ice cover…
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.recent.arctic.png
Hypocritical Bill Gates fossil fueled vacation :
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/i-m-on-a-boat–bill-gates-vacations-on–330m-yacht-193011058.html
I think that flying from JFK to Delhi and return on Air India for about $1,100 is a better deal. Better view of the ice, better view or the ocean and a better view of the geography. Use the extra money to spend a week or two or three touring India — you’ll have a great time and learn a lot.
BallBounces says:
August 16, 2014 at 12:10 pm
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I must admit I had never visited a Tim Horton’s until I got a coffee at one of two in Whitehorse last week 🙂 It is very good coffee.