Saturday, September 8th .....

Marilyn and Jamie flew to Melbourne yesterday on the first leg of Jamie’s trip to the Philippines to meet Xenia, his new lady-love.  Marilyn won’t be going on to Manila but it was a shame to waste the domestic flight so she flew with Jamie to wave him off this morning, and will come back this afternoon).  Jamie’s very excited and we hope everything works out as he wishes.

While we were on the ship recently, we found that one of the issues with having a cabin deep down in the hull is that there are more ship-board noises than if you up on Deck 11, for example.  The engine room is close by, and the crew quarters, and the gangplank is just beside you.  So, arriving and leaving port brings a cacophony of sounds.

When we were leaving Noumea at close to midnight, we heard the noise of rushing water.  With thoughts of the Titanic in mind, I looked out the porthole and found that the whole side of the ship was lit up and that dozens of seagulls were flying around and diving into the water from time to time.  Clearly there had been some discharge from the ship.  I could still see the lights of Noumea so we were not far off shore.  Having been brought up on tales of maritime adventure, I dismissed it as the crew pumping out the bilges – not that I know what the bilges are or why they needed to be pumped out.

It happened again the next night, we would first hear clanking then the rush of water.  Maybe they pump out the swimming pools each night, I thought. It usually happened a couple of times and then everything was quiet.

The third time it happened, I suspected that the water was something else.  2000 passengers, 700 crew, going to the toilet an average of three times a day at, say, 1 litre of water per flush – that’s a lot of water.  Include all the showers, and hand washing , and washing-up in the kitchen and so on, multiply that by 7 days and I’m starting to wonder whether the ship had a tank big enough to hold it all, and was there enough time at each port to pump it out, and what happens if we anchor off-shore and get taken in by tender?  But, no, they couldn’t …..

On QI the other night, there was a question about the Pacific Trash Vortex, a Texas-size raft of rubbish floating in the Pacific Ocean, north of Hawaii.  Mostly composed of plastics, the existence of this raft is blamed on the accumulated rubbish of thousands of ships disposing of their waste the easy way.  So, on to the internet and the first article I come across is headed ‘The cruise ship industry’s dirty secret’.

Yes, it’s true.  Until the first Clean Cruise Acts came into being in recent years, cruise ships were entitled to pump out grey water (from showers, etc) and black water (from toilets) directly into the ocean as long as they were 3 miles from land.  And the acts are state-based; there is no international covenant preventing ships from polluting international waters.  In reality, of course, the major cruise lines do their best.  Modern ships have sewage treatment processes but the outflow from these still find their way into the ocean.  Food waste and garbage is also treated.  Most garbage goes through a grinder before being dumped; glass and cans are crushed and stored for removal at the next port.

It’s not a pretty subject and those of us who enjoy cruising just have to ignore it in the hope that our cruise ship is a responsible-enough citizen to want to look after the environment it depends on for its future.