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Crossing the 3,000 miles (4,800km) of the North Atlantic by passenger vessel can be considered an art. I have done it 154 times and always enjoy it immensely. I consider crossings as rests in musical parlance, for both are described as “passages.” Indeed, musicians do often “hear” rests in between notes. So if ports of call are the musical notes of a voyage, then the rests are the days at sea – temporary interludes, when physical and mental indulgence become ends in themselves.

Experienced mariners will tell you that a ship behaves like a ship only when it is doing a crossing, for that’s what a real ship is built for. Yet the days when ships were built specifically for crossings are almost gone. The only one offering a regularly scheduled trans­atlantic service (a “crossing”) is Cunard Line’s Queen Mary 2, a 148,151-ton ship, built with a thick hull designed to hold well against the worst weather the North Atlantic has to offer. The most unpredictable weather in the world, together with fog off the Grand Banks of Newfoundland, can mean that the captain will spend torturous hours on the bridge, with little time for socializing.

When it is foggy, the crew of Queen Mary 2 is often pestered by passengers wanting to know if the ship has yet approached latitude 41°46' north, longitude 50°14' west – where White Star Line’s 43,326-ton Titanic struck an Arctic iceberg on that fateful April night in 1912.

A great tradition
There is something magical in “doing a crossing.” It takes you back to the days when hordes of passengers turned up at the piers of the ports of New York, Southampton, Cherbourg, or Hamburg, accompanied by chauffeurs and steamer trunks, jewels and finery. Even today, excitement and anticipation usually precede a crossing. First there is the hubbub and bustle of check-in, then the crossing of the threshold on the gangway before being welcomed into the calmness aboard, and finally escorted to one’s accommodation.

Once the umbilical cord of the gangway is severed, bow and stern mooring lines are cast off, and with three long blasts on the ship’s deep whistle, the QM2 is pried gently from its berth. The ship sails silently down the waterway, away from the world, as serene as a Rolls-Royce. Passengers on deck often observe motorboats trying to keep up with the giant liner as it edges away from Brooklyn’s excellent Red Hook Pier 12 terminal towards the Statue of Liberty, the restored Ellis Island, then under the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and out to the open sea. Coming westbound, arriving in New York by ship is one of the world’s thrilling travel experiences.

The QM2 has year-round scheduled crossings, whereas other cruise ships crossing the Atlantic are little more than repositioning cruises – a way of moving ships that cruise the Mediterranean in summer to the Caribbean in winter, and vice versa – they offer more chances to experience the romance and adventure of a crossing, usually in spring and fall. These satisfy those wanting un­interrupted days at sea and lots of leisure time.

Most cruise ships operating repositioning crossings cross the Atlantic using the “sunny southern route” – departing from southern ports such as Ft. Lauderdale, San Juan, or Barbados, and ending the journey in Lisbon, Genoa, or Copenhagen via the Azores or the Canary Islands off the coast of northern Africa. In this way, they avoid the more difficult weather often encountered in the North Atlantic. Such crossings take longer, however: between eight and 12 days. 

 Berlitz Guide © Apa Publishing 2010