Vehicles lined up by size, parked, waiting... Drivers and passwengers wandering, chatting with others who were also waiting, listening to occasional announcements, sharing, waiting. We rolled aboard a bit late, ferry pushing out at 10:30.
I boarded, parked, and asked the ferry staff member who was helping, “you're not going to have us back off of here, are you?” He laughed. No turns on this ship – we drove in the front, and we'll drive out the back. Straight in, straight out. Phew!
I walked the decks outside on level 7, then repeated my circles around the deck on level 10 – the level shared with the off limits bridge. It was so nice to have a place to walk.
Speed wasn't apparent; at first it felt like we were crawling. And yet, the MV Atlantic Vision is the fastest ship in the fleet, movng at 27 knots per hour, which translates to 31 miles per hour or 50 kilometers per hour. Hey, that sound's fast, doesn't it? Given our sailing time of 4+ hours, we certainly weren't moving that fast for the entire time. It was probaby the combination of moving slowly out of the N Sydney harbor and flipping the boat around to park in Port aux Basques with stern to land (so we could all drive forwards to exit the ferry).
An end to the water passage of the day...
In Newfoundland...
