Day 4 - Storm at Sea

We had an unscheduled 'entertainment' activity last evening (actually, early morning of the 13th).  The ship ran into a fairly large wind storm at about 1:00 AM. With winds of 65-85 mph and gusts of over 100 mph, the sea churned with swells of 50+ feet!! Not surprisingly the brand-new Viking Vela (this is only the 2nd voyage since it was delivered to Viking from the Fincantieri S.p.A., Italian shipbuilding company based in Trieste, Italy) was listing and rocking quite violently. Most everything in our cabin was tossed around and lots of the furniture, bar equipment, liquor bottles, dining room tableware, books on shelves in the atrium, and just about anything else not attached to the walls or floor in the public areas went flying throughout the ship. Our closet doors were damaged as they swung uncontrollably back and forth on their sliders, but other than that, everything else seems to be fine.

Captain Rune Loekling had to turn the ship into the wind to minimize the rocking and swaying and because of that we started heading west and southwest, opposite the direction we should be sailing. Finally, at about 2:00 pm the winds died down a bit (to only 45-55 mph) and the swells got
smaller (20-30 ft).

Captain Rune decided it was best to anchor at Ålesund (at least I think that is where we are headed) with the assistance of two tug boats. This means our second port-of-call, Narvik (#3 on the map), will not be made and so our excursion to Katterat Station was cancelled. 

The captain and cruise director tell us that we can finally leave out staterooms by 5:30-6:00 this evening for dinner service at the various restaurants (we were served breakfast and lunch in our rooms).

Here's to better conditions tomorrow - although another, smaller storm will hit us while anchored in Ålesund. Hey - all this extra entertainment is a bonus, right?