Not long after we were all back on board in Naples, the captain advised that we'd be missing another port - the authorities at the port of Messina had banned any access by cruise ships on 12 November because of oncoming bad weather. So, instead of going to Messina on 12 November and then at sea on the 13th, we ended up at sea on the 12th - running from the worst of the storm - and then stopping at Santorini on the 13th.
The captain said the forecast was for winds up to 45 knots (83kph) once we left the Strait of Messina, but he understated it a little. The sea certainly got very rough, and it stayed that way all through 12 November and that night too. Later the captain said that the winds had been as high as 60 to 70 knots (110 - 130 kph!!) for a lot of that time. I'm glad we weren't in the worst of the storm!!!!
Unfortunately, as we're at the front of the ship, we get to hear (and feel) lots of huge thumps and bangs as the ship hits the waves. And because we're up high, we get quite a rock and roll on. Very tricky to change for formal dinner when you can hardly stand up!
And, the formal dinner was an annoyance anyway. I simply don't like dressing up for dinner, so we booked to eat dinner at one of the specialty restaurants on Wednesday 13th, which was scheduled to be a formal night (it's counter-intuitive, but you don't have to dress formally to eat in the specialty restaurants on formal night). Basically as soon as I had made that booking, the captain announced we'd be missing Messina. And as a result of that, they changed the formal night to the 12th, so I ended up having to get dressed up in my formal gear anyway.
Santorini is a lovely place, but just the same we decided not to go ashore today. We have seen most of the things we really wanted to see, and although we would have gone ashore anyway if the weather was nice, it was not. The day started off cloudy but with rain forecast, but by 1pm it was "thunderbolts and lightning" everywhere. All the streets in the area around the port (Firá) are cobbled and I'm not comfortable walking on wet, slippery cobbled streets. Add to that the need to take a water shuttle both ways, and the no-doubt huge lines for the cable car and it just wasn't our idea of fun. (The 500-odd steps up are a risk on any day because you're sharing them with donkeys and donkey-poo, but on a day like today they'd be deadly, so the cable car was the only choice). In any case, our Mediterranean cruise next year is also due to stop at Santorini, and although there's still no guarantee about the weather (we'll be here on 16 November 2020) there will be a much better choice of excursions. They actually managed to get together about 5 excursions for today - pretty good given that they had almost no time to do so - but on next year's cruise there are 26 excursions to choose from.
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