Westerdam (II) Active

The Homeric was built in 1986 at Meyer Werft in Papenburg, Germany — the first large cruise ship the shipyard had ever constructed. Home Lines, an Italian-American company that had run quality passenger service since the postwar years, commissioned her at 53,872 gross tons for approximately 1,494 passengers. When Holland America acquired Home Lines in 1988, the Homeric became the Westerdam and joined a fleet that already knew how to use a ship that size.

Meyer Werft in Papenburg went on to become arguably the world's most celebrated cruise shipyard, building vessels of extraordinary scale and sophistication over the following decades. The Homeric was the experiment that told them what they could do. She was not a complicated ship by what came after — she was well-made, well-finished, and she lasted. That is how shipyards earn their reputations: first ship out, decade of service without embarrassing the name on the side.

Westerdam sailed Bermuda from New York, the Caribbean seasonally, and repositionings in between. She was a working ship doing working things for a cruise line that ran a tight schedule. When the next Westerdam was ordered and the Vista-class arrived, the second Westerdam stepped aside. She had done what was asked of her and then more than that — she had been the proof that a shipyard in a German river town could build something that lasted. That is not a small thing to have been.

— In the Wake editorial

We booked the Bermuda run three years in a row, and we booked it the same way each time: Friday evening out of New York, five days in Hamilton, then home.

The Westerdam left from the West Side piers and sailed south through the night. By Saturday morning we were past Ambrose Channel and into open Atlantic and the ship had settled into the movement that meant we were properly at sea. The crossing to Bermuda from New York is about a thousand miles and takes two nights, with a day of open ocean in between — enough to remember what ocean is, not enough to become tiresome. We had the same cabin on the port side all three years, which sounds impossible but isn't if you call early.

Bermuda from a ship berth in Hamilton is different from Bermuda by air. By air you arrive at the airport in the middle of the island and taxi to your hotel. By ship you arrive directly in Hamilton Harbour with the pink-painted buildings right there above the dock and the Elbow Beach and Horseshoe Bay a scooter ride away. We rented scooters on day one, every year, despite my wife's stated opinion that scooters were inadvisable for people our age. We returned them undamaged every year.

The ship sailed back on Monday evening. By Tuesday the Westerdam was in New York waters again and you could see the lights of the city from the forward promenade. My wife would go in. I stayed on deck longer. Five days was the right amount of Bermuda and just enough ocean to make the office feel very far away for a while longer.

— Arthur B.