A swim in the middle of the Atlantic? No problem, says captain of luxury ship

[mercedes]

Now this is something you normally don't see on a trans-Atlantic cruise.

Industry watcher Seatrade Insider reports the captain of a SeaDream Yacht Club ship sailing across the Atlantic earlier this month made an unexpected stop so passengers could hop overboard for a swim.

The vessel, the SeaDream II, is equiped with a small retractable marina deck that is often extended when the ship is in the sheltered bays of the Caribbean or the Mediterranean. It wasn't necessarily designed for the open ocean. But in this case, the seas of the Atlantic were so unusually calm that the captain concluded it was safe to offer passengers a rare open-ocean dip.

Guests had been telling me they would like to take a swim in the Atlantic and at dawn on Thursday, Oct. 15, I knew that this was the day, the captain tells Seatrade Insider. "The seas were as still as a pond."

The news outlet says the vessel was 958 nautical from the Azores and 1,541 nautical miles from its destination, San Juan, Puerto Rico, at the time.

[DebbieandJerry]

that would be so cool

[coloradocruisers]

Once in a lifetime opportunity for those folks...

[DebbieandJerry]

I agree

[RayColey]

And along came the giant squid.....

[tc1]

that's the kind of thing that makes life interesting.

Sam