P&O MV Arcadia; Tuesday, 21 October, 2025

It was certainly a rocky overnight, but around 8am we finally entered the calmer waters of the harbour at A Coruña, our first port call of the trip, with the ship mooring up in the secondary cruise parking space as the main terminal was occupied by the Sky Princess which we’d be following all the way down from Southampton.

A Coruña is 8 degrees West of Greenwich, but Spain is in the Central European time zone with Daylight saving in effect so dawn wasn’t until after Breakfast that the sun finally rose across the city and people were able to start venturing off the ship – with several spending a few moments just standing, still rocking slightly, on the solidly unmoving concrete of the quayside.

Mum and I headed off the ship and went for a short walk through the parks that surround the cruise terminals and the harbourside before eventually making our way to the central square of the old town the Praza de María Pita, where we stopped for a mid-morning coffee.

After coffee we had a short walk around the square before heading down to a taxi rank so that mum could take a taxi back to the ship, rather than walk the mile or so back that we’d walked on the way in. Back on the ship we were just in time for a spot of lunch, and after lunch mum headed elsewhere on the ship and I headed back into the centre of town to have a bit more of a wander around.

I made it as far as the castle but didn’t really have enough time to look round it, and given I’d seen it barely 15 months previously when I’d stayed in the city there didn’t feel like much point. Instead, I headed a little back in towards town and had a look around the Xardín de San Carlos, which had been closed when I’d visited in June 2024. I had a look around the gardens and took in the views over towards the harbour and both our cruise ship and the Sky Princess.

The other thing that was noticeable was the increasingly threatening looking sky and with a mile and a half walk back to the ship I decided it was probably a good time to start making a move, but even then I only got about halfway back to the ship before the rain really started coming down – and it was pretty clear this wasn’t a passing shower, so dodging between balconies and trees I made my way back to the ship trying not to get totally soaked.

Back on the ship I met up with mum in my cabin to watch the sail away from A Coruña, as my port side cabin was on the better side for views leaving port. All aboard had been at 16:30, and we’d assumed that the ship would depart about 17:00 but by 18:00 we we’re still tied up at the dock with the gangways attached and no sign of movement.

It was at this point that the captain made an announcement to the ship that the weather conditions in the Bay of Biscay were due to deteriorate significantly over the next couple of days – a storm, later named Storm Benjamine by the French Met office, was closing in and it would generate sea heights of 7 to 8 meters and storm force 10 winds, that would make the sail down the previous evening look like a gentle breeze. To make the cruise more comfortable the decision had been taken to shorten the stop in Gijón the following day by three hours and then, rather than heading East further into the bay for our scheduled stop in Santander, we would instead turn around, head West out of the bay and seek shelter on the Spanish Atlantic coast in the port of Vigo. The reason for the long delay in departing tonight had been caused by the ship waiting for confirmation from the port officials that this could be accommodated, and now this had been received we could make a move.

The port crew at A Coruña quickly set about detaching the gangways and the mooring ropes and pretty soon we were heading out of the city, with it disappearing quickly into the murk of the heavy rain.

Having watch the eventual sail away, mum headed back to her cabin to get ready for dinner and the familiar pattern of meeting for a drink and getting ourselves into the virtual queue for Dinner followed, though in the calmer waters and almost smooth movement of the ship, it was noticeable that there were a lot more people around, so despite joining the queue earlier we were still 103rd in line and waited 45 minutes before getting a table for dinner, meaning we ended up eating quite late and heading back to our cabins shortly after finishing.