As the wide-eyed ship's cooper travels the globe, observing and absorbing, he brings to mind an errant Candide or Gulliver sent into the world to comment on its foibles and our misperceptions about people and their inclinations.
Even with the best of intentions, the wider shipping industry will have accidents.
As the cruise ship industry moves towards ever larger vessels, many tourist destinations are faced with dilemmas about how to accommodate the latest generation of ships, which require deeper and wider shipping pathways.
The online store will eventually carry around 80 brands and promises Europe-wide shipping entirely free of charge.
On this weekend there were fewer container ships, making it easier to cross the 600-foot-wide shipping channel that annually moves 40 million tons of cargo, valued at $16 billion.
Coast Guard Commandant Paul Yost called it "almost unbelievable" that the Exxon Valdez had strayed from a 10-mile-wide shipping channel to crash into Bligh Reef.
To accommodate the ships that will carry 6,000-plus 6,000-plus, the port will need, in addition to deeper containersnd berthe, larger cranes that can reach all the way across the wider shiport
Rather than be given a tour of the thirteen-hundred-and-twelve-foot-long, a-hundred-and-ninety-four-foot-wide ship, Wiper was told, as he writes on his blog, "The engine is that way, the bridge is that way.
In preparation for the change, the Port of Tampa is planning a five-fold expansion and a new set of locks to accommodate more traffic and longer, wider ships.
The Harmony will also be the widest ship ever made, three meters wider than the Oasis and Allure, resulting in larger cabins, which is good news for passengers.
