Our two-night passage from Newport, RI to Cape May, NJ was uneventful other than we get exhausted on shorter runs of less than 3-4 nights without time for our bodies to adjust to new rhythms. We left Newport late morning on Friday, arriving Cape May 9:00 Sunday morning. One night I got nervous when I saw a long line of what looked like giant alien ships off to my port side during my 1900-2300 shift. I knew they weren't aimed straight at us because I would have seen red and green lights staring us down. But they were way too close to dismiss and there were so many of them. I could see on our chart that I was just south of the NY shipping channel but I still couldn't figure out what these monsters were because nothing was showing up on our AIS screen. Normally if there are any transmitting ships within 10 miles or so, they'll show up with identifying information after an alarm sounds on our AIS monitor. From the alarm we can track who they are, what kind of ship, destination, speed and distance/time until they cross our paths, if at all. I wasn't using the radar at the time which would have also given me similar information. Finally I poked around in the settings of the AIS and saw that something was turned on (a filtering system) that when flipped off presented me with 4 CPA's (Closest Point of Approach) and descriptions. What I had was 3 (!!!) very large cruise ships (including the Queen Mary 2) heading to NYC and a cargo ship taking up the rear. They were going to cross behind us but at enough of an angle that I was only seeing their port-side lights. Don't forget we have a new chart plotter and AIS system so everything is just different enough to be confusing until we get beyond that irksome learning curve. I'm learning but this was my first time on night watch without Ed showing me what's what. It's a great way to learn, in spite of the spikes of anxiety when I see monsters and say, "What the...!!"