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This book makes very clear what the heart of a ship is. And it’s not the electrical or mechanical systems. It’s not even the galley, although I can attest to the revival I felt after consuming the goods from this vessel’s galley at sea. By the language on the engine order telegraph, can you tell the vessel?
It’s Gazela, possibly the oldest square-rigger in the US still sailing, rebuilt in 1901 from timbers of an 1883 vessel, a Portuguese barkentine retired from dory-fishing on the Grand Banks the year Apollo 11 shuttled peripatetic passengers to the moon. As Eric Lorgus says in one of over 50 personal stories in the book, “she the ultimate anachronism, having been built before man’s first flight, and still sailing [commerically] the summer of the first moon landing.” But history by itself is NOT the heart of a ship either.
The heart of a ship is the stories told by her crew, by those who love her. A vessel underway is like an elixir; as she makes voyage after voyage through the decades, sea and weather and crew different each time, her pulse is the magic recounted differently by each person on board. Heart of a Ship breathes.
Here’s an excerpt from John Brady’s story: “We have sailed with master mariners and people who seemed just north of homeless. We have stood watches with carpenters, physicists, bank officers, and doctors. We have seen those just starting out in life and those salvaging what they could from mid-life crises. . . . We have sailed with strippers and masons, machinists and software writers, nurses and riggers, professional mariners and grandmothers….” For more samples, click here.
But don’t take my word for the life that pulsates in this collection. Buy your own copy, and support Gazela’s continuing preservation. Every historic vessel project should be so lucky as to have a collection like this.
For some of the posts I’ve done about Gazela, click here, here, here, and here.
From my reading Stephen King phase, I remember a formula that involved a storm or fog moving on and leaving something inexplicable, usually malevolent. If I
hadn’t expected Gazela at this appointed hour, my imagination would have raced. Instead, it did my heart good to see Gazela–who was still dory fishing on the Grand Banks when Armstrong strolled around some lunar real estate since abandoned. Crossing paths with Gazela as it entered the KVK was John P. Brown. If you’re interested in dining (DINING) aboard Gazela Friday evening, click here for info and reservations.
Gazela‘s in town as part of Atlantic Salt fest. For fotos of Gazela in clear bright August sunshine, click here.
This too, had I not been forewarned, would have conjured up Stephen King thoughts; given its beam, I’d call this “one big-ass ship” aka Makulu . . . if you speak Zulu. Dimensions: 735′ loa x 210′ beam!
It looks like it could carry all of BAT to some foreign shore.
In spite of its color, it’sBlue Marlin. Click here and scroll through to see Blue Marlin–back when it was still blue–carrying the DDG-67 USS Cole from Yemen back to Mississippi in 2000. Click here on Fogonazos to see some huge loads.
I saw some Reinauer boats skittering around the boro today . . . for fear of being loaded onto this orange Blue Marlin. I expect to see more of Blue Marlin loading the next few days.
All fotos by Will Van Dorp.
Unrelated but almost . . . See these fotos Capt Joey of Good Morning Gloucester took of Wanderbird high and dry up in Cape Ann.
What’s this? Clam-shell bucket and helicopter markings?
Amazing, as in IMO9456331. Amazing is the name of the vessel. And amazingly, three vessels here appear mostly on the rocks: middle ground in Noble Express and in the distance the stack belongs to Inyala.
I’m not sure where the cargo has originated, but
Amazing arrived in the sixth boro about a week after traversing the Panama Canal. So although we get salt from lots of places, this salt
I believe comes from somewhere in Asia, and
other minerals are commingled, here’s the color on the pile.
Ultimately it gets to storage barns like this one on the sanitation Pier on “thirteenth avenue.”
All fotos by Will Van Dorp.
Unrelated: Gazela will be at this very salt dock for a few days starting May 18 in transit to Portsmouth, NH.
Totally unrelated but amazingly upsetting to me: Can a government official with an annual salary of less than $7000/year order a yacht costing over $350 million? Sure, if the official happens to be Minister of Agriculture and Foresty of Equatorial Guinea, and named Teodorin Obiang, son of Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo (scroll through to see an official 2009 portrait). Disclosure: I’ve never visited Equatorial Guinea, but between 1975 and 1977, as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon, I visited along the border between the two countries.
The last milestone was the 1000, but this one, post 1280, goes up exactly four years (well, I’m three days late, actually) after my first ever post. Since then, I’ve spent countless hours of free time educating and entertaining myself, touring other folk through the sixth boro,
interacting with passersby in ports wherever they beckon–ports like the sixth boro,
Baltimore (and many other places …) and more I hope to come. Thanks to all for your tours and advice and feedback.
Meanwhile, I’m enjoying this blog more than ever, learning to see, fishing
(sometimes in extreme conditions) for
flights of fancy and
all manner of lore and historical info about the sixth boro and all the waters connected to it.
Like yesterday, I was reading about Alice L. Moran, her marvelous feats, and wondering if she’s still called Amsterdam and working in Bahraini waters. And I was reading about PY-16 USS Zircon (later a pilotboat named New York and previously a Pusey & Jones steam yacht Nakhoda), predecessor of pilotboat New York.
I’ve enjoyed these first 1280 and will be continuing. Meanwhile, here’s another interesting thing I stumbled upon yesterday on page 12 of the Spring 1966 Tow Line magazine. I hope no one is irked by my printing a screen shot here. Enjoy. Letter 1 with request on left and response on right.
Thanks for reading this blog and commenting for four years. The ride goes on.
Photo credits here to Les, Allen, Carolina, and bowsprite. Greets to the guys on SKS Tyne.
Meanwhile, a few words about the MWA Waterfront Conference tomorrow: ”
New York, NY: On Tuesday, November 30, senior officials and representatives from over 14 government agencies will join over 500 waterfront advocates, educators, and planning experts for the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance’s 2010 Waterfront Conference at Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in New York, the George Gustav Heye Center.
Dozens of agency officials, politicians, and other experts will be on hand to offer their perspectives on the future of the NY-NJ Harbor, including: NYC Deputy Mayor Robert Steel, Bob Martin of the NJ Department of Environmental Protection, Col. John R. Boulé II of the US Army Corps of Engineers, Capt. Linda Fagan of the US Coast Guard, Peter Davidson of the Empire State Development Corporation, David Bragdon of the NYC Mayor’s Office of Long-Term Planning & Sustainability, Adrian Benepe of the NYC Department of Parks & Recreation, Amanda Burden of the NYC Planning Commission, Cas Holloway of the NYC Department of Environmental Protection, and Seth Pinsky of the NYC Economic Development Corporation.”
To see an excellent Flickr foto of Gazela by Gregg M, click here. And for an account plus video of Gazela‘s trip to New Bedford earlier this summer, click here. For my earlier pics of Gazela in Atlantic Basin Red Hook, click here.
As Gazela sailed back to Philly between daybreak last Wednesday and late afternoon Thursday, I was fortunate to be a very “green” member of the crew, my first time sailing on a barquentine. Other vessels passed and overtook us, and I’m including those fotos here in hopes that anyone aboard these other vessels who photographed us might be willing to share those shots of Gazela. Please do.
Gazela departs through the Narrows under a drizzle; precipitation had been off and on for three days, delaying departure by 48 hours. (For pics, doubleclick enlarges.)
From midships, looking aft . . . notice the crew wearing foulies.
Tanker British Serenity overtakes us outside the Narrows. By sunset, 10 hours later, we’d motorsailed off Atlantic City, surfing swells and getting soaked with on & off drizzle.
Skies clear overnight, giving us a just-past-full moon. I stand a midnight–6 am watch from Cape May and up Delaware Bay. This is sunrise.
After breakfast, I nap for an hour until a lurch awakens me. ”Must be someone’s wake,” I imagine, grab my camera, and go on deck. I believe it was Amberjack, also headed up the Bay.
Astern, two vessels are catching up to us: broad on the port beam were EPA-Bold and Vane Brothers Brandywine.
For info on what Bold is doing in Delaware Bay and its schedule for the rest of 2010, click here.
If you have Thursday morning fotos of Gazela, please get in touch. I have additional Bold shots.
Doubleskin 141 looks formidable as it passes and
soon leaves us astern just
southeast of the PSEG power plants. By the way, light was unfavorable to get fotos of the five wind turbines in Atlantic City.
Amsterdam-registered Suomigracht passes us. For more Suomigracht shots, click here and here.
Austin Reinauer was anchored just south of the C & D Canal.
Near the Delaware Pennsylvania line, we cross paths with Aframax tanker Amalthea, which may or may not
have delivered Venezuelan crude.
Gazela was built in Setubal, Portugal; as such, which language might you expect here? A primary wood used is angelique.
A trip that begins in rain might end like this: honey colored sunshine after a trip well done, this member of the crew a little less green.
If you were on any of the vessels above and have pics of Gazela, please get in touch.
All fotos here by Will Van Dorp.
Many thanks to the Philadelphia Ship Preservation Guild and wonderful crew for the opportunity to sail. If you are interested in volunteering, click here. Gazela expects to be back up through the sixth boro once more this fall.
Because of last night’s rain, you have one last chance to see “Seven Deadly Seas” TONIGHT at 8 pm. Go early and catch this hard-to-replicate combination: left to right Cape Race, Gazela, and Mary A. Whalen … as seen from the entrance to the Brooklyn Passenger Terminal in Red Hook.
Big doings also are happening for Pegasus, here with a happy tour group. Pegasus and Lehigh Valley 79 will be docked in Brooklyn Bridge Park starting later this week.
Uh . . . shoes of future mariners?
Contemporary mariners work aboard such vessels as
JoAnne Reinauer III
and (right to left) Twin Tube– a supply boat–and CSL Atlas, cousin of my longlost Alice O. By the way, Atlas brought in the beginnings of the upcoming winter’s supply of road salt . . or was that table salt??
Colleen McAllister and other vessels labor away at the sisyphusian task of dredging.
R/V vessels like Blue Sea do their own research/education work. Here RV Blue Sea is on the high and dry as a preparation for a new season.
Jay Michael frequents the sixth boro, and
in parting, this sloop (Margaret A ?) passes a fuel barge.
Unfortunately, I missed yesterday’s lobsterboat races up in Portland, Maine, and I have to wait til 2011 to see them. But you can still get to the 18th Annual Great North River (aka sixth boro) Tugboat Race on September 5. See you there.
Tomorrow … yes … another few days’ gallivant. Details later.
All fotos here by Will Van Dorp.
Unrelated: Check out this Newtown Creek shipping post by Restless.
Ooooolala! What’s this? Make your way to Atlantic Basin ASAP; click here for tickets … only two shows Saturday (tonight!) and two Sunday left, before the floating burlesque sails over the horizon.
Staging this burlesque is barquentine Gazela, whose first life fishing for cod continued until the year Armstrong stepped onto the moon. Yessir, this fine vessel served as a dory boat until 1969!
Up to 35 dories (many built in the Merrimack Valley north of Cape Ann) like the one in the foreground here served “mothership” Gazela.
Daytime tours of Gazela as well as nighttime entertainment can be had only through this weekend! This is also the last chance (for a while) to see Mary Whalen at Pier 11. For directions to Pier 11, click here.
So I went to the show “The Seven Deadly Seas” the other night. Before the show, the devil’s advocate (of the Flaming Cherries) emerges from the nether portions of the ship, and
the city darkens as the band begins to play. See the twinkling Manhattan lights off in the distance.
Feisty bawds dueling over everything
can be charmed only by
dancing
and more dancing and
still more dancing that sometimes lead to … lost clothing.
Come learn the story of Calico Jack, who imagined he had all the skills needed to thrive on Wall Street.
Bring a dozen friends and make it the most memorable night of the summer, the summer of Atlantic Basin as prime offshore Broadway.
Will Calico Jack swing here, or is it Camp Butner FCC for him?
Don’t miss the boat.
Fotos by Eric Lorgus (some taken in Philadephia) and Will Van Dorp.
Can you guess the connection between the three fotos that follow? Gazela –540 hp, the oldest wooden square-rigger sailing in the United States, built in Portugal in 1901 (?) to fish cod, and Philadelphia’s tall ship.
Pati R. Moran, 5100 hp and built in Maine in 2007
and “pirate Calico Jack, who, unbeknownst to his crew, has decided toget out of the pirate business, and has sailed to Wall Street to make some business deals, secure a401k, and plan his retirement.”
Once more, Gazela,
Pati R, and
… who’s this with Calico Jack!
Well, buy your tickets here for “The Seven Deadly Seas.” Read a review from the Philadelphia CityPaper here.
Bringing Gazela and crew/acting troupe to Atlantic Basin is the result of hard work of PortSide NewYork. ”About bringing her to NYC, Eric Lorgus, President of Gazela, had this to say, ‘Tall ships have found it increasinglyhard to visit this place, and I’ve been trying to crack NYC foryears. We really appreciate the efforts PortSide has made on ourbehalf. Carolina herself has pursued this will tenacity and zeal.’
Carolina Salguero, Director of PortSide NewYork says about the visit ‘PortSide was founded to bring the BlueSpace, or the waterpart of the waterfront, to life in New York City. We are excited that Gazela is coming, because tall ships are education and inspiration afloat. We hope her visit opens the door to more visits by more boats—of all types—at this pier and other piers.We are encouraged by recent government initiatives focusing onthe water itself and grateful that the EDC [New York City Economic Development Corp] has made Pier 11 available to us for Gazela’s visit.’
Gazela will be open for deck tours during the day. These arerun on an open-house basis. To defray costs of the trip, a modest $5 donation is being requested, but is not mandatory. The cabaretalso subsidizes the trip.”
As to the connection between Gazela and Pati R., I’m leaving that open to your guesses for a few days yet.
See press release here. Show dates are August 19–22, 8 pm and 10 pm shows, for a total of eight shows.
Fotos 1, 2, 4, 5, and 7 by Will Van Dorp. Show fotos are compliments of Peter Gaffney of Cabaret Red Light.
See Otherwatersheds 6 here. Many thanks to Jeff Schurr and Capt. John Curdy, who gave me a first-rate tour of 20ish miles of greater Philadelphia waterfront from the Delaware line up to the Delair and Betsy Ross Bridges. According to a studied source: “Of the 360 major American ports, the Delaware River ranks second in total tonnage shipped, and eighth in the dollar value of the cargo. Every year, 2600 ships call into our port, which claims to employ 75,000 people.” And another from RITA, too pithy to summarize, lists the largest trading countries and the predominant products in and out through the port.
More posts and maps on Philly–in all its vibrancy as a port– in the next few days, but for now, a sampling, an overview of old and new, starting with the most threatened ones. Of course, that would be SS United States–which I wrote about here. For info on the raffle, click here. Doubleclick on fotos enlarges.
Equally endangered is Olympia. Click here and here for info on efforts to save this piece of history.
Setubal, Portugal-built Grand Banks dory boat Gazela graces the waterfront. Find more about her history here.
Mischief (ex-Thornton Bros, Cissi, and Cissi Reinauer) in her current colors and habitat. A previous appearance of this vessel is here.
Inactive carriers John F. Kennedy and Forrestal await their fate, as
does destroyer Arthur W. Radford. Soon to be an Atlantic reef ?
Weeds grow from the fendering of B. M. Thomas, launched in Groton, 1926.
Like I said earlier, port of Philly has a vibrancy, illustrated by OSG Vision and
“shortie” (77′ x 34′) tug Reid McAllister.
More Delaware pics up tomorrow, but for now, in the Pyne Point section of Camden, Anne is the skipjack rigged schooner (1965, masts farthest to the right) hiding in the weeds. Now look in the extreme left side of the foto . . . there in the weeds, what
might this be? Anyone identify this mystery tug?
The interactive map below shows Pyne Point Park; the weedy inlet is just to the right of the park label.
Again, many thanks to Jeff and John. All fotos taken yesterday by Will Van Dorp.
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