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Did I remember I’d seen her before in the same estuary and in the same time of year?
No, but I had.
Did I know the difference between bitumen and asphalt?
No. But now I do.
Keeping a daily blog of my sights and evolving understanding of them brings wonder. Did I know the reference in the name, Da Ming Shan?
No, but I’ve since learned it . . . a place as satisfying maybe as the Hudson Highlands. Should you care? Not really, but I’m glad I looked these things up.
Bon voyage, watch stander…
as you head for Gibraltar and beyond.
All photos and musing by Will Van Dorp, who’s written about freshwater asphalt haulers here.
I took the photo below on June 7. My special interest in Alice stems from her being the subject of my very first blog post.
Since then, I understand from two sources that Alice Oldendorff will be renamed. Algoma Verity.
Verily? Verity it’ll be when she next returns? We’ll see.
Anyhow, here’s one source, and here’s another. Also involved in the buyout are Harmen and Sophie. Now they are named Algoma Valour and Algoma Victory, respectively, according to this source.
Photo by Will Van Dorp.
One day in April, I noticed five ROROs in the sixth boro at the same time.I’m think the volume of ROROs in the port has increased. Anyone have substantiation of that hunch?
Contemporary ROROs look quite similar one to the other, but a careful point by point comparison reveals differences. Look at them here.
Hoegh Chiba was first in this line up, and
Amethyst Ace was next. The Ace vessel was built in 2008; the Hoegh in 2006.
On a different day, Glovis Companion arrived.
She was built in 2010.
Wallenius is often credited as the company that originated the roll on-roll off concept,
Nicholson Transit was moving cars around the Great Lakes a few decades before that. Click on the photos above and below for context.
Previous Glovis vessels on this blog can be found here, and other ROROs here.
All color photos by Will Van Dorp.
Quick post today . . . with a followup tomorrow. I became somewhat obsessed with the name of this ULCV; I’d expected it to arrive a day earlier and it anchored a dozen leagues out, so you can understand my obsession when my brain told me I was waiting in vain for the “world.” For now, this may be among the largest box boats to arrive in the harbor . . . 1200′ x 167′ x 47′ with an air draft of 177′, if my ears caught the numbers correctly.
Maybe you can participate in my tangent, though. Here’s how. Given the name of this vessel, what comes to mind? What song titles? And, if you worked for YM and needed to come up with a name for a sister vessel, what would you suggest? I don’t believe there is a sister vessel. And I believe this is YM World’s first visit to the sixth boro. If there’s any humor in this post, I intend it to be on me and on the crazy places my brain goes when I consider the (YM) World to be arriving in NYC . . . because hasn’t it always….
Some of my thoughts, in no particular order, would be these: stop the world I wanna get off, world on a string, I’m sitting on top of the world . . . . As to a sister ship, I come up with “other world” and then this one being worldly and the sister being otherworldly . . .
Anyhow, as I said earlier, more of this actual vessel tomorrow. By the way, she’s currently at Global Terminal in Bayonne, arriving here Saturday (4/27) as its first port call after departing singapore on 4/1.
All photos and reactions by Will Van Dorp.
Here’s a repository of song titles--most of which I don’y know–with “world” in the title. And book titles . . . around the world in 80 days has [comic] possibilities. This “world” song comes with its own NYC images in its music video. For many years I was a fan of what record stores (what are they??!) classified as “world music, stuff like this . . . or this.
And hat’s off to the fine machines and skilled crews who guide these behemoths into and out of ports as if the feats were just play.
Today I caught the stork, one stork.
I had work to do, but I just couldn’t let this big cherry blossom magenta vessel pass unrecorded, especially not on a sunny late October day. Besides, I could work twice as hard the next few days . . ..
Wait . . . I thought it was one STORK!??
Yup . . . one stork from Tokyo.
No way! It’s one tug named James D. Moran.
This minimal superstructure probably contributes to fuel economy.
She’s a product of Japan Marine United Corporation in Kure shipyard, Hiroshima.
And for some really cool alongside on the dock photos, here are a few from Sean McQuilken in Charleston.
It’s more than 100 feet up to the bridge wing!
Thanks to Sean for use of these photos; all others by Will Van Dorp.
Here was the first, but back then I had no idea what was to come.
On yet another gray day in the sixth boro, the pink cherry blossom magenta pink containers spiced up the load. I saw my first pink containers on a truck heading through a small town in upstate New York already this spring, and it caught my eye, has continued to catch my eye.
ONE is the acronym for Ocean Network Express, a new consortium of Japan’s biggest container shipping companies.
I’ve alluded several times to ONE Stork, which I’ve missed twice because it arrived and departed in darkness. But one of these times . . . .
Read that lettering above? Check the hiragana.
To reiterate,
I like that new color in containers. And consortiums make sense for the shippers.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
All All but one of the photos in this post come from David Silver, assigned as a cadet this summer on a Maersk vessel going halfway around the world and back. He departed Port Elizabeth on May 21. This post follows his voyage, focusing on what someone like me–mostly fixed–doesn’t see.
May 24. Charleston. Mark Moran.
May 30. Houston. Thor.
May 31. Houston. Wesley A.
June 06. Norfolk. Maxwell Paul Moran.
June 08. Pilot boards in sixth boro of NYC. JRT Moran.
June 08. VZ Bridge as seen from the ship and
as seen from my location, at about the same moment.
June 09. Port Elizabeth. Kirby Moran.
There was a stop in Algeciras–the world’s 10th largest transshipment port– but no photos of assist tugboats.
June 25. Suez Canal. It could be one of the Mosaed boats, maybe number 1.
June 26. Suez Canal. One of the boats called Salam.
After transiting the Red Sea and stopping in Djibouti, July 9. Mont Arrey,
they rounded the peninsula and entered the Gulf.
July 9. Jebel Ali. P&O Venture. That could be P&O Energy off the stern.
July 12. Port Qasim. SL Hodeida with pilot boat and other Smit Lamnalco tugs.
July 13. Port Pipavav. It appears to be Ocean Supreme and another one of the Ocean Sparkle boats in the distance.
I have enjoyed seeing this variety of towing vessels from this trip halfway around the world. Now I hope the return trip brings more photos and a safe return in late August.
Many thanks, David.
Some cruise ships look great after having sailed for many years. For example, Artania entered the sixth boro a few weeks ago. She was launched as Royal Princess in 1984 in Finland, 756′ x 97′ and carried around 1200 passengers with 537 crew.
The even older Stockholm still sails as well. Rich Taylor caught it here three years ago in St Kitts.
The following day, Norwegian Escape arrived.
30 years newer, 1069′ x 136′ and with capacity of 4266 with 1733 crew.
NCL vessels have featured an evolving use of art on their hulls. The artist for Escape was Guy Harvey.
The quality of the next photos is not great; it was drizzling, this is not a good camera, and I was not expecting her to depart at 1000. Bliss‘ tale of the tape comes in a 1082’ x 136 and about 4000 passengers.
The hull art here is from Wyland, Robert Wyland, originally a Michigander.
Bliss was doing 14kts by the time she exited the Narrows, and 24 hours after her departure for Miami, she was doing 23kts and already off Myrtle Beach!
But Justin Zizes caught the real difference between a previous NCL generation (Gem) and Bliss; a tremendous difference in scale. Gem was was launched about 10 years ago, 965′ x 125′ and 2400 passengers on 15 decks. For a great photo showing the scale of Gem compared with a NYC Circle Line vessel, click here and scroll.
Many thanks to Justin for use of his photos. All others by Will Van Dorp.
Two unrelated blog links:
Emita II is a 1953 Blount built excursion vessel long operated by MidLakes Navigation of Skaneateles, NY. But it has recently been sold to Harbor Country Cruises in New Buffalo MI (outside of Chicago). The sellers–the Wiles family–are delivering the boat to southern Lake Michigan and doing this blog on her journey.
GirlAtSea is a blog kept by a Romanian environmental officer aboard a cruise ship. If you click here, you’ll see that she has recently called at the cruise terminal in Bayonne.
After 66 days at sea, Zhen Hua 20 dropped anchor in Gravesend Bay yesterday after a few hours after I departed. But thanks to Bjoern of New York Media Boat, this phase of the visit has been documented.
Given the ubiquity of containers, there’s a worldwide demand for the cranes; according to their website, 70% of this style crane worldwide is produced by ZPMC. As the container ships get larger, a need for cranes with greater boom reach is created. ZPMC Netherlands has a fleet currently of 22 ships to idle these seemingly impossible loads. Since 2012, ZPMC has successfully completed “1070 voyages to 180 ports in 80 countries.”
Note the Miller’s Launch crew boat off starboard bow.
Booms must be lowered before the delivery will fit under the Bayonne Bridge on the transit to Port Elizabeth . . . alter this week.
Many thanks to Bjoern for use of these photos. For more info on New York Media Boat–actually there are several vessels–check them out online or see and “like” them on FB.
Here was a Zhen Hua vessel in port back in 2007–the first I ever saw–from 2008 here, and from 2014 . . here, here, and here.
Marginally related: One would not need these cranes at one point in the Comoros; this practice I’ve read has ended.
Preliminary question: Where in the world is Alice Oldendorff? Answer follows.
This profile below–not Alice— might make you imagine yourself in the St Lawrence Seaway or the Great Lakes. But I took this photo on the Lower New York Bay yesterday. I had not caught a self-unloader of this style in the Lower Bay since 2007!
A CSL self-unloader does call in the sixth boro occasionally. Here’s a CSL post I did in 2010, photos in the sixth boro.
She headed into the Narrows loaded down with
aggregates from Aulds Cove in Nova Scotia. And I’m guessing that’s here, place I hope to visit some day.
Besides stone, self-unloaders locally also offload salt, as here H. A. Sklenar and here Balder.
The photo below I took in July 2009, again a self-unloader bringing in aggregates,
a task usually done by fleet mate Alice Oldendorff, who surely has had enough exposure on this blog. Don’t get me wrong . . . Alice is also a self-unloader, but she had other cranes as well, as you can see from the photo below, taken in 2009.
Where is Alice? Well, she’s 300 miles from Pyongyang. THAT Pyongyang.
Here’s a little more context, showing Pyongyang to the right and Beijing top left, and heavy ship traffic.
Alice made her last stop here a couple months back, then she headed through the Panama Canal to Qingdao for some rehab. Qingdao is also spelled Tsingtao, like the beer.
She’ll be back come summer.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
tugster: a waterblog 
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