Retro Sixth Boro 59 A

Happy March . . . .  Exactly a decade ago I made my second trip to Puerto Rico, and both times I spent some time on the island of Vieques.  If you’ve never been to either PR or Vieques, you owe it to yourself to visit this corner of the US, so close to the east coast.

Of course, being myself, I spent some time watching the traffic in San Juan and visiting with the fine mariners working there.  Here the classic Honcho (former fleet mate of Atlantic Salvor and Atlantic Enterprise)

heads out to meet El Morro and together with 

Handy Three do their magic in the harbor.  

Don Raul also came into port with a barge on the wire.  Don Raul, working for the Borinken Towing and Salvage at the time, has been repositioned to the Great Lakes to work for the USACE.  Has anyone seen her on the Lakes yet, maybe Buffalo?  Has her livery been changed?

Beth M. McAllister, slightly newer sister of the sixth boro’s Ellen McAllister, was and still is working in San Juan.   Both Beth M. and Ellen are–as you can see–former YTB tugboats built for the USN in WI.

Service between the big island and Vieques is provided by small planes, where you get asked your weight (please answer honestly)and seated accordingly to balance out the seven-passenger load, and lots of ferries, like Isla Bonita below. 

For more context on this part of Puerto Rico, click here for the 2013 post.  See any resemblance to Blount built boat in the depicted nearer ferry below?

Clearly, back then I was still floundering with the camera on a flip phone and took the image below, with the negative setting.  To me, it adds magic to a magical place for me.  I can’t believe that a decade has passed since last I left the enchanted islands . . .

All photos, WVD, who encourages everyone to visit PR. 

Other Watersheds 7: Reredux

Here was the first redux for the Delaware.

Handy Three appeared on this blog almost a decade ago in a different livery and in a different port.

Of course, she’s been a Moran tugboat for a half dozen years already.

 In the background above, that’s the 1968-commissioned, 2007-decommissioned USS John F. Kennedy.

 

Several hundred yards away from Handy Three, Hunter D.   I’d never seen this boat previously although for some time a few years ago I’d see her AIS “ghost signals” all over the sixth boro.

She’s still in Harley livery even though on paper she wears a lion.

 

All photos, WVD.

Dole Ships

Dole has a lot of ships.  Capt. Neftali Padilla took these three fotos from his office, evident in foto #3.  Enjoy the fotos and ponder this question:  which fruits does Dole export from Puerto Rico?  Answer later.  Dole Asia meets Dole Europa.

Here’s the office . . . Z-One.

Here’s a foto I took of Z-One at the dock last spring while working on an article about its fleet sister, Handy Three.

Thanks to Capt. Padilla for use of his fotos.

Random San Juan 2

San Juan Pilots see big waves while still inside the Bay.

These same huge rollers fail to discourage fishermen, but

sabalo . . . aka tarpon attract!

Midnight Coast is another short-sea shipper of containers.

That’s assist tugs Honcho and Handy-Three with tanker Freja Taurus.

Pelicans perch in trees for plume-maintenance after doing

dives like this and

adding a splash to stun prey.

Time to move back to the sixth boro, but Puerto Rico . . . I’ll be back.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

 

Tugs of San Juan

Here’s the entrance to San Juan Bay . . . Freja Taurus passing the #2 red under rain driven by 15+ knot wind out of the north.

OK . . . Elizabeth snapped this foto . . . that’s my “focused” look as I huddle–like the ghost of a century-ago Spanish soldier– out of the rain behind  the bottom level of El Morro.

Here’s the aforepromised foto of Beth M. McAllister (ex-YTB-805), three years and two months younger than the sixth boro’s own Ellen McAllister.  Both Beth and Ellen were built in Wisconsin.

Don Raul came out of an Ohio shipyard exactly five years ago . . . now operating for Borinken Towing and Salvage .  .  .

drifting in and

towing a fuel barge.

Getting back to the first two fotos, once inside, Handy Three takes Freja Taurus‘ bow.

OK . . . another view of Beth at the dock.

PRT’s Triton  (ex-AT-77) is a 72-year-old Texas-built workhorse, just recently involved in the rescue of ex-Smit Rotterdam . . . foto later in this post.

And here’s my quite-poor foto of ex-Smit Rotterdam. . . .  now called Global Destiny.   Here’s more story on the rescue that brought Global Destiny into San Juan harbor.    She’s since headed south and east, but I really wish I’d caught this monster headed out the mouth of the Bay past El Morro.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Unrelated . . . here’s a foto of a Smit tug in the sixth boro of NYC a few decades back with a quite famous tow called Peking.

Looking for a Ship

OK . .  I stole am borrowing the title from what I’d call a “must-read” book by John McPhee . . .  from two decades back.  But this small boat, identified

here–double click–is

doing just that, no matter the stormy weather.

See the pilot boat here . . . approaching the incoming container ship, which is looking for a port.

The pilot boat descends into a trough starboard the vessel, SS El Morro. . . .      Sun Shipbuilding launched . . . 1974.   See hull # 666.   Here it approaches its namesake. . . .

where–standing off a sentry box–aka–una garita waits Honcho, a 1975 tug, also looking for a ship, along with

its newest fleetmate, Handy Three.   By the way, does anyone have a foto of Handy Three passing through New York City  . . . the sixth boro . . .  late last spring on its maiden voyage between Cleveland and San Juan?

If so, please get in touch . .  see email along upper left.

All fotos yesterday by Will Van Dorp, in the last half hour before catching a ride back to NYC . . .  aka the sixth boro.