Best of Mermaids 1

I’m going to miss the mermaid parade this year.  And, yes,  I AM going to miss it.

But you don’t have to.  Click here for info to get started on your way.   It’s free, although you can choose to pay for access to the staging area where I took some of these photos.

This’ll be the second time I miss since I first went in 2004.   I go because of the mermaids, of course.  Mermaids tell me they often linger below the surface in boat photos I take.

Seriously, while making my way around the five boros and beyond, I see scenes that would make powerful images, but it might be creepy to intrude into strangers’ lives to get those shots.  In fact, I’m not really a people-photographer, yet the mermaid parade is all about posing.  Paraders want their photos taken.  Once a mermaid even asked to take MY photo, but some sort of electromagnetic pulse zapped her camera.

If you’re not from the greater sixth boro, the parade happens on Coney Island, now a barrier beach.  Some history of the esprit of the beach I alluded to in this post from 2010.

Hints of NYC’s diversity emerge along with the denizens of the deeps.

 

 

 

 

A body paint artist there seems to take inspiration from coloration on amphiprioninae.

 

 

There are even mermen, or in this case someone I know posing as a navigator about to be dragged off course and possibly to see Davy Jones by a siren.

A lot of families come to the parade; in this case, a friend’s daughter attracted the attention of a mermaid with magic powder.

 

 

Each year a king and queen are named . . . as is true for many of the parades that happen each year in the boros, and

this royalty needs to be there before the marchers step off.

As I said, I’ll miss it this year, which has prompted me to have another glance at my photos of past years.

All photos here by Will Van Dorp.

 

What Xena Augurs

aka Names 34

What??

Xena, Lady Tara, one of exactly three barges squired in by Foxy3,

Denise A. Bouchard, 

Silver Cindy,

Elbabe . . . El Babe? . .. with Bruce A. minding to port,

Turecamo Girls, and I’ll bet more than just one British Sailor or sailor of any of the seafaring nationalities . . .

along with a high voltage shore connection . . .?!@#!    That can mean only one thing…  there might be a Debbie around soon too . . .

See tomorrow’s post, for which the photos have not even been taken yet, but it’s June fishing time.  All photos taken in the past week by Will Van Dorp.  Here’s a previous Xena reference on tugster.

June Fishing in the Sixth Boro 2

#1 was here.

It’s June.  Might you be suffering from hypoclupea . . .  deficiency of herring?    Read what the celebrated neurologist Oliver Sacks writes about treatment here, as published in the New Yorker two years ago.  Hypoclupea can leave you blase, bleached, apathetic . . .

dried out . . . as Miss Callie herself is feeling these days.  To see Miss Callie in her element among the fishes, click here.

Even on Coney Island, the painting near the boardwalk looks off because this siren has taken to eating . . . @#@!  dogs, and they’re not even hot.

Go fishing . . . whether you use bunker for bait and catch your own, or just

exchange cash or credit at the nearest purveyor of “new catch holland herring,”  and you’ll find your zest for life just

returns!    You might even end up seeing mermaids without having to go to the latest Depp/Disney show.

All fotos by will Van Dorp, who has lots of unrelated odds and ends and who just might not post tomorrow.

A herring-eaters blog

Translated info on the fleet at  a “loggers” festival in Vlaardingen on the Rhine this weekend.  “Logger” in Dutch is “lugger” in English.

From Uglyships’ Bart, here’s a video on an uneventful loading of  the loading of 15! tugs onto SSHLV Fjell in Singapore bound for Maracaibo via Cape Town.  Here’s a Reuters article on same.

And finally, last but not least, you’ll see a new image of “tugster” on the upper left side of this blog; click on the image and you’ll see part of an article that appeared in Jack Tar Issue #5.  Watercolor is by Herb Ascherman of Cold is the Sea blog.  Another great example of his work is cover on Jack Tar #5.

Finally, if you find yourself in Manhattan Saturday, look to the water:  I know of at least one swim around the island race going on.  New York has enthusiastic swimmers!

Happy solstice!

More Pioneer: Request

A bit of chain . . . and the onboard scenes like the ones I posted the past two days . . . these are the only views of Pioneer I got.  Simple request:  if you shot any good scenes of Pioneer heeled over or otherwise playing tag in the 20-30 mph winds on Thursday, could you get in touch.  Please.

I’d be happy to exchange fotos, high-res ones.

Especially if you were on the water on another of the chase boats or welcome boats,

let’s exchange

fotos.  Obviously Reid and Anne were the

center of attention . . . royalty of the ball, and again congratulations to them.  See Brian’s (Moveable Bridge) posting from the pier here.

And now . . . faintly, I hear the merfolk and all their kin drumming.  They’re soon to come ashore.    See you at Coney.

At Play Near J-Bay

Forces at play include:  sun, earth, season, tide, surf, and many more.  J aka Jamaica Bay is not not more than 10 nautical miles (goose-flying miles) from Manhattan, about the same distance the Meadowlands is, if you continued that straight line between my vantage point and the Empire State Building, then beyond.

Here’s a map.  Doubleclick to enlarge;  see “you are here” and continue clockwise around the indicated yellow path and look toward Duck Point Marshes;   Manhattan is to the northwest.  J-Bay is an NPS area.  Click here for info on the National Parks of New York Harbor Conservancy.

See the Verrazano Bridge on the far side of Floyd Bennett Field.

Osprey respond to all those same forces at play.

On the far side of a pond, a wildlife volunteer (aka midwife?) observes an egret,

a snowy egret, gossiping and waiting . . .  as they all are.

So what’s this volunteer doing?  Note the pendant and the red dot.

After the eggs get laid–prompted by all these forces–

and a thorough burying process happens,

the red-dot mama gets weighed, and all relevant info gets encoded.  I saw a half dozen egg-layers summoned by the forces in a one-mile walk in the preserve yesterday.  A year ago, on the northeast side of J-Bay, the terrapin shut down JFK.  See the story here.

Humans think the terrapin obey signs?    From the volunteer, I learned that another force at play here is an overpopulation of raccoons.  And for hatchlings, predators include wading birds and voracious fish.

Well, it’s time for us all to kick back and enjoy all those same forces at play:  Saturday . . . Coney.    Or if you’re upriver . . .  Clearwater.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp, himself beset by forces and tribal ritual of spring.

For info on terrapin mating, see here and here.

For another rite of spring in the sixth boro, click here.