You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘Sea Dart II’ tag.
Here was last year’s post by this title.
My 2020 calendars are ready and can be mailed out as early as this Monday. To order, send me your USPS mailing address by email (parrotlect at gmail dot com , you know what I mean) and pay by paypal to that email address, or check made out to Will Van Dorp. Calendars are $15 each.
When I started the calendar idea, I’d not considered needing a cover photo, so it was proposed that I chose the Sea Scouts and Sea Dart II, thinking that organization would be one to mention as a possible group to support. This is a break-even enterprise for me, but if you want to pay more, make a donation to the local Sea Scouts, whose Ship 228 I chose for the cover. Contact them here.
Here are some photos from the Sea Scout group doing chart training and
hand saluting.
So the calendar . . . here are some ..
sample pages.
Your votes guided my choices. In one case, I had to switch an image (the April shot of a container ship under the VZ Bridge) to make the photo fit. In a few cases, no proposed image had a majority, so I included more than one image.
In a few cases, I added some related images. I hope you will be happy with the result.
As to the actual calendar-making process, it was eye-opening. I chose VistaPrint (Waltham MA) because I was happy with work/price from them in the past. Vistaprint is owned by Cimpress, an Irish company that was founded in France. When I completed the assembly process and sent the credit card number, I got a receipt saying it was sold by Vistaprint in Venlo, Netherlands. When the box of calendars arrived, the shipping label stated “Printed in Canada” but was shipped from Reno NV. Mind boggling! This is the global supply chain involved in creating a calendar for a guy in NYC who is handling “order-fulfillment” himself to cut out [the additional] the intermediaries.
It reminds me of a William Langewiesche article I read years ago, which starts out with him telling of flying an air cargo jet over the Himalayas carrying air pallets of Chicago telephone books, back when there were still paper telephone books. It also reminds me of learning that my MMD-related urine sample was jet FedEx’d to a federally-approved facility in the Midwest; now I can’t look at a FedEx jet flying overhead and wondering what manner of biosamples it may be transporting.
I printed only 50, so get your calendar ASAP. My plan for Monday is to carrying a bunch down to the post office. To repeat, if you want one, email me your address. Paypal to my email address is an option; if you want to send a check, email me and I’ll get you my mailing address. Pieces-of-eight are fine; cryptocurrency is not, nor are sand dollars.
Enjoy one of the shortest days of the year, and the first winter sunrise in the sixth boro is not until 0715 on December 22.
Here are the previous posts in this series. Here’s the complete A. de Saint-Exupery quote: “If you want to build a ship [crew a ship], don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work , and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”
I was thrilled to see Sea Dart II this past weekend, and then not far behind
I was fortunate to see them; I know the scouts know how fortunate they are to have this opportunity. Sail on!
All photos and sentiments by Will Van Dorp.
I caught this T-boat back two years ago, and here she is again. I’ve posted on this vessel before, (scroll) here and here. It’s the 1953 Sea Dart II, originally T-513.
She’s become a sign of spring for me.
A good old boat like this to learn marketable skills would have been heaven-sent for me as a kid.
Fly your flags high, Scouts.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
I have more Saint Lawrence posts, but with a chrononautical weekend behind us, let me digress and report. The mood for the first ship was set by the weather; see what the mist did to my favorite downtown building–70 Pine. Click here and be treated to a slideshow of views through time of boro Manhattan’s tall observation cliffs, past present and future.
Looking eastbound up the East River, I saw her waiting, as
first one of her entourage arrived and
and then another.
The term “haze gray” was certainly demonstrated yesterday,
as was the vintage of this Liberty ship headed to sea, for a cruise.
Even the Higgins T-boat in the distance is a whole decade closer to the present–in inception– than Brown, although yesterday all crowded into 2016.
It was a moving sight,
which I beheld,
only slightly regretting I was not aboard.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
Whenever I see something new, it feels like a sunny day, no matter what the meteorologist calls it. Like this day last week, I was hunkering down keeping these spots from messing with my lens . . .
It took some seconds to conclude I’d seen this vessel before, (scroll) here and here. It’s the 1953 Sea Dart II, originally T-513.
I’d love to see her Buda engine, at least not that I know the engine, although my father’s old Allis Chalmers tractors might have had one.
Anyhow, hat’s off Troop 228.
All photos by Will Van Dorp, who hopes to be seeing sea darts of another sort today.
T-boats are up today, and seeing some in Baltimore led me into the archives. Click here for a short history of Carina, a T-boat I saw in Clayton NY but never got a good photo of. Here’s a database of the existing ones, although the info looks dated. Here’s another article on T-boats and Sea Scouts.
Enjoy. Higgins hull #424 from 1952.
taken in January 2011
Higgins hull 434 from 1952
taken in September 2015
Higgins hull 504 from 1953
taken in September 2015
Higgins hull 513 from 1953
taken in July 2014
same boat . . . stern
All photos taken by Will Van Dorp.
Unrelated but fascinating to me: the October 2015 National Geographic article on river transport on the Congo River in the DRC. The article describes conditions not unlike those I encountered on my travels on the River in 1973 and 1974. Click here for a post I did about that time.
Totally related: Here’s the book to read on Higgins.
tugster: a waterblog 
Recent Comments