May Nostalgia

[boatme99]

Its May. I always get nostalgic the first week of May.
That's when I would cast off the lines at my Florida dock and begin what would be a 2 - 3 week cruise northbound to Maryland where I'd spend 5 or 6 weeks before continuing on to New England for the season.
I do miss my boat days.

 

[kcghost]

I think that most people are driven crazy by traveling by boat. You spent half your time looking for a port or traveling out of port instead of traveling. Of course, there are those that enjoy the leisure of it.

 

[Sweet Home Alabama]

Is the old adage true, the happiest two days the day you get the boat and the day you sell the boat true?

 

[boatme99]

Is the old adage true, the happiest two days the day you get the boat and the day you sell the boat true?

I don't know. Never owned one, I just got paid live aboard and operate them.

 

[mso489]

My experience was living on a warship, if a minesweeper qualifies. And we were on patrol for months running. And I was a worker ant, not an officer, so living was particularly spare. Though it was long hours, hard work, and cramped living to say the least, the actual communing with the ocean on the weather decks, and the perpetually rolling deck had an odd entrancing effect. A few shipmates caught me taking in the scene as the seas were getting rough and the wind was hammering the ship. One big old engiineman rocked back and squinted at me and said, "You like this shit, don't you?" And all three shipmates shook their heads and walked off. And they were right.

 

[boatme99]

So, you didn't get to pull into a dock for Happy Hour every day in the Navy? You poor bastards.

 

[edger]

To boost your feelings of nostalgia, read Bill Buckley's books about sailing, and listen to Gordon Bok's and Stan Roger's records!

 

[mso489]

Happy hour in the Navy was when they passed around airline bottles of brandy after everyone got soaked during underway replenishment, and I went to a few of the non-drinkers and offered to take that sin off their hands, drank a few, and had a good nap. (Underway replenishment is where fuel and supplies are pulleyed across from an oiler. The crew has to provide the in-haul power because a mechanical winch might tear off someone's arm and leg. Occasionally we'd haul in a new crew member in a bosun's chair as well. ) I don't think the brandy was authorized, but when you get into the combat zone, you don't salute much either. ... The fuel comes through a hose pulleyed over, then used to fill a big rubber bladder lashed to the deck with fuel oil. Details too many to explain.