Joseph Conrad, who claimed not to be a sentimentalist when came to the life at sea, waxed poetic when writing of the trade winds: In the middle belt of the earth the Trade Winds reign supreme, undisputed, like monarchs of … Continue reading
Category Archives: Lore of the Sea
In World War II, the British government set up the Special Operations Executive (SOE) to to conduct espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance in occupied Europe. An unusual group, they were also known as “the Baker Street Irregulars,” (because their headquarters was on Baker Street in … Continue reading
José Salvador Alvarenga, the fisherman who apparently drifted for 13 months at sea in open boat, has been released from the hospital in the Marshall Islands. How is it possible that he could have survived for over a year, while … Continue reading
The Glyndebourne Festival Opera’s Michael Grandage production of Benjamin Britten’s opera, Billy Budd, opened last night at the Brooklyn Academy of Music(BAM.) Herman Melville’s Billy Budd was his last work, which almost died with him in 1891. The unfinished manuscript was … Continue reading
The two stories were drastically different and yet fundamentally the same. Off Florida on Thursday, roughly 75 miles northeast of West Palm Beach, Zeeland, a Royal Netherlands Navy patrol craft bound for Key West, spotted and rescued seven on an overturned … Continue reading
We recently endured the media farce in which dozens of newspapers and websites reported that “a ghost ship filled with cannibal rats may be headed straight for Britain,” even though the ship has probably sunk and the bit about the rats … Continue reading
The USS Forrestal left Phildelphia yesterday, under tow on her way to a scrap yard in Beaumont, Texas. The USS Forrestal (CV-59) was the first US “supercarrier” and the first American aircraft carrier to be built with an angled flight deck, steam … Continue reading
The MV Luno, a 4,600 DWT Spanish general cargo ship, lost power in rough seas and high winds and and was blown onto a breakwater south-west of French port city Bayonne. In winds gusting up to blowing up to 110 Km/hr … Continue reading
On Saturday, we posted about a man who drifted ashore in a 22-24′ fiberglass boat on Ebon Atoll in the Marshall Islands, claiming that he had spent the last 13 months lost at sea. He claims that his boat was … Continue reading
The world’s oldest surviving clipper ship, the City of Adelaide, has arrived in her namesake port in Australia. City of Adelaide clipper ship – finally home City of Adelaide clipper ship finally arrives home in Adelaide … Continue reading
Fascinating commentary on the joys and sacrifices of following her dreams by three-time Olympian sailor Nikola Girke, as she prepares for Rio 2016. “It takes guts to dream” – Canadian Olympian – Nikola Girke … Continue reading
The Starz premium cable channel has a new big-budget original series, Black Sails, which appears to be intended as a gritty, realistic look at piracy in the early 1700s in the pirate’s haven of New Providence in the Bahamas. In … Continue reading
Today’s Google Doodle is of Harriet Tubman. Born a slave, Harriet Tubman escaped and would become a leading “conductor” on the “Underground Railroad” which helped slaves escape from bondage in the South to freedom in the North and in Canada, … Continue reading
A man recently drifted ashore in a 24′ fiberglass boat on Ebon Atoll in the Marshall Islands in the northern Pacific. He speaks only Spanish and says his name is Jose Ivan. He claims to have set off from Mexico heading … Continue reading
Princess Cruises announced that the Caribbean Princess would be returning to Houston one day early “because we were informed that dense fog is expected to close the port for much of the weekend.” Others have suggested that it was because … Continue reading