Sailing

This evening I'm ruminating on the concept of sailing in the 21st century. Rewind a few hundred years and it was all fairly straightforward: body of water plus boat plus mast with sail plus a fair wind equalled sailing. But then along came fossil fuels and the wind was no longer requisite, nor the mast or sail - yet we still refer generically to boats or ships as "sailing" even if they are propelled by steam, coal, oil, diesel, electricity or nuclear power, and we call the people who man them "sailors". 

Wouldn't it be something to reclaim the terms sailing and sailors specifically for those who do things in the old-fashioned way, on craft with masts and sails which require wind to move them along? (You'll note that definition cleverly doesn't exclude sailboards, wind-surfers or even land-based vehicles.)

I imagine you thinking 'That's all well and good, but how then to describe all the rest and how they get about? The motorboats, ferries, cargo carriers, luxury liners, naval ships and submarines, cruise ships, oil tankers, and those giant container vessels?' 

Well, let me throw that back at you in the form of a competition. Have yourselves a little creative brainstorm. What words might serve as modern alternatives to sail, sailing and sailors for vessels that don't have sails? Post your suggestions in the comments below.

I've never sailed in the strict mast-sailcloth-wind sense. I've canoed in English and French rivers, punted countless times on the River Cam, rowed little boats on various rivers and lakes, voyaged as a passenger on proper big liners between this country and West Africa (where I grew up) but the closest I have come to sailing is reading about it in the novels of Arthur Ransome, Joseph Conrad or Erskine Childers - whose 'The Riddle Of The Sands', is my current engrossing bedtime reading.

At a time when spies and spying are making news headlines in the UK (and concerns over Chinese, Iranian and Russian attempts to steal state secrets), it's quite instructive to read 'The Riddle Of The Sands', one of the earliest espionage thrillers in a tradition that has given us John Buchan, Geoffrey Household, Eric Ambler, Graham Greene, Ian Fleming, John le Carré', Len Deighton and Stella Rimington.

I won't spoil the story for you. Suffice to say it involves two Englishmen in a small yacht sailing secretly off the North Sea coast of Germany to uncover infrastructure being prepared for a naval build-up in readiness for a sea invasion of Britain. Published in 1903, the novel was a sensation and did much to persuade the Admiralty to take seriously the possibility of the Germans readying for war, so that when hostilities began a decade later, the British Navy was in a much better state of preparedness.

For a poem on theme, I've chosen something quite famous by John Masefield. I've selected it for this reason: Arthur Ransome loved sailing and when he became literary editor of the periodical Temple Bar in 1905, he commissioned Masefield, who had some experience of sailing before the mast, to write a piece about sailing, shanties and sea songs. Masefield was happy to oblige, and Ransome was so taken with Masefield's article that years later he incorporated nine of the shanties referenced into various of his wonderful adventure stories, the likes of 'Swallows and Amazons', 'We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea', 'Peter Duck', 'Pigeon Post' and 'Secret Water'. 

Sea Fever

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;

And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
                                                   

                                                                                         John Masefield, 1902

                                

Thanks for reading, S;-)

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Sailing - All the Nice Girls Love a Sailor

‘The big ships sail on the Alley Alley O, the Alley Alley O…’

That nursery rhyme always takes me back to the film version of Shelagh Delaney’s A Taste of Honey. The first time I watched it, I was supposed to be in bed. My mother had shooed me off to my room once, on the grounds that it was on too late and not suitable for my eleven year old self. She went back downstairs to our pub and I sneaked back to the living room doorway to watch the film with one ear listening out for her possible return. I was spellbound by Jo and her sailor boyfriend, Jimmy. Whatever it was that my mother thought I shouldn’t see went way over my head. And we used to live near Salford.

My father took up sailing in his retirement. He had a small cabin cruiser on the Lancaster Canal and after a couple of years he upgraded to a larger, better built vessel. It was like a ship inside, all highly polished and varnished dark oak with brass fittings, like a miniature galleon.  He won awards for the best maintained wooden boat. Most summer weekends were spent sailing with my step-mother and in good weather they often took longer trips. They went to boat rallies and joined the Lancaster Canal Boat Club. I attended a couple of dinner dances. Events always ended with everyone singing along loudly to Rod Stewart’s ‘Sailing’, with arms waving. It could get emotional. Dad enjoyed his years with his boat and the club. He climbed the ranks to President of the LCBC, a post he held at the time of his death.  I only visited them on the boat very occasionally. I became queasy after another boat once sailed by and gently rocked us a tiny bit. Clearly, I’m not a sailor.

My husband was a proper sailor.  He left home to study at Nautical College in Hull then sailed with the Merchant Navy to faraway places. He loved his life and would have continued but physical injury put an end to his career. Eventually, it was back to college to train for something else, then in the future, he met me. Every cloud…

Together, we have taken a few short boat trips, Dover to Calais, the south coast of Jersey, Tenby to Caldey Island and St Helier to St Malo. Mostly, I have been fine. The St Malo to St Helier return trip was bad for me. Last year we island-hopped the Outer Hebrides travelling on ferries and we didn’t have any problems. This year we’re doing something similar, but the ferry trip is about four hours. I hope I can cope. I’m sure the destination will be worth it.

My father loved his boat and sailing on the Lancaster Canal, but he visited other waterways as well. He spent holidays on the Norfolk Broads, the Leeds-Liverpool Canal, the Caledonian Canal and other places in other boats. Sailing became his ‘thing’, but despite growing his sea-legs, a trip on the Fleetwood ferry to the Isle of Man made him sea-sick, something that gave us, his family, great amusement.

 

Two special men, both sailors.

I have watched A Taste of Honey many times, sang the song and cried.

 

I found this John Masefield poem.

 

Sea Fever

 

I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;

And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,

And a grey mist on the sea’s face and a grey dawn breaking.

 

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide

Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;

And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying

And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

 

I must go down to the sea again, to the vagrant gypsy life,

To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;

And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover

And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.

 

 

John Masefield, 1878-1967

 

 

 

 

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Spice Up Your Life

Where to begin? What are little girls made of? Well 'sugar and spice and all things nice' of course. Not boring old herbs - they are growing at the bottom of every ordinary garden.  When spices were first traded they were very expensive commodities: So expensive that the people who unloaded the cargoes from ships were often paid in cloves. Nutmeg was literally worth its weight in gold and the island of Run where it was grown had the most expensive real estate on earth. 

The Spice Routes were maritime routes linking the East to the West. Pepper, cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg were all hugely sought-after commodities in Europe, but before the 15th century access to trade with the East was controlled by North African and Arab middlemen, making such spices extremely costly and rare.

Exploration between the 15th and 17th centuries brought about by new navigation technology made sailing long distances possible, Europeans took to the seas to forge direct trading relationships with Indonesia, China, and Japan. Some have argued that it was the spice trade that fuelled the development of faster boats, encouraged the discovery of new lands, and fostered new diplomatic relationships between East and West. It was probably with the discovery of new sources of spice in mind, that Christopher Columbus set out in 1492 and ended up finding America.



The blue line shows the extent of the maritime Spice Route: The red line - the Silk Road. 

The Dutch and English especially profited from the control of the spice trade in the East Indies—modern-day Indonesia, especially the area known as the Moluccas, or Spice Islands, which were the only source of nutmeg and cloves at that time. Wars were fought, lands colonized, and fortunes made on the back of the spice trade, making this trade route one of the most significant in terms of globalization.

These days the chocolate industry thrives on spicing up our lives. I am a chocolate ginger girl myself, but think nothing of throwing cinnamon into chocolate cake, or indeed a stew.   I love the taste of and colour of saffron and recently went up into the hills near Alicante to sample saffron honey - the taste is really incredible.

I grew up with spice. I cannot imagine how food would taste without. I love to smell a baked egg custard, warm from the oven, smothered with freshly grated nutmeg, (even though I can't eat eggs). I mull my own wine at Christmas and bake a strudel full of spice, nuts and mincemeat. I love spice. I even put black pepper on my strawberries.

One of my all-time favourite things in life,  is popping cloves into the scored fat of a ham -  coating with brown sugar - the smell of it cooking makes my mouth water, filling the house with a warming smile and evoking happy memories of family, childhood and love. Spice is an adventure. Go on - I dare you - spice up your life.

Cargoes
Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir
Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine,
With a cargo of ivory.
And Apes and peacocks.
Sandalwood, cedarwood and sweet white wine.

Stately Spanish galleon, coming from the Isthmus,
Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores,
With a cargo of diamonds,
Emeralds, amethysts,
Topazes and cinnamon and gold moidores.

Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack
Butting through the Channel in the mad March days,
With a cargo of Tyne coal,
Road-rail, pig-lead,
Firewood, iron-ware and cheap tin trays.
                                                       
                                              by John Masefield (1878-1967)

Thanks for reading

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