Hydrograaf (the coolest ship we visited during the festival at Oostende)

 We passed this unusual-looking ship every morning we were at the festival, as we walked from the Galeon to the marina bath house. I was curious about the name, and learned that it was indeed used for hyrographic mapping and research, built for the Dutch Navy and launched in 1910. Over the years it has also served as the vessel used by the Queen to visit the out islands before a combination of roads and dams was built to connect them, and as the vessel used by Sinterklaas (the Dutch "Santa Claus") to deliver presents. More details about its history are available here. More recently, it has been used as a dockside attraction and party barge. They hosted a gathering for the crews of the visiting ships one evening, and we were treated to a fabulous behind-the-scenes tour by the ship's owners.

Publicity photo of the Hydrograaf.

Lovely dining area. 

The robe worn by Sinterklaas. By their legend, he travels not by sleigh from the North Pole, but by ship from Madrid, to deliver presents. He appears on the bow of this ship every year for the kids.

A full, fancy bar below decks. Just around the corner outside of my photo were pictures on the wall of the Queen in this exact spot during one of her visits.

They had a 4-piece band; no idea if this is also the location they would have played to entertain the Queen, but it was certainly quite nice.

A few of our work-hard, play-hard crew enjoying the party.

Brugge, Belgium (Dia Libre side trip from Oostende)

 I'll never attend a Renaissance Festival the same way again, because now I've been in a genuine medieval city, Brugge. It was huge in the 1400s; a center of finance and commerce like New York; and only about 15 minutes by train from where we were docked. Five of us had the day off so we went exploring. It was my first exposure to European trains and I was pretty intimidated and reliant on help from our Welsh shipmate, but honestly it was quite straightforward, as well as clean, fast, and modern. Delightfully, one of our fellow passengers overheard us chatting in English and introduced himself as a tour guide in the city. He gave us some fun tips on places to go and things to see, and we in turn told him the best way to visit the Galeon. 

Here in no particular order, a photo dump from the city. It was actually far cooler than this, a lot of our best memories came from inside museums, and from walking the streets from the train station, neither of which conveys well. You can definitely see the age, though!

Food-wise, I wanted to taste Belgian chocolate, Belgian waffles, and Belgian Trappist ale while in the country, and managed all three this day. The melted chocolate sauce for the waffles was insane!

Oostende, Belgium

 "Welcome to mainland Europe!" my Dutch friend Monica texted me after I posted that we'd docked in Oostende. We were here for another boat festival and it promised to be a big one. We were also going to be here for a while, long enough to get the rhythm ... and also have a few days off to explore. Our location was great, in a marina with many other boats also appearing in the festival, walking distance to much of the city, and also right across the street from the train station. This brought us even more attention and foot traffic as people saw our unique silhouette as soon as they got off the train, and gave us even more opportunities for tourism; worthy of a separate post. 

People lined the shore welcoming us as we docked. (Doesn't look like much in this photo but they'd lined our entire route.)

"What's on your mind?" the facebook prompt asks. Squares. Squares are on my mind. First, the squares of our old rigging that echo the squares in these buildings we're passing ...

... and then the squares in the Belgian waffle I had for breakfast.

We were delighted to find ourselves docked just across from the Nao Victoria; we hadn't seen them since St Augustine Florida in 2014. This was the first historic replica ship built by the Foundation that owns the Galeon, and we still have some friends on the crew.

Meeting up with some of our friends from the other ship after the festival closed for the evening, at a nice restaurant across the street. People move pretty freely from one ship to another (as you noticed if you've been following for a while, we spent several summers on the Nao Trinidad and the Nao Santa Maria before returning to El Galeon.)

Festivals can be intense; here's a feel for the crowdedness. (And now you see why we were shut down completely during Covid times.) The white tents along the side were one group of several, they contained artists, vendors, performers, and educational displays. Also, beer.

This charming French artist was exhibiting his boat paintings in one of the white tents you see on the left in the above photo. Look at what's top-center on this display wall ... our Galeon!

The "crew" nametag is like a magnet to be tapped for audience participation if you're watching a performance. This group was singing English sea chanteys and recruiting people for various positions aboard a man-of-war. I was the "admiral." 

The bagpipers marched through the festival grounds; it was a hodge-podge of cultures.

We normally adhere to a pretty tight schedule moving from port to port. This time, though, we had to delay our departure by a day because of strong crosswinds and a very narrow canal we'd have to pass through to get to the sea. We got to watch everyone else leave; some fascinating boats here. (I don't know anything about either of these, just that they were unusual.) Finally it was our turn. 

Plymouth, UK to Oostende, BE

 

Underway from Plymouth UK to Oostende, BE. Hurrying to get in before anticipated bad weather. Sunset underway and a moonlit night.

My view from the helm. Nothin' but blue ...

 If you zoom in you just might be able to see the legendary white cliffs. (My tired brain insisted on making that a glacier but we’re not in Iceland anymore!)

Adventures aren’t all pony rides in the May sunshine, as Bilbo Baggins reminds us. So in the name of keepin’ it real, here’s the rest of our passage report: we bashed into seas for 16 hours with chilly winds in our faces. I held onto the wheel as much to keep my balance as to keep the ship on course. Staggered around the moving deck like we were drunk, or at least a good imitation thereof. There was so much salt spray that I had to lick my glasses clean every half hour or they fogged up so badly I couldn’t read the compass. My phone switched to the new time zone (we’re now east longitude having crossed the prime meridian) so I woke up an hour early for watch, losing an hour of sleep I could have sorely used. OTOH, I could have had a job staring at a computer screen in a gray walled cubicle, instead of helmsman on a “pirate” ship, and shortly after I posted this a Dutch friend texted me "welcome to mainland Europe." Yeah, my life is pretty darn wonderful!

Plymouth

 Well hello there, Plymouth! Because it was a pirate festival, we fired our cannons coming into the harbour -- which also hosts one of the largest naval stations in the U.K. The joke was that the captain had radioed the Navy earlier to say we're going to fire a cannon salute ... don't fire back, okay? 

Here are some random views from our dock and the nearby streets, and some fun facts about Plymouth and the Mayflower. BTW, “Plymouth” is an extremely popular name for a town; there are 52 “Plymouths” recorded. And Jaye’s second childhood home was on Plymouth Street..

Apparently Plymouth has quite the reputation as a summer party town even when it wasn't a pirate festival. The night life was insane! Streets were so jammed you really couldn't get around, and the music was loud.

"Plymouth" of course has a significance for U.S. history. 

The approximate location where the pilgrims boarded the Mayflower, known to tourists as the "Mayflower Steps" that lead from the street to the sea.

Amusingly we’ve now visited both ends of the pilgrims’ voyage aboard Spanish ships. (If we’ve been friends for a while you saw us spend a few days in Providence in 2019 aboard the Nao Santa Maria.)

Commemorative stone in the pavement at the Mayflower memorial area.

Cobblestones! Plymouth is reported to have more cobbled streets than anywhere else in the UK.

Yes, that's a toilet behind my right shoulder. I’m not usually one for bathroom selfies. But. The Mayflower steps in the earlier picture aren’t exactly where the pilgrims left from. Those are a reconstruction. The **real** departure point is buried below the ladies room in this pub across the street from the steps the tourists visit!

Pretty sunset signals the start of partytime.

A visit from the city's mayor, and her ceremonial bodyguard carrying a (surprisingly heavy!) ceremonial mace.

We were visited by at least one "Jack Sparrow" in every port. I developed an entire album on my phone of pictures with them. 

Cardiff to Plymouth

 May 15, and time to go sailing! Due to the tides we planned to leave in early evening; fortunately it stays light quite late this far north.

"Cardiff has been interesting," I posted. "Learned a little about Wales history, saw some cool old buildings, ate new-to-me foods, chatted with many locals. We were absolutely slammed over the weekend with a record number of visitors; no time to really talk with anyone because we were so crowded, and then quieter days and deeper conversations Monday and Tuesday. I’m always surprised at how many people ask if the ship is original. To their faces I feign delight: “Ooh, we did a good job building the replica if we fooled you! Cool!” But really? If the ship was really 350 years old? It would be in a museum; we wouldn’t let you touch it; and I wouldn’t feel safe putting to sea in it. Which latter is exactly our plan for today. We’ll be packing up and leaving on the high tide for Plymouth, where we’ll appear in a pirate festival over the weekend."

It was quite a tranquil passage, so plenty of time for work, fun, and scenery.

Maintenance day: crew members were hanging over the sides of the ship and up the yards, scraping and painting. And polishing the ships bell.

Dan stripping many layers of old paint from the columns in front of the entrance to the galley. I only half-melted a scraper with the heat gun…

Noemi and Mario were on cooking detail for dinner for this part of the passage. She poured an entire bottle of wine into this sauce! We ate well. 

As we passed the building that housed the Royal Navy we saw many people taking photos of us from the windows of their offices. These two fine folks may never know how much we appreciated their salute.

There were 3 locks and some tight turns to get from the city to the open sea. We shared this lock with a modern cargo ship as we dropped about 5 metres.

My cellphone couldn't really capture this, it was a moonlit night with spooky clouds.

Turns out that "Land's End" is an actual place as well as a U.S. outdoor clothing company.

Land's End

More of Land's End, a few hours further along the voyage.

We had this bird passenger for most of my 4-hour watch.

On many of the voyage segments, we take a few paying passengers. Officially they're called "trainees" and we give them a taste of the sailing life -- they have bunks down in the crew dorm, and stand watch and share meals with us. We teach them to steer the ship ... 

... and to climb in the rigging. They delight in these activities that are just ordinary work days to me. I think with gratitude of a former captain, Pablo, who reminded me that my everyday life is someone else's once-in-a-lifetime.