We had closed our loop. Three months previous we began our tour of duty on El Galeon by taking a ferry from Poole to Jersey; now we returned to Poole where we'd end our time on the tall ship and begin our own adventures.
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| I love when people dress up to visit the ship! These women told me the story of smugglers in Poole, where the women didn't smuggle directly, but collaborated with the men who did. The women would go down to the waterfront to meet the ships, dressed in ordinary (if particularly loose and shapeless) dresses. When they arrived, they'd take off their clothes, wrap themselves in many layers of silk that the smugglers were bringing, then put on their ordinary dresses over to cover the silk up again, and walk right past the customs agents without paying the import duties. |
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| One of my favourite perks is crew-to-crew courtesy tours. Here, we headed off on a local day-tour boat for an informational tour around Poole Harbour (the employees of that boat got tours of El Galeon, too). |
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| Interesting old streets and buildings. |
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| Decked out as I'd come to expect the waterfront in seaside towns. |
We had a farewell barbeque; I went around the ship taking selfies with all my friends on the crew (in other words, everyone); and we gifted the ship one of the antique nautical instruments we'd bought back in Whitby. Next morning the chief engineer gave us a lift to the edge of town to pick up the rental car we'd reserved, and we were off on our own, with a few extra t-shirts and a lot of wonderful memories.
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| High-energy dancing at the bbq |
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| I'm really going to miss this crew! |
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| Antique pocket sundial/compass |
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| In its new home, on the table in the zona noble. |
A member of one of the local Poole "pirate" groups posted these pictures of the ship leaving the harbour at the end of the visit.
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