Remember that shark net well.
Two great whites could swim through it abreast.
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It is very interesting to read through the replies to this thread, it is also a bit sad as to see the amount of posters from those years who no longer post on the site. Obviously some will have crossed the bar but the others ????
Ivan point taken so I have just added to the posts on the fights on ships thread.
#165... Ivan / John I have been in a RAAFA retirement village 5 minutes , and today received a call from one other residents who has been here since 1999 inviting me to join a club they have here of a few old stalwarts who call themselves the ancient mariners. He as as can gather started off in the gravesend sea school, but. Served most of his time in the RN . he is 90 years of age , I haven’t met the others but hold their meetings during the Happy hour once a month , so will be interesting to hear their views. Who knows they may already be members of this site. Cheers JS
I don't know if this fact has already been posted, if it as I apologize: A more important date for me was my eighteenth birthday. I went from galley boy to third assistant cook...a rating, and ratings pay. A hundred percent pay increase. Eleven pounds a month to 23 pounds a month.
I was in Canada on my 21st, I did a jump and emigrated 4 months before my 21st birthday. My choice was to stay in the merch as a married man until I was 26, or go ashore and end up conscripted into the army. Canada was a wise choice for me and my new bride, and the USA 3 years later was the right choice for me too.
And here I am at 83.
Every decision I have made in my life has been a good , looking back, I have mostly no regrets, my almost 5 years in the Merch taught me a valuable trade and broadened my horizons, Canada prepared me for the states, a great transition from the UK to the USA. And all I ever wanted, and a life beyond my wildest dreams here.
The weirdest thing, was I didn't find out I'm three quarters blind in my left eye until I had to take a physical at 35 for the US army to get mydraft card to complete my citizenship application. ( I wouldn't have had to go as the cut off date was 36 and Vietnam was coming to a halt).
Who knows, if I found out I was 4f in England and wouldn't have been conscripted, would I have still emigrated? It was impossible to even get a bed-sitter one room flat in London in those days, unless you slipped a fiver to the clerk to get on the list, and a tenner moved you way up the waiting list, but there was not too many young people floating around who had ten pounds in those days.
I left England with fifty pounds after paying for our wedding and our passage on the Sylvania to Montreal and the train to Toronto. And thirty odd of those pounds were a pound or two from relatives who couldn't buy us a wedding gift, so gave the money instead. Those were the bloody days.
I looked at my three sons. I didn't ever say anything, when they hit 21, but I thought a lot of things. Mainly I had spoilt them rotten, giving them all the things I never had...I was so wrong. Sadly they couldn't hold a candle to the men (and women) on this site. Who went to boot-camp at 16 (not 18), and signed articles for a standard 24 months away from mommy and daddy, unless you went straight away to the "big ships" on a bus run, Most of us never knew where we were going, yes on your first port o' call, but not where you would end up or pay-off.
But it was full of adventures, boredom, solid friendship, and some whankers, coming home in Jan. with a sun tan, laughing at a puking first tripper in his first gale and offering to bring him a bowl of pork stew and dumplings. Sneaking a couple of extra bottles through customs, yet paying off the cop at the dock gate.
You wouldn't swop it for quids, would ya shipmates! (not a question, an emphatic statement of fact)
Cheers, Rodney (still down memory lane.)
Hi All,
I was in KGV working by an H boat, a few days later I was on a ferry to the Hook to rejoin the 'Otaio' in drydock in Antwerp. I lost my landing card and had to pay a fiver to get off the ferry !
Cheers, Paul.
Rod thanks for that very interesting post, you have certainly had a good life, long may it continue. Rgds Den
On my 21st birthday I was in Kwinana, Perth WA on board the BP Tanker, mv British Vine. I was an engineer cadet along with the other cadet called Geoffrey James Bond (no prizes for guessing his nickname "007" !). We had sailed from the Isle of Grain, Kent through the Suez Canal and on to Kwinana, quite an eventful 1st trip, that was in 1966. Happy days.
Mike Jefferson R817026.
21st Birthday alongside in Detroit, 3rd mate on the Manchester City. The year 1961. We were waiting for a berth in Chicago about 16 hours steaming time up Lake Huron and down Lake Michigan. Went ashore and treated myself to a Matsushita Transistor radio. Back on board bought a crate of ale and shared with my shipmates. How many years ago????