happier days

[Colin Wood]

Hi Thomas Michael, just to let you know, Sydney Hobart goes nowhere near the Bight. That is south of Oz and the Bass straight connects the Bight to the Pacific Ocean where this race takes place.

[j.sabourn]

#22 Colin , Thomas just thought he’d pop into Adelaide for a quick one.! JS

Think it was 1998 when I was bringing back the ship I was on working out of Sydney back to Fremantle the same time as the yacht race. It was really bad weather and a lot of the yachts ran into trouble. I had Eden lined up,for refuge as knew the harbour master there; Decided to go for the corner and get into the Bight regardless. The MF. Radio came adrift off the chartroom table after passing Eden , so had no means of reporting in to Canberra every 6 hours when outside of VHF range , but was fortuanate enough to get a vhf call to them advising them of the possible no reporting in due to the radio being kaput. Otherwise may of had coastwatch out looking for us. JS

[thomas michael]

hi colin wood #22
good morning, seems my bite is worse than my bark, ? but the reference to the bight was merely a whim,which caused the reaction that i intended it to do so,except it was you whom picked it up ?
the race as expected went to the maxis and i followed it on the (AIS ) on the internet after seeing some of the start.
sadly my only reference on australia is that my wife and myself had filled in the application forms in the sixties and we where saving up for the ten pound passage, that never came about.
tom

[j.sabourn]

You could of borrowed the 10 quid off Cappy , he would only of charged you the reduced interest of 12 % if he knew you. JS
PS Forgot to mention that interest was daily. Cheers Happy and prosperous New Year , 2 hours and 50 minutes to go. Will have take my tablets for various things first , don’t want to fall over and have people think I’m drunk. Cheers JS

[thomas michael]

hi john sabourn #25
good afternoon, if i had made acquaintance of cappy in the early days i still would not have borrowed off him, even though his repayment loan plans where so good, as i have heard since, that he used big george to collect the monies due, and if the payments where not met he got him to toss you off.
have great night and a better new year.
Feliz Ano Nuevo
tom

[j.sabourn]

Was that the high level in Newcastle or the newer one they call the eye. ? JS

[thomas michael]

hi john sabourn#27
good afternoon, he never stated which level you where likely to get, He just promised that you where going to get it.
tom

[Colin Wood]

Hi JS, you mentioned loosing a radio. The Fortesque 4 was being redelivered from Mackay to Port Hedland when the Master found he had just got a permanent tug job in Newcastle, so did a pier head jump.
Sailed and on trying to contact VID found the SSB radio was non operative, but as coastal just carried on.
Weather typical dry season strong SE'ly so very wet on small tug/workboat. Had a full union crew who had had 2 cans of beer each written into voyage articles. Luckily mate and engineer kept working, but everytime a any of the so called deck crew appeared, I would take the top of of a tinny and say '2 can's a man'. They would immediately have a rainbow yorn and retire to there bunk.
On going through the charts, found they stopped at Broome, but as had been assistant HM and Pilot in Port Hedland, had no trouble finding the fairway buoys and arriving in Port Hedland, where I asked the control tower to notify contacts of our arrival. Oners agent arrived with a ute and mini bus, and all crew loaded into bus to go to airport as all thier beer was going into ute. I think they cried.

[alex smith]

Happier days indeed and ones we can still all learn from, sadly many deaf to anything other than self now.

[j.sabourn]

#29 Those permanent tug jobs in the likes of Dampier I always fancied one of them , living ashore with all the amenities etc. but heard on the grapevine you had to have friends in high places , the high places being the appropriate union. So never made it . However as have said many times my life style and work style , out here was the best I have seen in my total earning and learning seagoing life, that’s being mercenary of course. After following what had got previously , I could be very mercenary indeed . Better late than never. Cheers JS