Flights to ships

[Louis the Amigo]

Hi Shipmates, one of Ropners the "Bridgepool by ferry to Dunkirk great crew 9 months trip, Flew home from naples from the breakers "Patia" skin boat lovely ship real old fashion canvas hatches cover,and wooden decks with derricks and a few passengers I would still be on it? she was too good to scrap!!! we had some great times on he she called at the right ports, Thats the only time I flew home and the first time on a plane ? dont remember much could be due to plenty of drink before the flight.

[John Aspin]

Greetings one & all,
Never actually flown out to join a ship but did fly home after paying off one ship, paid off in Ceuta North Africa went by ferry to Gibralta then flew home three days later, the last thing I wanted was wating around for a flight home after being away fro seven months but having said that we saw quite a bit of Gibralta what there is to see of it.
However, I did join one of my ships in Hamburg but was sent by train and six months later went home the same way.
Two other trips I paid off and was sent home by train, the first was from Venice to Dover then up to Middlesbrough, the other paid off in Copenhagen via the Hook of Holland then up to Middlesbrough.
I sailed one time with a Chief Steward from Hull and he was sent to join a ship in Vancouver and would you beleive he was flown to either New York or Canada then travelled by train through the rockies to Vancouver some journey that must have cost a fortune.
Once again this particular thread has brought back some nice memories.
Best wishes to all,

[Ray McCerery]

First time I flew home was 66 from Mina (Kuwait City) to LHRA then train to Sunderland, Great flight Dan Aire now most crews fly to join and pay off) Different world today from the 50-60-70s.


Ray

[Glan Phillips]

Gulliver.......the good old days, did a few of those trips during my brief commercial flying time......Cheers....Glan

[John Arton]

Hi
My 1st flight was not joining but leaving. Left my 1st ship in Port de Bouc in 69. Spent a night in Hotel where nearly all the boys fling home got ratarsed on cheap brandy. Next day a very sorry bunch of Officers and cadet turned up at Marseille airport to get a Air France Caravelle flight to London. Apart from the time when I was 2/3 years old when the family flew home from Gibraltar where we had lived for 2 years (cant remember much of those days, dad was Master of a salvage tug in Gib, hence our stay there. Why we flew home is another story but involves a hissy fit by dad and a run in with the Gib authorities) this was my first flight. Actually at one point we thought we were going to be tossed off the flight as the Skipper ( a dead pervy individual (sort, bald, with a squeaky voice) kep making inappropriate comments to the air hostess who threatened to throw us off the flight. Air bound the skipper commandered the drinks trolley and they all proceeded to top up the levels, as the flight was pretty empty I reckon they could not be bothered serving zee inglish pigs so just allowed us sole use of the drinks trolley. By the time we got to Heathrow most of us were feeling no pain but were brought up in a shock when the pilot who had been circling for some time trying to find a break in the clouds (or was it the airport, no fancy landing stuff in those days) suddenly put the plane in a steep dive after spotting a gap in the clouds, boy did my stomach come as my body went down. That was with the Canadian Pacific and shortly after that with the huge fleet expansion we were regulalry flying all the way round the world to join and leave our ships, though strangely enough never with CP Air after the rd mate flying out to Japan to join a ship with CP Air, being annoyed with the lack of attention/service to him by the air hostess stood up in the aisle and in a very loud voice informed her that he too worked for CP, the only difference being he was an Officer and she was crew!!!! Draw your own conclusion to the result of that little outburst.
There are a number of stories about ships crew fling home, Esso I believe were banned by one airline when they all rioted, attempted to attack the stewardess and had to be locked in the lower deck of a stratocruiser and my Ben Line mate sid that as Ben Line owned Dan Air they always flew full crews out and home to the continent on specially charted flights until on day flying home in high spirits the whole crew decided to see if they could make the plane pitch. Apparently on the old propellor jobs if enough of you charge from the front of the plane to the back and then back to the front it does cause some rather serious problems for the poor old pilot.
Now I guess you all get packed into cattle class, fed rotten meals, given2 highly priced drinks as a max, disembark after an 18 hr. flight, get treated by Immigration of whichever country you are in like a possible crimminal, shoved on a bus to the ship (4 hr. drive away) join, shake hands with the guy you relieved and a few hours later sail.
Going to sea is definatley not the life it was
rgds
Captain John Arton

[Gulliver]

Gulliver.......the good old days, did a few of those trips during my brief commercial flying time......Cheers....Glan

Thanks for that Glan. Well I must say you have had a varied and fascinating life !

Looking at that snow,these days they'd close the airport for a week if as much as a dozen flakes landed on the runway!
Some Cambrian Airways literature HERE.

Iachyd Dda!
Gulliver

[Tommy the T]

Not totally relevant to the theme of this thread....but...

As I have mentioned in a previous post about me coming from a seafaring family,After hearing from my father & brother of the amazing places they had both been to..... whilst I was at Gravesend sea school I had hoped that maybe my first ship would mean I would fly out to somewhere exotic like Singapore etc ( visions of Granduer at 16 yrs of age )

Anyways , after completing my time at Gravesend from November to January ( bloody cold being in the parade ground at 6am every morning), On the day I left the sea school I headed into London to report to P&O,s head office in Aldgate, excited & nervous all at the same time , met my personel officer who informed me they had a ship for me ....."Great " I thought to myself, I wonder where I,ll be joining?, he then instructed me to join my first ship in.........wait for it.........Tilbury Docks on monday , 3 months in Gravesend then first ship in Tilbury smashed my hopes of a flight to some far flung part of the world

Signed on my first ship to be told " right, now you are part of the crew you are now on strike " ( NUS strike in 1981 ) & so had 12 days alongside in Tilbury, had the time of my life & became a regular at "The Ship Inn " with the rest of the crew.

Back to flights to ships.....Once flew to Sydney to join The Canberra, flight tickets in my name at Heathrow, Hotel room booked in my name in Sydney.....all going well until I arrive onboard the Canberra when I reported to sign on & was told, "didn,t know you were coming, don,t need you"....So I replied with "well, I,m not flying home ( hated that flight ), in the end they allowed me to sign on as a "Floating Bar Tender" & had a great time flitting from bar to bar when they were busy, meant I could keep an eye on the ladies too

Worst ever flight was from Teesside to Heathrow, the baggage AND the passengers had to be weighed before we took off, never thought the plane would make it...gulp.

cheers
Tommy the T

[Michael Lawrence]

Joined the Esso Stockholm in Dunkirk Dec.,56 taken over by steam packet. In August 57 paid off in Jackonsville Florida and flew to New York via Washington with Eastern States Airlines. Picked up at KLM flight from there for London via Gander in Canada and arrived Heathrow at 0630 hrs. Total travel time over 30hrs. Had my leave and then flew out to Gib on an old Dakota to join the Esso Canterbury, took off from what was Blackbush Airport Hamps.,. Any other flying was then done courtesy of the army (TA). Never really liked trusting myself to a couple of engines mounted on at flimsy piece of metal.

[Captain Kong]

First time I flew was in 1959 after taking the Good Hope Castle to the breakers in Hong Kong.
We had a week in Honkers on the ship then they took us to Kai Tak airport, we got there , no plane.
It was in Australia we were told with a load of East European Refugees. We had to wait in the airport, which was just a shed in those days. We were broke, no money, crabs nada, the Captain and the Chief Engineer had a bag of money but he would not give us a sub, he said we all might disapear down to the rags and not come back. The Officers were sat in the bar, we were sat outside with nothing and 24 hours to wait.
Next moment a plane comes in and who gets off is Fidel Castro, Che Guavara and four other Hombres, they were on their way to Peking to see Chairman Mao. They had just won the revolution in Cuba
I went to Fidel and said something like, "Hey Fidel, you are our Hero, buy us a bevy, " All he said was "Vamoose or something similar.
We had a meal at the airport courtesey of our Captain. Egg and Chips. and not a drink. the Officers repaired back to the bar.
We slept on hard wood benches for the night awaiting this refugee plane to arrive from Australia.
Next day an old Dakota covered in Camoflage, and `American International Airline` painted in graffiti style down the side of it landed. we had to wait while the owner driver had to have a good sleep as they serviced the plane.
Late afternoon , full of egg and chips, we were finally allowed to board our "AIRLINER".
The only good thing about it was the stewardess, she was a beautiful blue eyed blond who was obviously the pilots plaything. But we could fantasize from afar.
The plane was owned by an US Korean War Vet who bought it cheap, still with the original camoflage, he had a mate as co pilot and the blue eyed blond, What more could a man want, his own airline, [ one decrepit dakota ] and She.
The seats were just cast iron bucket seats, no padding, the toilet was a bucket in a cupboard at the back and stunk.
The two engines revved up and we shot down the runway at Kai Tak which was just a pier over the sea then, and took off we circled over Honkers and then headed off into the sunset.
It was a three day flight to Stanstead Airport somewhere near to London.
In Honkers it was very, very hot in the plane and when we took off up to 10,000 feet it got very very cold. It was not pressurised like the new planes. We were freezing. Then we landed in Calcutta,
Now I had a pet with me that I had found in Mauritious, called Charlie, he was a large Chamelian, so when we were going ashore in Calcutta I left him hanging onto the small curtain by the port. we went into a shed, that was the airport then, and we had more egg and chips, the officers and the Pilots and She, had steaks.
After a few hours we boarded again and as we were taking off, we were running down the runway increasing speed, I saw that Charlie was missing. Stop the plane I shouted Charlie is missing. The Captain thinking it was one of the crew ran to the cockpit and shouted to the pilots STOP one of my men is missing.
The Pilot slammed on the brakes and the plane almost upended, emergency stop.
I was down under the seats and found Charlie clinging to one of the seat legs. He was shaking and covered in bruises. I think the cleaners had seen him on the curtain where I had left him and then battered him. poor fellow.
I shouted `I have found him , its OK`,The owner driver, Pilot, came out to us and went berserk when he found it was Charlie the Chamelian, He walked away muttering something about crazy Limies.
Next stop was Bahrain, just a sandy strip in those days with one wrecked plane at the side of the runway.
We went into the shed and had egg and chips again while the Officers and Pilots and She had steaks.
We had a rest there for several hours. The journey would have been quicker by sea.
We took off again and suddenly my window went dark, it was covered in oil. I went to the cockpit and told one of the drivers, this big, long tall Texan strolled out to where I was sitting and looked at the starboard engine, he just said ......"I guess that baby dont like oil no more" and went back into the cockpit and put his feet up on the dashboard.
We eventually landed at Stanstead Airport in Essex, what a relief to get off, three days. It was only a shed and we were the only plane in the airport but there were more Customs men than us crew, they searched Everything.. We then had a coach to take us to Euston Station
That was the end of an epic flight.
Thank you Union Castle.

[Gulliver]

It makes me wonder,but just imagine having to fly out to a ship these days using one of the low-cost airlines because your company was a cheap-skate or cowboy outfit(and there were many of them !).
You'd have to take a huge sub with you first to fly out to your ship.

The charges for this and that soon mount up.Someone cracked a joke saying he was on on a flight from Luton to Cork.Turbulence was encountered and the aircraft plummeted a few thousand feet.That caused the oxygen masks to be deployed.He grabbed it-only to find there was a slot on the side reading FOR USE IN EMERGENCY ONLY-PLEASE INSERT £1 COIN .


I was prompted to write this after seeing a news article:~


Ryanair customers who try to avoid the budget airline's booking fees by using its new card could be charged hefty fees unless they use it every month.
The user guide for the Ryanair Cash Passport reveals that after six months, anyone who does not use the card will be charged £2.50 a month for inactivity, while a ten pound charge will be levied every time the card goes into negative territory because of the inactivity fee.
Customers will also be charged £2 for withdrawing money from cash machines, and £4 if they try to get cash out over the counter.
From November 1, the new prepaid card the only way to avoid a £6 each way charge per person per flight when booking with Ryanair. ‘






There is a great video by three operatic ladies (some choice Irish language) recounting an episode aboard a low-cost airline-one of the 50p flights varieties-you can probably guess which one they are probably referring to....

HILARIOUS YOU TUBE HERE....

Gulliver