Marlinspike #39

Summer 2023

Number 39

PICTON CASTLE embarks on a new World Voyage

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MICHAEL RUTSTEIN

Community Over the years, we’ve written a lot about tall ships and the folks who own and sail them, but not much about the relationship between boat operators and sailors. We’ve tried to encourage a community of traditional sailors, but haven’t written much about the health of that community, or the direction it’s moving in.

In this issue, Noah Waldman of the Bay Lady talks about the community of tall-ship sailors — discovering it for the first time, searching it out in a new place, and trying to build up that community in his new home port of Seattle.

Waldman’s goal is to create a business model robust enough to pay decent wages, provide year-round employment, and allow people to forge a long-term career in tall ships.

Is this possible for year-round operators, on large vessels with full accomodations? Often it is, and longer careers are available — at least for those committed enough to develop the skills to become valuable cooks, bosuns, mates, engineers and captains.

Most small for-profit operators, of course, will scoff. They barely generate enough income to maintain the boat, pay their bills, and provide a decent living for themselves. Their crews may earn decent money during the season, but once the boat is downrigged, they’re cut loose.

Waldman threw out the idea that boat operators with opposing schedules could share crew. A Maine windjammer could partner with a day-sail operation in Key West. A Great Lakes boat could send their crew to San Diego for the winter, creating steady employment and — who knows? — maybe even some benefits. Meanwhile, both operators benefit from trained and competent crew.

Worth a look? Anything that creates a lasting and mutually-profitable community of tall-ship sailors can only help all of us.

MARLINSPIKE MAGAZINE Summer 2023 • Number 39 Michael Rutstein, Publisher Marlinspike is published quarterly for $29

by Pennant Publications, Inc., 98 Washington Square #1 Salem, MA 01970 Cover Photo courtesy of Picton Castle Postmaster: send address changes to Marlinspike 98 Washington Square #1, Salem, MA 01970 Copyright 2023 by Pennant Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.

Phone (978) 594-6510 E-Mail Marlinspike1812@gmail.com

Fair Winds,

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Michael Rutstein, Publisher

4 b Around Again

34 b Once Upon a Ship

Picton Castle has at long last set off on World Voyage 8

A brief history of Norway’s STS Sorlandet

14 b Schooning in Seattle A Midwestern sailor finds a home in Elliott Bay

22 b Rendezvous at Le Beau Port Gloucester is celebrating its 400th with, yup, schooners

26 b A Path Less Traveled A former ASTA intern becomes a CG officer and pilot

40 b Boatyards 44 b Boats, Bars & Beaches 53 b Name That Boat 54 b Show Us Your Spike 55 b Show Us Your Tattoo

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Around Again After three years of pandemic-related delays and an unscheduled five-month stint on a broken railway, PICTON CASTLE is once again on her way around the world On May 10, Picton Castle sailed from her home port of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia on a long-delayed circumnavigation.

Less than 200 nm into the voyage, she had to return, due to a medical issue. But after waiting out a few days of bad weather, she finally broke free, and at press time had arrived at the Caribbean island of Anguilla.

We spoke to CEO Maggie Ostler in June, a week after the (second) departure, as she took a break from sweeping up the confetti on the Lunenburg docks.

Marlinspike: First of all — congratulations!

Maggie Ostler: Thank you. To finally have the ship underway again is pretty exciting! All the crew especially are so happy. They really, really stuck with it. They were persistent and tenacious and just hung in there until we could finally get to sea. And they’re a great group. We’re really pleased with the crew that we have on this voyage.

MS: How many of the crew were able to wait out the three years of delays? You must have suffered some turnover, as people’s windows opened and closed for them to be able to participate.

MO: Yes, there was some turnover, but the vast majority of them stuck through all of the delays. The voyage was originally supposed to start in the spring of 2020, so there are folks who have been signed up since 2019 for this voyage!

Others had signed on since 2020, and even in the weeks and months leading up to the start of the voyage this spring. We sailed with 40 people on board. And we’re full at 50.

But I should tell you about the day the ship left Lunenburg, because that was incredible. The ship sailed on a Wednesday, the ship was going to leave the wharf at four o’clock in the afternoon, and we only made the final call about timing on late Tuesday afternoon. So we had less than 24 hours notice.

We’d decided we didn’t want to do a big media push,

but there had been such a buzz about the ship leaving, that we did a social media campaign locally, through our local community bulletin boards and groups and things like that, to let the people of Lunenburg and the surrounding area know that the ship would be sailing and that they were welcome to come down and see her off.

And by four o’clock on Wednesday afternoon, we had probably close to 300 people on the waterfront — maybe more on some of the other wharves that I couldn’t see. We’ve often had a crowd that big for a homecoming, when the ship comes back from a voyage, but we have never had a crowd that big to send her off. It was really special. I get a little emotional talking about it, actually.

People just wanted to come out and, and show their support for the ship, after such a long time here in Lunenburg, especially after this past winter where we had a number of the crew here and they had the opportunity to get to know folks around town. Many of those people came out to see the ship off and say goodbye to the crew: the staff at the local grocery store, the servers at the pub, and everybody in between.

MS: It was noted, back when Ocean Classroom folded in 2014, that it’s hard for a community and a boat to bond when that boat’s gone for months or years at a stretch. But with Picton Castle home for such an unprecedented long time, you got the opportunity to build those bonds. Just getting used to seeing the boat there, and having the crew around…

MO: The crew bring a vibrancy and an energy to the waterfront. Lunenburg feels it during the summertime.

During the season, when the Bluenose II crew are around, you’re seeing active, vibrant, young people on the waterfront, engaged in the business of the waterfront. Having Picton Castle and her crew here for an extended period of time gave that feeling as well. Having vessel crews, particularly youthful vessel crews, on the waterfront, breathes life into Lunenburg

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“And by four o’clock on Wednesday afternoon, we had probably close to 300 people on the waterfront — maybe more on some of the other wharves that I couldn’t see. We’ve often had a crowd that big for a homecoming, when the ship comes back from a voyage, but we have never had a crowd that big to send her off. It was really special.

I get a little emotional talking about it, actually.”

— Maggie Ostler

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and into the… I don’t want to say the heritage, because that makes it sound like it’s in the past… but the culture of a working waterfront.

MS: After all the pandemic-related delays you had to wade through, the barque was then stuck on a railway for quite some time, no fault of yours. How much did that hold you up?

MO: I think we got hauled out on a Wednesday and we were supposed to be launched the following Tuesday. It’s one of those marine railways where the cradle is divided in half. It’s quite long. They can launch the whole thing, or they can launch just the bottom half.

So, while Picton Castle was up on the dry dock, they went to launch the bottom half to pick up another ship for a short repair. In the process of launching the bottom half of that cradle, the winch that hauls the cradles up and down broke. That left Picton Castle stuck on the upper half of cradle.

We thought we were going to be there for a week. We ended up being there for five months.

MS: Ouch. Good thing she’s not a wooden boat…

MO: [Laughs] Yeah! Anyway, the hull was in great shape. Within that first week, we had done a couple little steel repairs and a new coat of bottom paint, and the ship was ready to be relaunched. Sitting there for another five months didn’t do any particular damage to the hull, but it was hard on the decks and the rigging.

First, there’s the long period of anticipation, all the stops and starts and on-again, off-again that we’ve had… that created this sense of such joy [laughs] at just being able to get underway. People have been looking forward to this for a very, very long time.

When we had the drydock delay, we gave the trainee crew the option either to stay with us here in Nova Scotia, sort of wait it out, or leave for a little while and come back.

And many of them stayed. And with the extra time that they spent in Lunenburg, they’re more skilled than a lot of the crew around our previous voyages. We always have a long pre-voyage period here in Lunenburg. That gives the crew a chance to get to know each other, and we have time for training and safety drills and all of that stuff. But these guys got into some of the seamanship stuff that we normally wouldn’t do until the voyage began. So they’re already pretty good at some of the skills that normally people wouldn’t learn until we put to sea.

MS: Picton Castle is getting on in years, for a circumnavigator. What work needed to be done to her for this voyage?

MO: The work that we did in drydock was pretty routine. Almost every time we haul the ship out, we inspect the hull, we gauge the hull thickness. We were pretty pleased with what we found, and anywhere where it was less thick than we would like, we did some sort of repair or addition.

But that would have all fit into the week that we were

MS: Did you realize that you would be stuck for a while when the winch broke, or was it like “We think we’ll have it fixed next week”… every week for five months?

MO: We originally were told that it was going to be six to eight weeks. And then it just sort of kept extending from there. Had we known, we would have approached things differently. But it’s one of those hindsight-is-2020 things.

MS: I guess the good news was: the boat had plenty of time get ready, and the crew know each other better, and have been working together longer, than is normally the case at the outset of a new voyage.

MO: Absolutely! That’s one of the things that I think is going to make this voyage unique, from a crew perspective.

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