This is how i would like to cross the ocean.
The Cruise People Ltd is pleased to announce the opening this week of a new cargo-passenger service between Europe and North America with five new ACL vessels called the G4’s. Delivered over the past two years to Grimaldi Lines subsidiary ACL, these ships now offer a weekly year-round fixed day of the week passenger service […]
Cape George Lighthouse
Since it is National Lighhouse Day, let me celebrate.
I have enjoyed going to lighthouses, and have done so for years. If anything, I keep finding them more and more evocative. A number of years ago, from high cliffs over the Northumberland Straight, this is what I saw one afternoon from a lighthouse.
One old fishing boat:
One sleek new fishing boat:
One chubby fishing boat:
One fading green fishing boat:
One distant white sailboat under sail:
One close white sailboat under sail:
Two small outboard boats:
One tugboat pulling . . .
One rusting barge.
Happily, the Cape George Lighthouse is now listed as a Heritage Site by the government of Canada.
(photo)https://opto.ca/sites/default/files/pictures/featured_items/nova_scotia_-_cape_george_lighthouse.jpg
DE
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I have also written a couple of chapters in one of my novels that were set in a lighthouse. This is a section of one of them.
Let the light shine.
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Excerpt from: He Lives In The City / He Drives To The Country
“Well, Blaine, the place is as sturdy as the rock it’s on. Government inspected every spring. We even sat pretty through the Great Groundhog Day Gale in 1976, the worst storm in over a hundred years.”
Fred Gannet nudged Blaine to the huge windows. He pointed into the distance, although neither could see through the fog.
“Waves forty feet smashed up against us. We clocked winds at one hundred and thirty-seven miles an hour. We had the warning, so we got most of this battened down. Turned over my van, but I had it far from the cliff. Smashed out a window in the living room. I had a bitch of a time getting plywood over it. Lost power and phone of course, but everything here can run on emergency generator. And part of the roof lifted, but it didn’t do that much damage.” He jabbed his finger at the rain spattered windows. “This is a baby compared to that whore.”
He gave a whoop of a laugh, and took off his cap.
“Old George Crenshaw, he’s the keep on Goat Island, a mile square drop of nothing about eight miles further out to sea. Well, he took the brunt of that bitch, and we were all sure he was a goner. For hours after it passed, there was no boats could get through the waves, or helicopters through the wind. Even the radios were gone, and no one had talked to the old bugger for twelve hours.
“We kept trying and trying, and finally I heard his call letters, but real faint like. I turn my juice ’til the needle’s in the red, and I’m yelling, to find out how he is. You know the first thing any of us hear that old son of a bitch say?” The large man’s body was actually shaking with laughter, something Blaine had rarely seen in anyone.
“Old George’s thin voice comes out of the radio, like a fart out of a ghost, and he says: `Well, boys, that was quite a breeze’.”
There was a documentary about Maine lighthouses on the local PBS last week. A relatively (in this day and age) ancient documentary, as one of its features was the current (then) president, George Bush (HW) giving a speech. So at least a quarter century ago.
I have enjoyed going to lighthouses for longer still. If anything, I just keep finding them more evocative. I have a couple of chapters of one of my novels set in a lighthouse. A number of years ago, from high cliffs over the Northumberland Straight, this is what I saw one afternoon from a lighthouse.
One old fishing boat:
One sleek new fishing boat:
One chubby fishing boat:
One fading green fishing boat:
One distant white sailboat under sail:
One close white sailboat under sail:
Two small outboard boats:
One tugboat pulling . . .
One rusting barge.
Happily, the Cape George Lighthouse was recently listed as a Heritage Site by the government of Canada.
DE
(photo) https://opto.ca/sites/default/files/pictures/featured_items/nova_scotia_-_cape_george_lighthouse.jpg
(news item) http://globalnews.ca/news/2089945/14-lighthouses-across-nova-scotia-granted-heritage-status/
(Cape George Lighthouse) http://www.parl.ns.ca/lighthouse/
Last night I stood on a high hill, overlooking the broad Bedford Basin.
Bedford Basin is a wide body of water connected to Halifax harbour by The Narrows. Halifax harbour in turn leads to the ocean. As I watched the further hills of Bedford Basin, fog was rolling from inland and spreading across the water. As I looked toward The Narrows, fog was streaming from the harbour to fill the entrance of Bedford Basin. There was a lot of fog.
This morning, the meteorologists say that Halifax is in a “deep fog”, a term I have not heard officially used. They are correct. I can not see across the harbour, though I can see houses across the street.
I like fog. I like foghorns. I enjoy seeing a wall of fog roll in from the ocean. I enjoy watching the water, the land, the ships, the houses, all become obscured. I anticipate becoming obscured myself. Now you see me, now you don’t.
I also enjoy foghorns. They have been sounding from the harbour this morning. They can startle, yet they are evocative. They are historical. The Queen Mary 2 was in Halifax last week. There were celebrations for the 175th Anniversary of the Cunard Line. The grand ship sounded its grand horns a number of times as it left. I was, if I may say, blown away.
One time I was on the Atlantic coast and saw a thick wall of fog out to sea. From my distance, it seemed to be staying put. The description of it being a wall is almost literal. On my side, blue sky and sunshine. On the other, white obscurity. As I walked along the shore I kept looking at the fog. It did not change or lift.
Then, one time I looked, I could tell something was different. The image was thicker. There was some additional colour. In the course of a long minute I realized that a huge ship was coming out of the fog. Spectral and slow. A container ship piled high. Its bow glistening in the sun. A three- masted schooner would not have been more impressive. Or spooky.
DE
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