This Is How We Tramp

Richmond, Ca, was a cluster.

The longshoremen wanted a gangway put down onto the dock in addition to the sidewalk up the giant loading ramp on the stern, so that meant we needed two gangway watchstanders at a time, which means I stood my watch, did my fire round, then went to bed at 0100, then I was called back out at 0330 and I worked until the following midnight.

Because the longshoremen.

They also filed a grievance against the ship b/c we did stores. Apparently taking perishable food aboard by crane forward the gangway, where we take on supplies, instead of waiting until midnight when they were done with cargo on the stern cargo ramp, violated their contract in some way.  

They refused to allow us to do it even during lunch when they were off work for an hour. Make it make sense.

I recall the Oakland longshoremen being equivalent in speed, competence, and attitude to the longshoremen in Pakistan.  Worse than the poor and starving Sri Lankans or annoying Egyptians.  And yet, just down the road in Long Beach they're pretty decent.  

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After "burning on STCW," the maritime verbiage for "exceeding the legal recommendations for work without rest," it took me two sleeps to get caught back up.  Physically I was good after one sleep, but the cotton in my head took the second sleep to pick out.

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Liners have a set route and the predictability of their fixed schedule is really nice.  A ship of the line runs like a clock and there are very few surprises.  There's a lot to be said for predictability.

While it's great to be bored at sea, it seems that I prefer tramps.

Tramp ships don't know where they're going, or when. It's never simple or straightforward. No one aboard is quite prepared for the weird situations that arise.  Currently we're pinned offshore near San Diego by weather, and we can't go into port until the wind abates.  

The port we're going into has a very narrow fairway in and the approach must be precise. With swells on the stern and 50 knot winds on the beam, this giant box is not exactly... Navigably precise.

So, we're either going to anchor somewhere or lay hove to and drift offshore.  TBD.

The schedule is turning out to be interesting.  After we manage to do what must be done in this port, we have to be back in Tacoma... In mid January.  I don't know what that means except that we're going to slow bell it north, go to anchor somewhere, drift aimlessly... That's a LOT of time to kill.

Then we're off to the great white Asian north... Korea.  The destination port has 25-ft tides and the cargo can only be run 2 hours at a time.  So cargo is going to take weeks.  

And the high there today was 26 degrees, the low 12 degrees.  And no... That's not Celsius.  

I am very glad I brought two sets of wool base layers!  And multiple sets of wool socks!

From there we make our way back to this tiny little, narrow-hipped port we're currently unable to enter because of the howling winds and heaving seas.

Only three ports in over a month!  That's kind of incredible... Even for a tramp.  

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When I got up to the bridge to make coffee and assume the watch last night, the old man and the mate on watch were out on the bridge wing with binoculars looking down at our gangway area.

I made my coffee then came over to see what was going on.  I saw a launch alongside, but before I could fathom what the operation was, the mate exclaimed, "Holy shit!"

The departing captain - a man who spent 15 years on a Russian freighter in the Bering Sea before coming to the US and joining our merchant fleet - misjudged the swells while boarding the launch and fell 10 feet to its deck, breaking his leg.

I didn't see it, neither did the captain who was also looking at the launch in relationship to the boat, but the chief mate and sailors at the gangway were as dumbfounded as the mate on watch up on the bridge.  

So the departing captain had a breathalyzer and an ambulance waiting for him at the dock when the launch got him ashore.

Have I mentioned this is a dry ship? Night and day different than previous ships I’ve been on.  Being drunk will get you fired.  Having alcohol aboard will get you fired.  The energy is so different as to be a different job, altogether... Another point for my new union contract.

The chief mate had incident reports already underway before the launch determined it too dangerous to attempt to get the broken-legged Captain's luggage from the gangway.

I think the old man had at least a hundred phone calls since last night.

The third mate printed out a half dozen interweb photos of people jumping off boats and ships and had placed them in inconspicuous locations around the ship by the time I assumed the watch this morning.

He'd also requested a clarification (in post-it note form) for the logbook whether the log should refer to the incident as "a failed leap of faith" or a "gross miscalculation of judgement."

It's Christmas morning and my phone has been busy with texts and messages - a very different experience at sea for me.  Usually, I'm buried in busy-work or large projects... Anchor watch is 10 minutes of walking and 2 minutes of work at the top of every hour and then standing by with a radio for the rest of the time.  Spending it texting with friends and family is quite civilized.

We had cold cuts for lunch... Which would be cause for anger in other circumstances... Except the cook asked if I wanted 2 lobsters tonight for dinner, or 3... Apparently, we have too many of them.

Merry Christmas.

People in A Big Metal Box Carrying Little Metal Boxes That Carry People

All last night my dreams were gently nudged by the awareness that the seas were building. Internal background processors of my brain took note of the size and direction of the swells and the apparent wind speed, but I never woke up because the ride was so mild - a slight hurky-jerky with some rolling and heaving, but nothing more.

When my alarm went off at 0700, I found myself inside a coma dream, THE coma dream... Under way making way, a sailor out sailoring; it was as if I'd never been ashore.  All the real world, all of my real life, is actually the dream and this is all I've ever known.  

It is weirdly comforting and slightly terrifying and I think this deja vous only adds to the credibility of the Simulation Theory:  How can two parts of a single life be so distinctively separate and yet be contained on one single rock hurtling through time and space?

It's a hell of a thing.  Do I remain within the lane of this timeline or do I detour onto another? I guess we'll find out.

I'm aboard a 200 meter RORO (roll on, roll off) named the "Green Wave."  My sign on was smooth.  The company personnel agent was courteous and professional.  I came aboard and the familiar hostility of my former Union's culture was absent.  

Per the terms of this contract for my new union, I am a watchstander.

So my first day aboard (how was that only yesterday!?), I stood a gangway watch, then knocked off and sanitized my quarters... Even going so far as to sougee the walls- a term I've only heard at sea. On my evening watch I immediately took the wheel and for the next three hours I steered us out of the Salish Sea along the Puget Sound sea lanes.

When I first laid eyes on this ship, I assumed two things: one, that she'd ride like a nightmare in heavy seas; and two, that she'd drive like she looked.

But here I am in 4-5 meter seas in Force 10 conditions (50 knot winds, or 58 mph) and it feels remarkably seaworthy and stable.

And handling? Very nice, indeed. The steering station is state of the art, clean, and the boat does what I ask her to do without complaint. The automatic steering, aka "steering by the mike," is much more adaptive and intelligent than the old rotary devices I've always used - no reverse rudder required.

Two helm commands into steering by hand and I had her ship handling nature... Responsive and compliant.  You'd never know it to look at her shape- she looks like the offspring of a puffer fish that mated with a shoebox, if it had a guppy’s belly.  I guess Phil Bolger (the boat designer who had a few designs derided as "Bolger's Boxes") would be proud.

We cross the Columbia bar tonight and my watch will be spent entirely in hand-steering.

We expect to make arrival in Vancouver, Washington, sometime around 0130 tomorrow morning.

Two things of note from today’s watch: First, I saw either the dorsal of a beaked whale or a fin whale as it breached dead ahead of us, passing from starboard to port. I know they're very different species of the same critter, but I saw a whale in gale-driven seas, which is very uncommon, and that I could make out its color and fin shape was even rarer.

And second, the third mate picked up what appeared to be a SART (search and rescue radar transponder) signal on the radar.  SARTs are only supposed to be used when a crew is in catastrophic duress.

I was doing mandatory training down below (helicopter and sexual harassment) and when I returned to the bridge the cadet was in hand-steering.  I relieved him and for the next little while we performed the remainder of a Williamson Turn and came back to the position of the SART radar sighting and it turned out to be abandoned fishing gear - somehow the transponder on that gear mimicked a SART. 

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Remember how I said even in 5-meter-seas, the ride is nice?  Well, the other thing I'd noted about this boat is the bow is flat.  The designers basically cut off the flare above the waterline a ways up and she has a flat bow. 

To which I said, "I bet that sounds like a drum in heavy seas."

Turns out, heavy seas is anything above 5 meters.  

I had a powernap engaged in earnest when the pitching and heaving intensified into prolonged sensations of freefall.  Fair enough... I was merely being rocked in the cradle, no need to wake up.

Then the whole ship resounded with a big, wet, slapping, "baroom!" and shockwaves bounced back and forth between "stem" and stern like a physical, vibrational echo.

So, 6 meters and above with swells directly on the bow is where we find sleeplessness, and I know this for certain within my first 48 hours.

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Those >6-meter seas, it turns out, were the waves of the Columbia River bar as we transited into the river, proper.  It's known as the "Graveyard of The Pacific" b/c of the thousands of shipwrecks scattered in and around the river's mouth, but now I'll call it by another moniker, as well: "Sleep Robber of the PNW."

Robbed of sleep but still fresh from an idle life of sloth and indolence ashore, at 2000 I steered up the river for four hours until I was relieved at midnight. 

The pilot was one of the worst pilots I've encountered anywhere in the world and to describe why I think so would take too long and bore you far too much for it to be worth it for either of us, but suffice it to say, the Suez pilot who told me to "keep it in the middle" and then went to sleep in the pilot's chair after eating two lunches showed more ship handling confidence and people skills.

In my humble opinion, of course.

Tie up was interesting.  We moored alongside a small floating dock and ran our mooring lines to dolphins (multi-pilon piers) by way of a line boat, an arrangement that reminds me of tying up in the Marshall Islands or Puerto Rico.   

We were all fast by 0430, and I then went back on watch - a gangway watch, this time - at 0745, and I was tired, cold, and bored for the duration.

The floating dock is only there to accommodate our massive cargo door, and I spent the watch entertained by our cargo operations.

An endless stream of Subarus and work vans flowed out of the ship and down the ramp, while the same vans full of the same drivers returned aboard back up the ramp.  It looked like I-5 rush hour in Seattle if Seattle drivers knew how to merge. Or exceed the speed limit. Or simply drive, in general.

The sailing board is set for 0300 let go for Richmond.  I'm going to spend the next few hours sleeping before my next watch.