Archive for the ‘Cargo-ship travel’ Category
Crossing the Atlantic on a cargo-ship: video diaries
Saturday, April 5th, 2008
As well as sending back various letters/blogs, which you can read here, Kate filmed some video diaries on her digital camera. We’ve edited them together for you to watch!
Loco2 - England to Costa Rica by Cargo Ship from Rosa van Wyk on Vimeo.
After day 11 Kate didn’t take any more videos, probably because she started having too much fun, and didn’t feel the need for so many diary-room contemplations…
As well as sending back various letters/blogs, which you can read here, Kate filmed some video diaries on her digital camera. We’ve edited them together for you to watch!
Loco2 - England to Costa Rica by Cargo Ship from Rosa van Wyk on Vimeo.
After day 11 Kate didn’t take any more videos, probably because she started having too much fun, and didn’t feel the need for so many diary-room contemplations…
Cargo-ship carbon
Tuesday, January 8th, 2008
As we all know from rhymes at school, “in fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue”, and since then a very large number of ships have crossed the Atlantic and the other seven seas. Unlike the Santa Maria, in the 20th century the vast majority of them have been powered by a fossil fuel of some kind. On Wednesday I read an article in the Guardian about an idea that could change that, at least to some extent. Putting sails back on ships could be a way to make them greener, and crucially for the shipping companies, consume less fuel (which like all fossil-based fuel in the world is becoming increasingly expensive).
Companies such as Skysails are promoting this technology as a cost-saving measure for freight shipping companies, with the slogan “Turn wind into profit” (which reminds me of an amusing advert). Because of the significant contribution to climate change caused by shipping (due to the large number of goods we trade around the world), making freighting by greener must be a good thing (although localising economies so less stuff is shipped is a key part of the solution too).
But how green is cargo ship travel for passengers? Various people have taken this option as an alternative to flying (including Kate, the founder of Loco2; you’ll be able to read blogs about the experience soon) but as yet there is little information available about the CO2 emissions per person because of the fact that the ships are (of course) primarily carrying cargo, not people. This makes it difficult to ascertain the contribution of individual passengers to the overall carbon emissions.
One argument (discussed here) says that because the ship is travelling anyway to get the cargo to its destination, the passengers’ travel is irrelevant, and therefore the journey can be seen as carbon neutral. That’s all well and good whilst we’re talking about a small number of pioneers taking the opportunity to have a trans-Atlantic adventure, but it’s not going to work for large number of passengers (the main risk involved with scaling up passenger numbers is that we’ll go down the polluting cruise ship route).
A way to look at cargo ship travel that takes into account the passenger contribution is to work it out in terms of weight. This is the method that the mighty Barbara Hadrill used to calculate the emissions on her massive adventure to Australia. Barbara worked out that the freight ship leg of her adventure (Singapore - Darwin) produced 285,760 grams CO2 for 2350 miles (see her August 2006 blog).
Calculating in terms of weight is far from an established method, but it is logical, and should help us to think about the comparative advantages of each mode of transport, both in terms of CO2 and fuel efficiency (which is an increasing concern for all of us given massively rising energy costs).
Right off the top of my head, the method goes something like this (I may come back and improve on this as I talk to people about it):
Think about a humble passenger cabin on a cargo ship where all other space is used as efficiently as possible (because the more cargo the ship holds, the more cost-effective the freighting). This is going to be far better in CO2 terms than a decadent cruise ship where not only the cabin, but the whole ship is engineered around comfort and entertainment, rather than simply getting as much cargo (human or otherwise) from A to B on as little fuel as possible. For a cruise ship calculating the CO2 emissions per person is simply a case of dividing the total emissions by the number of passengers (as that’s the only purpose of the voyage), but for a cargo ship we need to take into account the fact that it’s carrying cargo as well.
Let’s assume a cargo ship can carry 3000 tonnes of cargo (that’s 3 million kg) and that a person weighs 65kg (about 10 stone). In this situation (if my calculations are correct) the passenger would be responsible for 0.002% of the overall CO2 emissions of the journey. I couldn’t find a fuel consumption figure for a typical trans-Atlantic journey (the nearest I got was here) but we can safely bet that 0.002% of it isn’t very much. Now obviously this assumes that to carry everyone that efficiently we’d need to cram all the passengers into containers like they were cargo, and that would be mental, but it does give us a useful indication of the terms we can view the issues in.
The basic conclusion (and we probably didn’t need to do such ludicrous calculations to work it out) is that using space more efficiently when travelling is a good thing. What it doesn’t tell us unfortunately, is a comparable CO2 per km figure for passenger cargo-ship travel versus air travel (or other means). There’s still work to be done on this, and I’ll be continuing to dig around places like the New Scientist and sustainable shipping sites to try and find more answers.
In the meantime, I’ll leave you with two thoughts:
- there needs to be a clear distinction between greenhouse gases that cause climate change (a very pressing global concern) and other pollutants such as Sulphur Dioxide that cause local environmental damage (an immediate concern for some, but not something that will affect all of us)
- we need to think about the feasible efficiency advances available in shipping/ferries (such as solar power) versus the feasible efficiency advances available in aviation (such as airships) and then make bold decisions about mass transportation on that basis
As we all know from rhymes at school, “in fourteen hundred and ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue”, and since then a very large number of ships have crossed the Atlantic and the other seven seas. Unlike the Santa Maria, in the 20th century the vast majority of them have been powered by a fossil fuel of some kind. On Wednesday I read an article in the Guardian about an idea that could change that, at least to some extent. Putting sails back on ships could be a way to make them greener, and crucially for the shipping companies, consume less fuel (which like all fossil-based fuel in the world is becoming increasingly expensive).
Companies such as Skysails are promoting this technology as a cost-saving measure for freight shipping companies, with the slogan “Turn wind into profit” (which reminds me of an amusing advert). Because of the significant contribution to climate change caused by shipping (due to the large number of goods we trade around the world), making freighting by greener must be a good thing (although localising economies so less stuff is shipped is a key part of the solution too).
But how green is cargo ship travel for passengers? Various people have taken this option as an alternative to flying (including Kate, the founder of Loco2; you’ll be able to read blogs about the experience soon) but as yet there is little information available about the CO2 emissions per person because of the fact that the ships are (of course) primarily carrying cargo, not people. This makes it difficult to ascertain the contribution of individual passengers to the overall carbon emissions.
One argument (discussed here) says that because the ship is travelling anyway to get the cargo to its destination, the passengers’ travel is irrelevant, and therefore the journey can be seen as carbon neutral. That’s all well and good whilst we’re talking about a small number of pioneers taking the opportunity to have a trans-Atlantic adventure, but it’s not going to work for large number of passengers (the main risk involved with scaling up passenger numbers is that we’ll go down the polluting cruise ship route).
A way to look at cargo ship travel that takes into account the passenger contribution is to work it out in terms of weight. This is the method that the mighty Barbara Hadrill used to calculate the emissions on her massive adventure to Australia. Barbara worked out that the freight ship leg of her adventure (Singapore - Darwin) produced 285,760 grams CO2 for 2350 miles (see her August 2006 blog).
Calculating in terms of weight is far from an established method, but it is logical, and should help us to think about the comparative advantages of each mode of transport, both in terms of CO2 and fuel efficiency (which is an increasing concern for all of us given massively rising energy costs).
Right off the top of my head, the method goes something like this (I may come back and improve on this as I talk to people about it):
Think about a humble passenger cabin on a cargo ship where all other space is used as efficiently as possible (because the more cargo the ship holds, the more cost-effective the freighting). This is going to be far better in CO2 terms than a decadent cruise ship where not only the cabin, but the whole ship is engineered around comfort and entertainment, rather than simply getting as much cargo (human or otherwise) from A to B on as little fuel as possible. For a cruise ship calculating the CO2 emissions per person is simply a case of dividing the total emissions by the number of passengers (as that’s the only purpose of the voyage), but for a cargo ship we need to take into account the fact that it’s carrying cargo as well.
Let’s assume a cargo ship can carry 3000 tonnes of cargo (that’s 3 million kg) and that a person weighs 65kg (about 10 stone). In this situation (if my calculations are correct) the passenger would be responsible for 0.002% of the overall CO2 emissions of the journey. I couldn’t find a fuel consumption figure for a typical trans-Atlantic journey (the nearest I got was here) but we can safely bet that 0.002% of it isn’t very much. Now obviously this assumes that to carry everyone that efficiently we’d need to cram all the passengers into containers like they were cargo, and that would be mental, but it does give us a useful indication of the terms we can view the issues in.
The basic conclusion (and we probably didn’t need to do such ludicrous calculations to work it out) is that using space more efficiently when travelling is a good thing. What it doesn’t tell us unfortunately, is a comparable CO2 per km figure for passenger cargo-ship travel versus air travel (or other means). There’s still work to be done on this, and I’ll be continuing to dig around places like the New Scientist and sustainable shipping sites to try and find more answers.
In the meantime, I’ll leave you with two thoughts:
- there needs to be a clear distinction between greenhouse gases that cause climate change (a very pressing global concern) and other pollutants such as Sulphur Dioxide that cause local environmental damage (an immediate concern for some, but not something that will affect all of us)
- we need to think about the feasible efficiency advances available in shipping/ferries (such as solar power) versus the feasible efficiency advances available in aviation (such as airships) and then make bold decisions about mass transportation on that basis
Letters from a cargo-ship part III
Friday, September 7th, 2007
See the photos that go with the letters
This letter is part III and should be read after Part I and Part II
September 7th 2007
Dear family,
What a difference a day makes! Since I last wrote I was feeling a lot more positive but in the few days since things have gotten (is that a word?) even better and I’m now having a great time! I’m sure the ups and downs of the first few days were perfectly normal considering the bizarre situation I’ve put myself in but I’m glad that the early panic has passed. As you will know from my last letter, I made a friend. As I said, she left after we’d known each other for only one day, but having managed to build the courage to speak to her in the first place, I have become less nervous about approaching other people.
A couple of days ago the ship had a welcome party for the passengers. Granted it was a bit a late, seeing as it was my tenth day but it was still a nice gesture. There was some extra special food and a glass of wine for all the passengers and the officers, not to mention no short supply of vodka. The Russians love a good toast so there were lots of raised glasses and a nice atmosphere. I can’t remember if I described the other passengers for you in my last letter so just briefly: Bert, a retired German doctor who is just having a holiday, and Claude and Collette, a French couple in their early fifties. They’re all very nice and we manage to have a few conversations, although with varying degrees of understanding.
Anyway, just by coincidence, the night of the welcome party was also Bert’s birthday so after dinner he invited the passengers to the deck for a few glasses of champagne as the sun went down. And then, to my delight a dolphin starts leaping out of the water and doing flips. It was just like a film! Brilliant. Once the other passengers went to bed, I went to chat to some of the crew. There’s no doubt that I was more bold due to a little Dutch courage, but once I got over the initial nerves, it was fine. I’m familiar with quite a few of them and I’ve enjoyed a few evenings of table tennis as well as some truly terrible Ukranian folk music, and some not-so-bad Russian hip-hop. I’ve also managed to master a few Russian words which has increased my popularity enormously (it seems my accent is hilariously bad). A couple of them have now taken to calling me “Queen Katarina” as apparently the second queen of Russia was a Katharine too. The point of all this is now that I have people to chat to and sometimes have somewhere to go, besides my cabin.
Funnily enough I’d actually got used to the solitude and was quite happy in my own company, but it’s always more fun to have people to spend time with, even if most of them are fifty-something Russians. I thought I might have a revelation about my personality, to find myself in a cliched sort of way, but actually all the solitude proved that I already know myself quite well.
We are currently somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic, having passed through the Azores two days ago. The weather was pretty bad so all we could see was a tiny glimpse of a mountain-top on one of the islands. Claude told me that the peak, which is about 2500 metres above sea-level, has claimed the lives of many people, including the pilots of one of the first planes to attempt to fly across the Atlantic. Even though we were about 20 miles away there were more signs of life (see drawing of bird for Dad to look up) so it was exciting to watch the birds as they skimmed across the water’s surface, looking for fish. Most days there’s nothing to see but sea and sky, usually there aren’t even any clouds. I was out on the deck the other day and actually considered getting my binoculars out to look more closely at a bit of driftwood. However, this morning I was lucky to catch a glimpse of a flying fish which leapt at list one meter high and three across in an arc. They’re quite erratic so are difficult to spot but if you’re patient you can see one every now and again.
I used my spare time to learn a bit about the boat and the various bits of equipment. I’ve learnt how to check our coordinates on the charts (which are produced in Taunton) and the second officer actually me steer the ship for a bit. Usually it’s on auto-pilot but they have manual controls for approaching the harbour. It was quite fun turning five degrees port or starboard etc., although the rudder takes ages to turn so it’s a slow process. Did you know that early ships only had a gangway and docking facilities on one side - hence “port-side” - while the other side faced out to the stars! Talking of stars, it’s amazing how many you can see from the top deck and there’s no light pollution because the bridge is lit at night with red light only so as not to affect visibility.
At the moment we’re anchored because the engineers are fixing part of the engine, replacing a piston, I think. It’s taking a while so I think we’re a day behind schedule but I’m not bothered. Another day doesn’t matter seeing as I’ve been here so long. I’m saving “One hundred years of Solitude” and working my way through the ship’s library. Unfortunately, I’ve had the terrible misfortune of reading a Danielle Steele novel. This is one of my few regrets in life.
My puzzle is coming along well, I never thought I could get so much satisfaction from a jigsaw. I was so happy when I found a particular piece the other day that I actually stood up and performed a jig while alone in my cabin. I’ve also recorded quite a few video diary bits on my camera and have some extraordinary photos of the water that I want to get framed when I get home. One of the crew speaks Spanish so I’ve been practising a little with him, although I suspect his Spanish is not quite as good as he claims as sometimes I’m sure he’s speaking absolute bollocks! The upshot of all this is that my days are fairly busy now and the time is flying past. We should be in Guadaloupe by the 14th or 15th and then it’s plain sailing until Costa Rica.
The weather now is absolutely glorious and you can tell Phillip that I’m staying out of the son during peak hours and wearing my cap. After all, cool cats wear hats! The swimming pool has now been filled with sea water. Last night the water temperature was 26 degrees at 9pm so it’s lovely. The pool is so small it’s barely worth swimming but I’ve been floating around and treading water for the sake of getting some exercise. I think that’s all I have to report. Wait, no! I just thought of something else. It’s wonderful every night we have to put the clocks back one hour as we move West so unlike in a plane where you set your watch to seven hours back all at one, we get a whole week of having another hour in bed every day. I don’t suppose this will be quite so fun on the way home. Now that’s everything, I hope you’re all OK.
Loads of love Kate
p.s. today 12th September I saw more flying fish. These ones were very small; they barely leave the surface of the water but they travel for at least ten metres. They’re more like running fish - amazing! And last night I saw three shooting stars in as many minutes and the milky way was as clear as day. The second officer saw me star-gazing and has offered to show me a maritime book of constellations if the sky is clear. I almost forgot, even though it was totally clear where we were last night, there was a storm far off on the horizon and I could see the lightning from miles and miles away!
Today (13th Sept) we crossed the Tropic of Cancer, nothing to see obviously but exciting nonetheless. I also ate some cow’s tongue for dinner! It didn’t taste bad but I kept thinking about my own tongue as I ate so I didn’t eat too much. There’s been a change of schedule so tomorrow we’re going to Martinique for a few hours then going to Guadaloupe instead of the other way round. It’s a shame we won’t get more time to explore but that’s the nature of freight travel I suppose.
See the photos that go with the letters
This letter is part III and should be read after Part I and Part II
September 7th 2007
Dear family,
What a difference a day makes! Since I last wrote I was feeling a lot more positive but in the few days since things have gotten (is that a word?) even better and I’m now having a great time! I’m sure the ups and downs of the first few days were perfectly normal considering the bizarre situation I’ve put myself in but I’m glad that the early panic has passed. As you will know from my last letter, I made a friend. As I said, she left after we’d known each other for only one day, but having managed to build the courage to speak to her in the first place, I have become less nervous about approaching other people.
A couple of days ago the ship had a welcome party for the passengers. Granted it was a bit a late, seeing as it was my tenth day but it was still a nice gesture. There was some extra special food and a glass of wine for all the passengers and the officers, not to mention no short supply of vodka. The Russians love a good toast so there were lots of raised glasses and a nice atmosphere. I can’t remember if I described the other passengers for you in my last letter so just briefly: Bert, a retired German doctor who is just having a holiday, and Claude and Collette, a French couple in their early fifties. They’re all very nice and we manage to have a few conversations, although with varying degrees of understanding.
Anyway, just by coincidence, the night of the welcome party was also Bert’s birthday so after dinner he invited the passengers to the deck for a few glasses of champagne as the sun went down. And then, to my delight a dolphin starts leaping out of the water and doing flips. It was just like a film! Brilliant. Once the other passengers went to bed, I went to chat to some of the crew. There’s no doubt that I was more bold due to a little Dutch courage, but once I got over the initial nerves, it was fine. I’m familiar with quite a few of them and I’ve enjoyed a few evenings of table tennis as well as some truly terrible Ukranian folk music, and some not-so-bad Russian hip-hop. I’ve also managed to master a few Russian words which has increased my popularity enormously (it seems my accent is hilariously bad). A couple of them have now taken to calling me “Queen Katarina” as apparently the second queen of Russia was a Katharine too. The point of all this is now that I have people to chat to and sometimes have somewhere to go, besides my cabin.
Funnily enough I’d actually got used to the solitude and was quite happy in my own company, but it’s always more fun to have people to spend time with, even if most of them are fifty-something Russians. I thought I might have a revelation about my personality, to find myself in a cliched sort of way, but actually all the solitude proved that I already know myself quite well.
We are currently somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic, having passed through the Azores two days ago. The weather was pretty bad so all we could see was a tiny glimpse of a mountain-top on one of the islands. Claude told me that the peak, which is about 2500 metres above sea-level, has claimed the lives of many people, including the pilots of one of the first planes to attempt to fly across the Atlantic. Even though we were about 20 miles away there were more signs of life (see drawing of bird for Dad to look up) so it was exciting to watch the birds as they skimmed across the water’s surface, looking for fish. Most days there’s nothing to see but sea and sky, usually there aren’t even any clouds. I was out on the deck the other day and actually considered getting my binoculars out to look more closely at a bit of driftwood. However, this morning I was lucky to catch a glimpse of a flying fish which leapt at list one meter high and three across in an arc. They’re quite erratic so are difficult to spot but if you’re patient you can see one every now and again.
I used my spare time to learn a bit about the boat and the various bits of equipment. I’ve learnt how to check our coordinates on the charts (which are produced in Taunton) and the second officer actually me steer the ship for a bit. Usually it’s on auto-pilot but they have manual controls for approaching the harbour. It was quite fun turning five degrees port or starboard etc., although the rudder takes ages to turn so it’s a slow process. Did you know that early ships only had a gangway and docking facilities on one side - hence “port-side” - while the other side faced out to the stars! Talking of stars, it’s amazing how many you can see from the top deck and there’s no light pollution because the bridge is lit at night with red light only so as not to affect visibility.
At the moment we’re anchored because the engineers are fixing part of the engine, replacing a piston, I think. It’s taking a while so I think we’re a day behind schedule but I’m not bothered. Another day doesn’t matter seeing as I’ve been here so long. I’m saving “One hundred years of Solitude” and working my way through the ship’s library. Unfortunately, I’ve had the terrible misfortune of reading a Danielle Steele novel. This is one of my few regrets in life.
My puzzle is coming along well, I never thought I could get so much satisfaction from a jigsaw. I was so happy when I found a particular piece the other day that I actually stood up and performed a jig while alone in my cabin. I’ve also recorded quite a few video diary bits on my camera and have some extraordinary photos of the water that I want to get framed when I get home. One of the crew speaks Spanish so I’ve been practising a little with him, although I suspect his Spanish is not quite as good as he claims as sometimes I’m sure he’s speaking absolute bollocks! The upshot of all this is that my days are fairly busy now and the time is flying past. We should be in Guadaloupe by the 14th or 15th and then it’s plain sailing until Costa Rica.
The weather now is absolutely glorious and you can tell Phillip that I’m staying out of the son during peak hours and wearing my cap. After all, cool cats wear hats! The swimming pool has now been filled with sea water. Last night the water temperature was 26 degrees at 9pm so it’s lovely. The pool is so small it’s barely worth swimming but I’ve been floating around and treading water for the sake of getting some exercise. I think that’s all I have to report. Wait, no! I just thought of something else. It’s wonderful every night we have to put the clocks back one hour as we move West so unlike in a plane where you set your watch to seven hours back all at one, we get a whole week of having another hour in bed every day. I don’t suppose this will be quite so fun on the way home. Now that’s everything, I hope you’re all OK.
Loads of love Kate
p.s. today 12th September I saw more flying fish. These ones were very small; they barely leave the surface of the water but they travel for at least ten metres. They’re more like running fish - amazing! And last night I saw three shooting stars in as many minutes and the milky way was as clear as day. The second officer saw me star-gazing and has offered to show me a maritime book of constellations if the sky is clear. I almost forgot, even though it was totally clear where we were last night, there was a storm far off on the horizon and I could see the lightning from miles and miles away!
Today (13th Sept) we crossed the Tropic of Cancer, nothing to see obviously but exciting nonetheless. I also ate some cow’s tongue for dinner! It didn’t taste bad but I kept thinking about my own tongue as I ate so I didn’t eat too much. There’s been a change of schedule so tomorrow we’re going to Martinique for a few hours then going to Guadaloupe instead of the other way round. It’s a shame we won’t get more time to explore but that’s the nature of freight travel I suppose.
Letters from a cargo-ship part II
Wednesday, September 5th, 2007
See the photos that go with the letters
This letter is part II and should be read after Part I and before Part III
September 5th 2007
Dear family,
I thought it only fair that I write to you again, although this letter will arrive at the same time as the first I wrote. I have discovered that writing letters is very therapeutic and with each letter I write filling five pages on both sides, also very time-consuming. The real reason though that I am writing again is to reassure you all that I am OK. The first days on the boat were probably some of the hardest days I’ve ever experienced in my life but I have emerged triumphant. Tomorrow will be a week since I left you at Dover and although I do still feel pangs of homesickness now and then, I am coping far better than I thought possible in these first few days.
I have developed a routine which helps to pass the time. It mainly consists of early nights and hours of reading but the days are passing more quickly all the time. I find it quite difficult to resist clock-watching, a totally fruitless exercise, but still the time passes faster than before.
We were joined at Hamburg by another passenger whose name I have forgotten. He is a sixty-something year old German who used to be a doctor and he seems very nice. His English is not particularly good and my German is limited to a few useless GCSE phrases so our conversation is stilted, but it is nonetheless nice to eat at the table with a companion, even if we do rarely speak. We should be picking up two more passengers at Le Harve where we should dock at 9 tonight. I know that they’re in their late fifties but I am hopeful that they speak English.
I rather wish I’d had the sense to join the boat at Le Havre because I find it frustrating to think that after this long I am still so far from my destination. Hamburg was a nice city and pleasant to stroll around for a few hours, but I could certainly have given it a miss. As for Antwerp, I was not impressed at all. I might have been walking English high-street - bloody Starbucks and C&A, it’s ridiculous. It’s not clear whether I’ll get a chance to get off at Le Harve yet as we were delayed last night by bad weather (my first wave of seasickness and I hope my last) but it all depends on the tide. We may leave first thing in which case the steward will post this for me, otherwise I hope to find a post office myself.
I’m not struggling so much with the boredom either and I’ve made it through a few chapters of my Spanish book. It’s rather hard to follow actually but I do an hour a day and it seems to be sinking in. I also found out that they will fill the swimming pool at Le Havre for the Atlantic crossing so I hope that I will be able to have the occassional dip as it gets hotter. I’ve also started a jigsaw puzzle that I found in the passengers’ day room.
Think of me on the 10th… when I will officially be half-way through this mammoth journey and probably somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic. It turns out that we won’t be stopping at the Azores after all, we pass nearby but do not dock which is a pity so it will be nine days non-stop across the Atlantic as originally planned. But after those nine days I am on the final stretch.
The stories I’ve heard about Columbia have totally put me off leaving the boat on those stops so unless I have company I will be boat-bound on those days which is a shame. Alex, the girl I made friends with, was telling me stories about the lengths people will go to to smuggle drugs from Columbia. Her father told her of one man who climbed inside a satellite thing on the deck, I don’t know how because she showed me and it’s pretty tiny. She also told me a man they found who had stowed away in the compartment where they store fruit. He was lucky to be found before they set sail because when closed that area is almost completely air-tight and refrigerated to minus 5 degrees centigrade; he would surely have died. I’ve been told that the security will be stepped up at Columbia to counteract this sort of thing as the shipping company is given hefty fines if anyone is found. To be honest it won’t be hard to improve on current security measures as no-one has yet checked my passport. I remember on that film by that guy who bought a freighter to Canada talking about daily life-boat drills. There is no such thing on this boat so I took it upon myself to read all the safety guidelines and practise putting on my life-jacket. Better safe than sorry.
I hope when I arrive that I will have received an email from Raleigh with the address of where you can write to me when I am volunteering. When you get this letter though, I’d love it if you could write me an email. I know I won’t receive it for a few weeks but I’d love to get news from home as soon as I reach a computer. I hope you’re all well and sorry I shocked you a little with the first letter. I think it’s important for me to send it because it captures how I felt during the first few days. But I hope this letter reassures you that I survived, despite my panic.
I love and miss you all loads.
Love Kate
P.S. I just got your postcard this morning, it’s so lovely to hear your news. I’m so sad that I couldn’t see you waving, I did scan the cliffs but I was a bit too upset to stand out on the deck so stayed in my cabin for privacy. The worst thing was that after 15 minutes on board, the steward asked if I was going back into Dover for the day so I could have spent longer with you after all but I didn’t have my phone to call you. I miss you all very much.
See the photos that go with the letters
This letter is part II and should be read after Part I and before Part III
September 5th 2007
Dear family,
I thought it only fair that I write to you again, although this letter will arrive at the same time as the first I wrote. I have discovered that writing letters is very therapeutic and with each letter I write filling five pages on both sides, also very time-consuming. The real reason though that I am writing again is to reassure you all that I am OK. The first days on the boat were probably some of the hardest days I’ve ever experienced in my life but I have emerged triumphant. Tomorrow will be a week since I left you at Dover and although I do still feel pangs of homesickness now and then, I am coping far better than I thought possible in these first few days.
I have developed a routine which helps to pass the time. It mainly consists of early nights and hours of reading but the days are passing more quickly all the time. I find it quite difficult to resist clock-watching, a totally fruitless exercise, but still the time passes faster than before.
We were joined at Hamburg by another passenger whose name I have forgotten. He is a sixty-something year old German who used to be a doctor and he seems very nice. His English is not particularly good and my German is limited to a few useless GCSE phrases so our conversation is stilted, but it is nonetheless nice to eat at the table with a companion, even if we do rarely speak. We should be picking up two more passengers at Le Harve where we should dock at 9 tonight. I know that they’re in their late fifties but I am hopeful that they speak English.
I rather wish I’d had the sense to join the boat at Le Havre because I find it frustrating to think that after this long I am still so far from my destination. Hamburg was a nice city and pleasant to stroll around for a few hours, but I could certainly have given it a miss. As for Antwerp, I was not impressed at all. I might have been walking English high-street - bloody Starbucks and C&A, it’s ridiculous. It’s not clear whether I’ll get a chance to get off at Le Harve yet as we were delayed last night by bad weather (my first wave of seasickness and I hope my last) but it all depends on the tide. We may leave first thing in which case the steward will post this for me, otherwise I hope to find a post office myself.
I’m not struggling so much with the boredom either and I’ve made it through a few chapters of my Spanish book. It’s rather hard to follow actually but I do an hour a day and it seems to be sinking in. I also found out that they will fill the swimming pool at Le Havre for the Atlantic crossing so I hope that I will be able to have the occassional dip as it gets hotter. I’ve also started a jigsaw puzzle that I found in the passengers’ day room.
Think of me on the 10th… when I will officially be half-way through this mammoth journey and probably somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic. It turns out that we won’t be stopping at the Azores after all, we pass nearby but do not dock which is a pity so it will be nine days non-stop across the Atlantic as originally planned. But after those nine days I am on the final stretch.
The stories I’ve heard about Columbia have totally put me off leaving the boat on those stops so unless I have company I will be boat-bound on those days which is a shame. Alex, the girl I made friends with, was telling me stories about the lengths people will go to to smuggle drugs from Columbia. Her father told her of one man who climbed inside a satellite thing on the deck, I don’t know how because she showed me and it’s pretty tiny. She also told me a man they found who had stowed away in the compartment where they store fruit. He was lucky to be found before they set sail because when closed that area is almost completely air-tight and refrigerated to minus 5 degrees centigrade; he would surely have died. I’ve been told that the security will be stepped up at Columbia to counteract this sort of thing as the shipping company is given hefty fines if anyone is found. To be honest it won’t be hard to improve on current security measures as no-one has yet checked my passport. I remember on that film by that guy who bought a freighter to Canada talking about daily life-boat drills. There is no such thing on this boat so I took it upon myself to read all the safety guidelines and practise putting on my life-jacket. Better safe than sorry.
I hope when I arrive that I will have received an email from Raleigh with the address of where you can write to me when I am volunteering. When you get this letter though, I’d love it if you could write me an email. I know I won’t receive it for a few weeks but I’d love to get news from home as soon as I reach a computer. I hope you’re all well and sorry I shocked you a little with the first letter. I think it’s important for me to send it because it captures how I felt during the first few days. But I hope this letter reassures you that I survived, despite my panic.
I love and miss you all loads.
Love Kate
P.S. I just got your postcard this morning, it’s so lovely to hear your news. I’m so sad that I couldn’t see you waving, I did scan the cliffs but I was a bit too upset to stand out on the deck so stayed in my cabin for privacy. The worst thing was that after 15 minutes on board, the steward asked if I was going back into Dover for the day so I could have spent longer with you after all but I didn’t have my phone to call you. I miss you all very much.
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