Found a couple of pics from my big boat days.....

[Nauti Fox]

From British Navigator, the very first ship I served on that had an air conditioned control room.....bliss and lifts!
Came to a sad end later in her life when hit by an Exocet!

Leaving the ship at Freeport....

 

[BruceK]

I'll raise your look of boredom with a handful of diamonds

RV Geomaster off West Africa

 

[Nauti Fox]

Not me sitting down, took the (bad) photos.
I did find it a strange life aboard.......

 

[BruceK]

I worked 3 weeks on, 2 weeks off with an 84 hour working week which was hard enough, but on a DP working ship at rest in the Atlantic rollers the rolling and scream of the bow thrusters and stern azimut would make sleep difficult and even then because of the roll you'd have to wedge yourself in with pillows or wake up with a seriously stiff neck from your head rolling about. The cardinal sin on our working boat was to drop a spanner and the poor Filipino crew that were on 24hr chipping duty must have been the most abused souls on the sea. It was a hard life made harder ashore when one would party with abandon and blow the hefty wodge of dough you'd just broken yourself to earn. Great days, earned hand over fist and blew it all on good times, oh, and a small business which made even more dosh. Then I decided it was time to travel the world and blew it all on good times and girls. What I would give to do it all again :encouragement:

 

[Nauti Fox]

Normal watchkeeping for me and six months on and two off, got to say I did find it hard to adjust being back at home.
Very memorable photo for me of leaving the Navigator, it was during the oil embargo against America so the ship was unloading in the Bahamas, I was "stuck" in Freeport for a week, very few flights because of the embargo. Then flown to Nassau for another week and then to New York for three days....
I was young and foolish, also on expenses, and it was over Christmas.........
With the Gulf run it took about a month to get there, then normally loaded offshore and the same time back to europe where on the bigger ships you would part discharge at different places, trouble was if you were on watch you didn't get off as they could discharge at a mighty rate.
Only time I've ever worked where flogging spanners were the norm
Also worked on smaller ships where we seemed to spend most of the time wandering around in the Baltic, very enjoyable as we were in port a lot, one ship I was on had a football team... we were a sight to behold!

 

[BruceK]

Well you definitely trump me there. I can assure you some of the African ports we frequented were, mmm, educational, and not in a good way. Especially if there were Taiwanese trawlers that frequented.

 

[Nauti Fox]

We were once alongside in Alexandria with a lot of Russian warships, we had a cargo of lube oil ( I did come mightily close to blowing this ship up a couple of weeks earlier) when an Israeli reconnaissance jet flew over low and fast (it was that era) and it got a tad tense for a while....we also had to throw all our Jaffa oranges over the side before we got there....
Fun times....:encouragement:

 

[Seastoke]

I worked 3 weeks on, 2 weeks off with an 84 hour working week which was hard enough, but on a DP working ship at rest in the Atlantic rollers the rolling and scream of the bow thrusters and stern azimut would make sleep difficult and even then because of the roll you'd have to wedge yourself in with pillows or wake up with a seriously stiff neck from your head rolling about. The cardinal sin on our working boat was to drop a spanner and the poor Filipino crew that were on 24hr chipping duty must have been the most abused souls on the sea. It was a hard life made harder ashore when one would party with abandon and blow the hefty wodge of dough you'd just broken yourself to earn. Great days, earned hand over fist and blew it all on good times, oh, and a small business which made even more dosh. Then I decided it was time to travel the world and blew it all on good times and girls. What I would give to do it all again :encouragement:

You could start by buying a few barrels for my fridges .

 

[LBRodders]

Then I decided it was time to travel the world and blew it all on good times and girls :encouragement:

At least you didn't waste the money

 

[BruceK]

You could start by buying a few barrels for my fridges .

Buy my own grog? The day you sport the pirate flag maybe we'll stop raiding as a courtesy.

At least you didn't waste the money

:encouragement: I survived nearly a decade before I got cut down in my prime by an English lass. C'est la vie.