The Last Voyage

An old cliché holds that there is a first time for everything.  Less often repeated is the obvious truth that there is also a last time for everything.  I now look back on several last times.  Some examples are my last transatlantic voyage (aboard the Comet in 1983), my last transpacific voyage (also aboard the Comet, in 1984), my last voyage as a paid employee (aboard the Kane in 1986), the last time I took the license exams (in Boston in 1984), and my last visit to company headquarters in Bayonne (in 1987).

More recently, I have experienced several last times in my family life ashore.  There was the last time I rode the train from Boston to the Family Headquarters in New York to visit my parents, the last time I walked home from the Mineola station, the last time I brought flowers to my mother, the last time I showed Mom pictures of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, the last time I bid my parents farewell when returning to New Hampshire, and so on.

We also made a last voyage.  When my now-widowed father decided to leave the old family home and relocate to an assisted living facility here in Nashua, Miss Patty and I returned to New York to get him.  On Wednesday, August 15, 2018, he made what will likely be his last voyage aboard ship.  At 12:00 noon that day the three of us along with Bradley, the dog, sailed from Orient Point, Long Island, to New London, Connecticut, aboard the Cape Henlopen.

As a young man in the 1940s, my father had sailed on troopships across the Pacific and back.  He traveled in less-than-luxurious accommodations to less-than-idyllic destinations and was happy to simply return to the United States unscathed.  In his middle years, he skippered the family sailboat Justine along the South Shore of Long Island.  More enjoyable and much safer than his treks across the Pacific, these happy times yielded many fond memories and formed the basis of my own interest in the sea.  Later, on summer vacations, he crossed the Delaware Bay several times aboard the ferries of the Delaware River and Bay Authority fleet.  Still later in life, my parents made numerous sailings on the Cross Sound fleet to visit their grandchildren in New England.  Today’s voyage aboard the Cape Henlopen would serve as a fitting capstone, perhaps a grande finale, to a long family tradition.

We boarded the Cape Henlopen about fifteen minutes prior to her scheduled departure time and ensconced ourselves in a comfortable spot with a good view on the port side promenade deck.  The meteorological conditions were perfect for making a voyage: a clear blue sky with bright sunshine, excellent visibility, a very light breeze, a mild temperature, and a calm sea.  The “beauty of the earth”[1] indeed!  My father took in the magnificent view of Gardiners Bay and the Orient Point beach with obvious delight.  At the appointed time, the whistle blew and the Cape Henlopen backed easily away from her berth and set sail for New London.

For the next hour and a half, our little family, and my father in particular, savored the gentle motion of the Cape Henlopen through the water.  As she accelerated away from the dock at Orient Point the Susan Anne arrived.  The two vessels passed starboard to starboard, and then the Susan Anne eased into the berth that the Cape Henlopen had just vacated.  Proceeding eastward, the Cape Henlopen came abeam of the Plum Gut Lighthouse and then turned to port to transit the Gut and come out onto the more open water of Long Island Sound.  The Connecticut hills stood out clearly in the distance as the Cape Henlopen now turned onto a more northeasterly heading.  Next the Jennifer C and shortly after her the Mary Ellen came into view as they sailed in the opposite direction toward Orient Point.  To the northwest, close to the Connecticut shore, the Coast Guard buoy tender Juniper[2] lay stationary as she serviced aids to navigation.

The Cape Henlopen sailed on steadily past Plum Island and across the deep blue water of the open Sound.  As she did so, we ate a light lunch and recalled that five generations of the family have now sailed on this great ship.  As we discussed this and remembered previous voyages, Bradley made friends with several of the other passengers and their dogs.  He was the first family pet to sail aboard one of the ferries, and he seemed to like it very much.

Soon the New London Harbor Light at the mouth of the Thames River came into view, and then the John H came downstream and passed the Cape Henlopen close by to port.  It was a busy day on the water!  Too quickly—and these voyages are always too short—the Cape Henlopen proceeded up the Thames and slowed for her approach to the docks in New London.  Shortly after 1:30pm, it was time for us to disembark.

This was an especially bittersweet moment.  My father had enjoyed his voyage aboard the Cape Henlopen tremendously.  But we all knew, as we continued our journey north to Nashua and the assisted living facility, that at age 96 he would in all likelihood not return to Long Island again. Thus, there would be no more voyages aboard the Cape Henlopen or any other vessel.   Shakespeare expressed it very succinctly: 

I shall no more to sea, to sea,

Here shall I die ashore.[3]

Very sad, but time had marched on, and we could not turn it back.

Happy memories of the bygone time remain, though, and some bright future still lies ahead.  Far from being isolated in a geriatric infirmary, the family patriarch now resides comfortably in a state-of-the-art facility with a home-like atmosphere close to a son, daughter-in-law, and grandson.  Furthermore, with the long range capability of the cell phone, he receives regular updates from and photographs of other grandchildren and great-grandchildren in Brazil and Alaska.  These family ties, both in person and electronic, dispel the melancholy of loneliness with the happiness of companionship, and prove the proverb, “As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country” (Prov. 25:25).     

Photographs of the Cape Henlopen, her fleet mates, and landmarks along their route abound in our family’s collection.  I’m pleased to share some of them here:

 

The New London bound Cape Henlopen as seen from the Orient Point bound John H on Tuesday, June 21, 2016.  The fresh coat of paint really stands out against the gray sea and sky.

The Cape Henlopen coming up the Thames River to New London, seen from the outbound John H on a bright and sunny Wednesday, August 17, 2016.

Bradley aboard the Cape Henlopen just prior to departure from Orient Point on Wednesday, August 15, 2018.  All subsequent pictures are from this voyage.

The Plum Gut Lighthouse with Orient Point in the background.

The Orient Point bound Mary Ellen passing the Cape Henlopen port-to-port just north of Plum Island.

The Juniper servicing aids to navigation on Long Island Sound with Connecticut in the background.

New London Harbor Light at the mouth of the Thames River.

The John H leaving New London for Orient Point and passing the Cape Henlopen port-to-port.

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[1] Folliott S. Pierpoint, “For the Beauty of the Earth,” in  Hymns of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985, p. 92.

[2] The Juniper (WLB-201) has an interesting but sad history.  She participated in the recovery operations of Trans World Airlines flight 800 in 1998 and EgyptAir flight 990 in 1999.  Finally, she assisted in New York immediately following the terrorist attack of 2001.  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USCGC_Juniper_(WLB-201).

[3] The Tempest, II:ii:44-45.

All the Girls

The oceanographic survey ship Bartlett rested quietly alongside the wharf in Port Everglades, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on Friday, January 4, 1985.  She was preparing for a two-weeks-long voyage in the Gulf of Mexico and would sail on Monday, the 7^th.   Late this Friday afternoon, the day’s work was winding down, but it would resume promptly the following morning.  Nearly at the end of my own duties for the day, I went up to the bridge and glanced out the windows in the direction of the inlet that connects Port Everglades with the open Atlantic, and there I beheld a great sight.

Entering port through this narrow inlet was the Cunard Line’s famous passenger ship Queen Elizabeth 2.  I watched as this magnificent vessel slowly and gracefully glided in from the sea, turned around in the basin, and eased alongside her berth.  Her mooring lines then snaked ashore, and she was made fast directly across the wharf from the comparatively diminutive Bartlett.  Next, I wrote up the log, went off duty, and had my dinner.  Afterwards, I went ashore for a closer look at the great Queen.

Almost a thousand feet in length, the Queen took up nearly the entire dock space on the east side of the Port Everglades basin.  To look this ship over carefully involved a lot of walking.  This great sight was worth every step, though, for the Queen Elizabeth 2 was clearly the most interesting  thing in Fort Lauderdale that day.  Several of my shipmates felt the same way, and a group of us roamed the pier admiring the Queen.

In the early evening twilight, the passengers aboard the Queen began to stream ashore to enjoy a night on the town in Fort Lauderdale.  They came out by the dozens, and they made for a somewhat odd sight.  The vast majority came ashore as couples.  Without exception, the men were much more advanced in age than the ladies.  This was clearly evident in their balding heads, gray fringes, sagging jowls, and pot bellies.  The ladies, by contrast, were tall and slender with long flowing hair and radiantly beautiful faces.  They were dressed in evening gowns, and the men wore tuxedos.

After stepping off the gangway, each couple walked a few steps to a waiting lineup of limousines.  The drivers, also attired in tuxedos, hurried with lavish gesticulation to open the doors for the young ladies.   Several of the older men gruffly interrogated the drivers about their vehicles:  “Do you have a wet bar?  Do you have a TV?  Do you have a phone?”  If a particular limousine failed to meet these expectations, the older man turned his nose up in the air and led his young lady away to a more worthy conveyance.  Once embarked in their limousines, the couples were chauffeured away into town. 

This spectacle continued for quite a long while.  There were just so many of these superbly dressed but oddly matched couples coming ashore from the Queen and then being whisked away by this enormous fleet of luxurious limousines.  This ostentatious display of wealth astonished me almost as much as each couple’s blatant disparity in age.  Yet there it all was, and doing a very brisk business.

Later in the evening, their shore excursions completed, these same couples returned to the Queen in their limousines.  The tuxedoed chauffeurs again held the doors for the young ladies, received their tips from the older gentlemen, and then drove their now empty vehicles away.  At dawn the next morning, Saturday the 5^th, the Queen Elizabeth 2 took in her lines and went to sea again.  The Bartlett remained behind and continued preparations for her own upcoming voyage.

My initial reaction on seeing this parade of old men and young girls was bewilderment.  Somehow it just didn’t seem kosher.  In thinking about it, I figured that they were probably not fathers and daughters, nor uncles and nieces, nor grandfathers and granddaughters.  I did not hear any of the girls call any of the men “Daddy,” or “Uncle,” or “Grandpa.”  The thought of such innocent pairings-up seemed too idealistic and unlikely, not to mention naïve.  By process of elimination, I concluded that I was most likely seeing what was euphemistically called an escort service.  These old men obviously had money, and they were willing to spend it on young, pretty girls.  And they no doubt expected returns on their investments. 

Fearing that I was becoming too cynical while still in my twenties, I was relieved to hear an older colleague remark, “These girls are making hay while the sun shines.”  It was expensive hay, too, much more than anyone on the Bartlett could afford.  Yet the Bartlett was crewed mostly by young men, about the same ages as these girls.  That seemed like a more natural source of attraction than old men so far past their prime.  But some such men still salivate over young, pretty girls, and some girls love what money can buy.  Otherwise, I could not imagine what they would have in common socially.  I wondered, though, when the sun stopped shining and the thrill of sailing on the Queen wore off, how would these girls then feel about their careers as “escorts?”

With their many warnings against moral decadence and degeneracy, the ancient scriptures attest that the lechery of old men is not a new phenomenon.  These senior citizens embarked on the Queen would have done well to heed the proverb’s counsel, “Lust not after her beauty in thine heart; neither let her take thee with her eyelids” (Prov. 6:25).  They were not the only ones, though.

Many years later while working ashore, my employer feared that I had suffered a hernia and sent me to be examined by a physician.  Miss Patty accompanied me.  As we and numerous other people sat quietly in the waiting room, an odd spectacle developed.  The administrative area behind the receptionist was open by both sight and hearing to the waiting room.  Everything that happened there was easily visible and audible to the waiting patients.  When we first arrived, all was quiet.  But then an obviously older man (receding hairline, grayish-white fringe, sagging jowls, and pot belly) approached a much younger lady (slender, long blond hair, and pretty face) working at a desk.   At first we thought nothing of it, but after a moment, the one-sided conversation caught our attention.

As a room full of patients waited for the physician, this sixty-plus-year-old man flirted publicly, loudly, and shamelessly with this approximately twenty-year-old girl.  He laughed at his own inappropriate jokes while she sat silently and looked extremely uncomfortable with it all.  This performance continued unchecked for several minutes.  As we watched in amazement, I remarked to Miss Patty, “I wonder who that guy is?”

“I don’t know,” she replied  “Maybe he’s the office manager.”

After a few more minutes, the show ended and then we were called into an exam room by a nurse.  She took care of the preliminaries with us and then left saying, “The Doctor will be right in.”

A minute later, the old man who had just been carrying on with the young lady entered the room.  He caught us both by surprise, and Miss Patty blurted out, “You’re the Doctor?!

He then introduced himself.  Miss Patty and I exchanged inquisitive glances with raised eyebrows, and the Doctor saw this.  The medical checkup that followed was carried out in what we thought was an unprofessional and condescending manner.  This man had been caught, and he clearly did not like it.  My employer was paying him, so I did not protest.  If it had been my dime and my time, however, I would have left and gone elsewhere.  But the good news was that I did not have a hernia, only a mild muscle strain.

Afterwards, I read the Doctor’s posted credentials in the waiting room.  He was a board certified surgeon, had medical licenses in two states, and held academic degrees from two of this country’s most prestigious universities.  With all these lofty qualifications, I would have expected more professional behavior.  Instead, I thought of Shakespeare’s famous lament, “How ill white hairs become a fool and jester!”[1]

On a happier note, a portrait of the Queen arrived in the mail some time after my encounter with her in Port Everglades.  This was part of an advertisement for a travel agency.  It was a beautiful photograph of a beautiful ship, and it proved that not all junk mail is junk!  I’m happy to share it here: 

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[1] King Henry IV, Part II, V:v:51.