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May 30, 2003
maiden?
Every day I have the fortune to look out my office window on the Friendship of Salem, a replica of a 1797 sailing vessel which they have been slowly building over the last ten months that I've been there (actually, they brought it to Salem in 1998 and have been building on it ever since, even after it was hit by lightning at one point). Every day I see this lovely image...
Today, for some reason that we couldn't figure out, they decided to sail it away. Well, not exactly sail it because not all the sails are rigged yet (only the lower tier are installed as you can sort of see from the pictures).
It was rather odd...they have been slowly adding the rest of the masts, the crossbeams, the rigging and in recent weeks the sails. Not all the sails were even on the ship yet. They sailed the one lifeboat/dinghy up to it, someone climbed up the ladder...they pulled the ladder and the boat up and that was the majority of the fanfare.
Read on for...
There were SOME passengers, but not really very many. A handful of people. There wasn't any press, which I thought was odd for the maiden voyage of such an amazing vessel. The wimpy coast guard ship played tugboat (which is odd since there is an actual little tugboat tied up in the docks nearby).
Finally they pulled away...you can sort of see the figurehead in one of the pictures...a woman in blue with a bouquet of flowers.
I was so surprised that they didn't wait till all the sails were on it before they sailed it away. It wasn't back at the dock when I left work at 5PM, so it must be staying somewhere for the weekend--maybe Marblehead or Boston. Ignore the factory in the background...I try to...
I scoured the web looking for news on why she was sailing but nothing. There wasn't any press, there was no fanfare except that she was sporting a strange amount of flags (with symbols that, for the most part, had no meaning for me). Human Resources even called the chamber of commerce...they had no clue.
I feel so lucky though, to be able to be watching the progress of her building...and to be there when they finally moved her out of the bay. She's a big ship and very beautiful. I should have taken a picture of the empty dock...everything looks rather forlorn now.
Posted by crystallyn at May 30, 2003 11:29 PM
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» Sailing away from Boston Common
For two years, Crystallyn worked across the street from the Friendship of Salem, a replica of a 1797 sailing ship. [Read More]
Tracked on June 1, 2003 09:48 PM
Comments
I love sailing.
Specially on the repro wooden ones that aren't real big or touristy. Best place for that was kinda Greece & Tunisia. I haven't tried an American-based one yet though.
Posted by: Shanna at May 31, 2003 01:37 AM
I can't see the colours she's flying or I could tell you... :D
Posted by: Shanna at May 31, 2003 01:38 AM
I have a feeling they were heading down to Boston Harbor for the Boston Seaport Festival which was this past weekend. In fact I think I buzzed past the Friendship with my work vehicle when they were sailing into Boston on Friday.
Posted by: ethan at June 4, 2003 02:04 AM