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STORMVOGEL - 1978
STORMVOGEL - 1978
Jacek Pałkiewicz2006-06-17 14:59:41
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difficulty pouring their drinks. After dinner we went back on deck with a glass of rum, syrup and ice...not always in equal measures.
Helped by the drink, we listened to stories of the pirates who used to dwell in these islands more than two centuries ago. Even today stories are whispered about sailing ships which appear and disappear mysteriously, of ships found drifting, intact, but with no passengers on board. Whispered, because no-one wants to frighten the tourists away.
One of the Stormvogel's crew told me : "There are still pirates, but they aren't as blood-thirsty as they used to be. Nowadays, especially if you stray off the beaten track, you are more likely to meet drug smugglers transporting cocaine to the USA from Latin America. Down there people grow that stuff so they don't starve. Here, if you want to go on working, you make sure that you don't know anything and that you see less".
It would seem that there is trouble even in this paradise.
One day we saw a set of white sails come over the horizon moving like a cloud towards us. They turned out to belong to a superbly trim vessel, ideal for long voyages in tropical seas, which was flying the flag of the Cayman Isles. It was the "Sea Cloud of Gran Cayman", the most prestigious of all the charter ships in these awters, which is some 7 metres longer than the "Vespucci", the training ship used by the Italian navy.
Launched almost half a century ago, this ship was originally the property of the wife of an American millionaire. Since then it has belonged to others and has sailed under many different flags, passing from the American Ambassador in the USSR to Truijllo, the dictator of the Dominican Republic. Finally it became the property of a German financial consortium, which rents out even its most humble cabins at exorbitant prices.
Our boat was luxurious too, but its prestige owed more to its reputation as a racing yacht. It finished
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I remember the Stormvogel, 2008-05-03 07:34:34
See photographs from:
French Polynesia Gallery
Very enjoyable and fast for the time with daily runs of about 200nm. I remember being on watch at the wheel in the middle of the night surfing down large swells at 15/16 knots. Pity it had to end in Grenada.
Hamilton Mcdermott, 2008-11-12 15:24:09