I've just been reading an old (Sept 1996) copy of Rare Birds ... (the bi-monthly magazine of the UK400 Club). There's a fascinating thing in there with details of the 1996 Scillonian Pelagic !! Never mind the good stuff they saw .. been there done that, so there .... it was the disastrous weather, which in combination with the Scillonian's famous proclivity for oscillating violently in a tiny breeze caused a awful lot of seasickeness, vomiting, chundering and prostration !! Wooo ! Here's a few chunks ... a rather unfortunate choice of words there ... " boarded the dreaded Scillonian" " without knowledge of what would be in store for them." " headed immediately into force 7 northerly gale !!" "after 35 minutes the the state of some passengers was beginning to give concern " " a large percentage of those on board began to feel "queasy." " made worse by the unsavoury smell of the "chum" and diesel fumes " " large numbers of birders were being seasick on deck" " even more were being ill below" " the sound of crashing cutlery and crockery could be heard from within." " it was going to be a disastrous, if not nightmarish, trip." " moving from one side of the boat to the other sent many birders down the slippery slope of no return." "Even LGRE and Viv Stratton, both veterans of rough pelagic trips, failed to survive and were violently ill." " Likewise, several members of the crew were seasick for the first time...." " those that could rushed to the stern, but many were curtailed as they slithered to and fro on a mixture of wet sick bags and seawater." " some fell headlong on the deck and many simply could not get the energy to raise their heads." " .. it was obvious to many birders the seriousness of the trip when LGRE failed to show any interest when a second Cory's Shearwater passed close by." Eee..... what fun eh ? Ok, so they saw some good stuff. Well, some of them did. And yes, it was indeed "memorable." The nifty thing is, I never get seasick, so I can gloat. OK ... I was crap on the rugby pitch and used to get half killed every games lesson. Mostly by the bloody teachers. Bastards. But I don't get seasick. I've been on really hairy boat trips, some were pelagics,on/in boats tiny and huge, Irish Sea Ferries ... many times. Some of them were appalling ! Back in the day's of my youth, the Troubles were going strong, and the Belfast ferries were packed with soldiers .... the only places to sleep were on the floor. And blimey, did we get some rough rides .... on one particular one, everyone around me was puking all over the place...the smell alone was horrific. When I went into the toilets, all the sinks were full of sick, which was sloshing from side to side merrily and spilling onto the already pre-sicked-on tiles. Lovely !! Ace !! But I was fine. And on one of the "dinky-boat" pelagics into the "Wilson's Triangle" we had a particularly rough time of it .... one couple started to puke up within 10 minutes of us setting out, and they continued to do so whilst lying down on the floor of the boat throughout the trip,missing the Wilson's etc and all the rest.Ho ho. But the brilliant thing was, when we were walking up the quay on our return, I was telling them how unfortunate it was that they were so ill all the time, and they blithely replied that they had been absolutely fine. How odd! Very. But, dear reader, i was indeed absolutely fine. Not that I'm gloating or anything. . ..... so ... what goes with that ... I know ..... simple stuff .... love it !
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AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
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