Sea Blogs - Tales of the High Seas

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From The North Atlantic****Sea Blog M/V Integrity North Atlantic ‘07
 This is a brief accounting of my experience on a Car Carrier ship during the winter of ‘07. Take note that earlier posts to this Blog are down below where you will find my ‘08 mission, as all recent posts appear at the top. Click on the "Next Blog" Button found at the bottom of this. Or find the "Blog Archives" to the right as you scroll down. Please subscribe and leave comments.

So these are emails that were written back then and I am just now posting them here to my Sea Blog just to provide a continuing record of earlier experiences.  Me and Blogs never got along well. :-(  The order of the pics and the copy might be all jumbled up.

 Hi all:
It appears my attempts to send from the ships satellite system has been unsuccessfull. My earlier attempts are copied below. Looks like this will be a 2 month gig. I am getting off at the first opportunity. So I am one quarter of the way through this now. We are pulling out of Germany tonight. We will have very little time in the other ports to see much of anything - if anything at all. We will get a part of a night, if that.

This ship keeps a tight schedule. It is all about hard work all the time everyday. I work the max overtime. This has been something else. Very taxing. The heavy seas literally throw us around in our racks. Impossible to sleep good. I was totally exhausted for many days. I have already sailed further than ever before. We are underway most of the time. I am typing this on my laptop, hoping to get off the ship tonight, long enough, before we get underway, to get to the Seaman's Center and use their computers to access my AOL Email and send this out.

So, I don't know when I will be in contact again or access my email account. We are pretty much isolated from the world most of the time. We do get a little news over the satellite. We are updated on the Brittany antics and Anna Nichole. Of course the Pop news travels to all four corners of the earth. And I've heard about the NASCAR debacle and Harvick. So I will sign off for now.
Later, some time,
Chuck
　

　 I tried to send this a few days ago:I am trying to resend this as I don’t know if the first try went thru, as I have received no replies. I am working with Microsoft Outlook which I have not used before, Dunno if I am doing things right. All mail is forwarded to the Captain before it is sent out from the ship. So here is another try. We should be pulling into Bremerhaven Germany in a couple of days which will be nice as it is quite rough seas in these parts. In a week or so we head back across the Atlantic to Baltimore. I guess we will be bucking the tradewinds on the way back, which will be different.

Ahoy there: I am on the ship computer and can only do email. No internet. Cannot send or receive attachments. I will try to figure another way to send more later. Hopefully I can access my aol screenname from a facility on shore. Later I will try to post a link to a blog or something so those who are interested can read about here. Right now we are in the middle of the N. Atlantic. We are rockin’ and rollin’ and it is snowing. Quite different from the hotter climes I’ve been to previously. I am on the car carrier Integrity and you should see some of our cargo – pretty interesting. There are many decks going way down into the belly of the ship. This is the tallest ship I have ever been on. It holds thousands of cars. And boats and trucks and motorcycles and tractors and on and on.

The first few days have been real hard right from the beginning. We are losing hours almost daily. We will go thru 6 time zones before we reach Germany. And, I’ll say, that one hour at night is valuable when working twelve hour days. Should be nice collecting them back on the return trip tho　　
That’s all for now.
　
Greetings:
As I write this on my laptop I am somewhere out in the North Atlantic, somewhere around the Azores Islands, I think. It is early March, ‘07. I am on the car carrier, M/V Integrity returning from stops in Bremerhaven, Germany, Amsterdam, Belgium and Northhampton, England. I won't be sending this out until I am able to gain some sort of internet access upon my return to the States. We will be returning to N.Y., Baltimore, Charleston and Georgia to reload for another Atlantic crossing. I can't say for sure when we will return to the U.S. as we are in the middle of quite a storm and not making good headway. Storms are not unusual out here. We went thru one hell of one coming out, that covered nearly the entire Atlantic. We live on the thirteenth level (ship calls it the "Upper deck"). It really rocks and rolls up here. This is a real tall ship. We must tie down most everything. I tell you, this is something else!

A quick review on what this list is all about. It originally began in '04 when I graduated from the Veteran's AB class at the SIU training Center in Piney Point Maryland. We got together and exchanged Email names in an attempt to maintain some sort of contact through cyberspace as we sailed across oceans. As fate would have it, all but one fell off the radar screen. AB Guy is the only one left, (actually now in ‘11 - I think only AB Paul is left), out there somewhere sailing for the Military Sealift Command. Other ABs have been added along with other individuals I have met thru the years in my travels around the world as well as in cyberspace. This particular piece consists of several entries made while traversing the Atlantic. It will probably be a pretty long time before I send another.

This reads like a Blog due to the number of entries over a number of days. But my time is so limited that if and when I do get access to the internet it is doubtful I will have the time to post this to my Blog.


Here is a brief recap of my sailing experience: I was in a rather miserable state of life when AB Morgan made me aware of the possibility of training for the Merchant Marines through a special Veteran's program. It seemed highly unlikely after about a half century on this earth. But, sure enough, my hitch in the US Navy some thirty years prior made me eligible. I ended up spending two months at Piney Point, a place I referred to as "The land that time forgot." The night I graduated I was set upon by a group of NCL punks outside a bar, outside the gates to the training center. They had been there training to be servers on the Norwegian Cruise Lines ships that were relocating to the Hawaiian Islands. Don't ask me what was motivating them. They were drunk and on drugs.

I ended up airlifted to the Baltimore Trauma Center unconscious as all the others were flying home or to ships. The worst injury was a dislocated shoulder. I spent the rest of the year in rehab in the Portland VA Hospital. I was finally cleared to sail in early 2005. I ended up on the bomb ship M/V Bennet in a place little known to the outside world, called Diego Garcia, a small atoll in the middle of the Indian Ocean. There we store a huge amount of munitions on ships anchored out in the lagoon ready to relocate to fields of battle when necessary.

Returning to the sea after so long a time was certainly an arduous experience - hard to describe. But I made it through that mission only to be felled by pneumonia upon my return to Portland. Turns out it was caused by a thing called a Carcinoid that had appeared in my lung. They don't know where they come from or why but this one had to go. I guess I spent about two or three weeks in the VA Hospital, leaving minus half a lung. Months of rehab ensued. I guess the high point, however was a small settlement from the State of Maryland from the attack, which led to the purchase of my '56 Chev project. The building of that during my rehab got me back into the Rodding world.


Well into 2006 I was again cleared for duty. This time, as fate would have it, I ended up on one of the NCL Cruise ships in Hawaii, working out on the deck of the Pride of America. I spent the entire Summer there and this time returned in good health. Many people tend to assume that to be a glamorous experience. But for an old dude working out on the deck, away from the passengers for the most part - I assure you, it is not! But, some of my experiences in Hawaii were certainly something else. And I do have pics online for viewing.
 J　　　 So we will be going to Germany, England and Brussels, that I know of. It takes over a week of sailing to cross the Atlantic. Full round trips are around a month. I came aboard at Charleston after traveling all night Mon. Then went right to work. We stopped at the Georgia/Fla. State line where we saw the warmest weather we will see in quite some time, then headed out to sea. I work out on the Deck. I am not a Watchstander this time – so no driving　 L　　 Well, the watchstanders don’t drive on this ship anyhow – they are lookouts.
I will have to get my driving (drifting) in later　 J　 Chuck Fasst

This next part will be of interest to only those who are into cars. Last November, in the course of two weeks I managed to sell my '56 through eBay, traveled to the Las Vegas SEMA Show then to L.A. where I picked up my next project, a '69 Camaro Drag car. I will be building it into a Drift Machine to compete in Drifting in the future. This is a new kind of auto racing that came here from Japan. Its mostly all about burning rubber. I intend to make my last stand in this sport as the only "High Seas Drifter."

I have been documenting my exploits all along and will be posting footage to my page as time goes on. I will send along the occasional link in the future.

My Union Hall is up in Tacoma, 140 mi. North. I ended up making several trips trying to find another ship. It was quite frustrating and difficult. The only thing I could find in Dec. was a short relief trip 8 days before Christmas. They crewed up a Navy ship, the Mohican that had been in drydock in Portland to sail to its homeport in San Francisco. It may have been a short trip but what a wild one. We sailed right into a Pacific storm where we recorded a top wind speed of 101. The ship was really rocking and rolling and dumped over everything that was not tied or bolted down. The winds had subsided by the time we approached San Francisco Bay. But there was plenty of fog, current and huge rollers remaining as we entered in the middle of the night. And I was on the helm. What an experience!

AW, but our fun was not over. Being that we entered in the middle of the night we were not able to tie up so we dropped anchor in the bay and promptly ran out of gas. Good thing that didn't happen in the channel! We called for a tow in the morning (tugs). That was a huge gaffe on the part of someone in management. We had no power, heat or water. We had barbecued coffee and toast out on deck for breakfast.


I returned just in time to lose my cat, Keeper on Christmas day. It was my fault for taking her with me on a jaunt. After searching a week I had to go back North to look for another ship. I returned unsuccessfully some three days later only to find my cat at the porch around 3 AM that night! One could call that a miracle but I know that my cat is one helluva survivor - for sure now.
She had a lot of injuries and lost a lot of weight. I took her to the Vet and nursed her back to health before heading back North again.

Note: Keeper managed to survive sub freezing temps, pouring rain, hail and snow during those lost 10 days! I will never know where she went. The pads on the bottoms of her feet were worn red from their journey. I am happy to report that she has remained well to this day, curled up indoors and observing the wild winters from the warm side of the window. She is old, however - well past 10 yrs. In her “geriatric years” as the Vet put it. But you would never know as she is still lightning fast. And we eventually returned to our neighborhood walks. We cover many blocks late at night on the weekends. All of the cats just let us pass on through their territories J The only reminders of her journey are the patches of white fur that grew in as the burns or maulings or what ever they were healed, providing quite a contrast on a all black cat. The vet said the markings give the cat character. J So, I will go with that.

OK, now when in the heck did I write this Blog -'07? WOW! How time flies away! Well, I am saying that Keeper was over 10 back then. It is now approaching 2014. God almighty, how old does that make my cat??? She is still spry as ever, sneezes a lot though. Still an outdoor cat - out all day long in the dog days of Summer. Still walking blocks and blocks late at night on the wknds. We hear a lot more gunshots these nights. Other than that, she will still jump up and walk a fenceline just to show me she can still do it  :-)

 
I finally got this ship. I must say, the North Atlantic is about the last place I wanted to go - and I can say that for an absolute fact now - but it was all I could get. The earlier storm I mentioned (written a couple of days ago) and we have since picked up speed but are still running way behind and the captain tells us we are heading into another one. So, looks like we still have days to go. Most of the ports we pulled into we could not even make it off the ship before our workday was done because they load so fast nowadays. Its all business. And I am now informed that the same thing will happen in New York. Charleston will be my only opportunity to get off the ship for a night before heading back across this God forsaken ocean to do it all over again. When we return again, some time in April, I'm getting the hell off this ship and never coming back.

So, I am working as a Dayman on this ship (ABM). That means no watchstanding on the bridge. I
do all the maintenance on the deck with another AB and the Bosun. I get in all the overtime. It is grueling but we do get paid more than the watchstanders. Our work week is over 80 hrs. I will be putting that extra money to good use racing this Summer. I don't like this ship and it doesn't like me it seems. I have hit the deck twice so far and am nursing minor injuries as a result. Can't seem to keep my feet under me on this slippery deck.

Hopefully this will be my final installment from the Atlantic. We are now a couple of days out of N.Y. the captain tells us. He was hoping to maintain the schedule. We have since sailed into the next storm and the ship is groaning now. I guess it doesn't matter much to me when we get back. Looks like we will be spending very little time in any of the U.S. Ports. I hope I can at least get this sent out. Then we do it all again. I can hardly believe I'm going to do this all again. I won't be ever coming back to this ship or any others like it. That's for sure!

　
　
Now more days have gone by, I finally made it back to the states but my feet have yet to touch solid ground and I am back at sea again. Prior to our arrival we received the news from N.Y. The low temp was at zero degrees! In March!!!!? We were called out at 0215 in the morning to begin preparations to tie up. We broke out the snow shovels and rock salt and began chipping the ice build up on the deck of the bow mooring station.

This dumbass Blog will not allow me to upload half the pics I want to put up here - How Redonkulous  :-(

As the day progressed we tied up in Bayonne, N.J. Us two ABs got about 2 ½ hrs of rest that afternoon then untied and moved to another dock in N.Y. Then it was evening and we took on stores. We winched up pallet after pallet of provisions for 3 months. It was tons. We stowed every box and got about an hour of rest before we were called out again to untie and leave at 2330. We did that then had to go rig the pilots ladder then go shovel more snow on the upper deck (it snowed all day). Then put up the masts we had taken down earlier for a bridge. That went till 0300 in the morning, a thoroughly exhausting 24 hrs. I have never been so cold or worked so hard in my life.
We are now back out at sea and on our way to South Carolina and I have a little time to myself. Don’t know if I will even be able to go ashore long enough to find a computer to send. At least things are warming up now and all the snow has melted from the ship. I no longer have to bundle up in my stateroom. And it will be back to the regular sched. For a day. The standard wakeup call will be coming at 0520 in the morning.

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Aw yes, now more days have passed, I am back at sea again. We are now enroute to Baltimore from Brunswick, Georgia. Charleston has come and gone. Those days were close to a repeat of what I have already described but without the snow. We shift from one dock to another, were at it into the wee hours. I’m talking 9 to 10 hrs of OT in addition to the 8 hrs. Incredible and totally illegal on the part of this shipping company. I guess DOT laws don’t mean much here. There was no time for me to find a computer.

We have a new Ford GT strapped down on deck 5. It had a price tag of $170K on it. I saw some Vettes on the pier. I suppose they are on here somewhere. Haven’t seen them yet. We unloaded about a thousand Mini Coopers.
　
Again we will be using up a day shifting from one pier to another in Baltimore. But they say we will still have a night in Baltimore because there are so many vehicles to load. After that it is back to the Atlantic and then Europe.Till then,

My purple ear from a snapped mooring line. So close to death in a millisecond! I would have dreams about my head rolling around on the deck for a while after.

Note: I made it to Baltimore and found a wireless signal at a Hotel. But for whatever reason, this email would not send. Maybe my list was too long. I dunno. So now I am back at sea in more storms heading back to Europe. So I will break the list into smaller pieces and attempt to send this from Germany around the end of the month. Note: And that concludes my coverage of this Atlantic trip in ‘07. Before this trip would end I would have another brush with the Grim Reaper (who would seem to be an old pal by now). My description of the aft mooring line parting is included in the next Sea Blog.

Earlier accounts of my ‘06 deployment to Hawaii and ‘05 deployment to Diego Garcia are hand-written. They will remain as such for now. Knowing the nature of those of us who go to sea, I don’t suppose there are too many written accounts of our experiences that can be found. So these are here simply to provide a record of my experiences to whomever may come across this.