Although I’ve generally lived in the landlocked West Riding, I’ve had many pleasurable nautical experiences:
- A couple of cruises around the Caribbean; weeks of free bars, amazing sunsets, waking up to stunning views, dolphins swimming along the front of the ship, sunshine on tap. It doesn’t get better than that. I also got to tour one of the ships which was really cool going on the bridge and in the engine rooms etc.
- On one of the above cruises I got to go on a proper submarine, which was extremely cool seeing the fish and a shipwreck and it’s quite a rare experience, something I always wanted to do.
- On the same trip I went on a catamaran that had a free bar, saw sea turtles and flying fish which amazed me at how numerous and fast they were. Travelling on the sea under sail power was pretty cool too, a very chilled experience.
- I’ve had a lot of cool trips across the Straits of Messina due to my parents having a house in Southern Italy. Being a bit of a nerd I appreciated the train ferry. I wasn’t a passenger on the train, we just happened to hit lucky when crossing with a car. It was a bit surreal watching a train join us on the ship. I like the crossing at Messina, you see the naval fort and warships, Mount Etna, fight your way across the busy shipping lanes, see aircraft going into land at Reggio, see the trains. I’ve also crossed on a Hydrofoil which again is a cool experience. It’s also quite dramatic in bad weather or amazing when it’s sunny and the seas are blue.
- Lastly and somewhat less exotically, I paid £3 for a speedboat ride at Bridlington, which was good fun and definitely rates as the best £3 I’ve ever spent.
One of my life ambitions is to sail to Antarctica, so hopefully I manage that one
...although I best get saving.