GMT+11
We left Yokohama at approximately 5.30 p.m. on tuesday evening and now we are in the pacific ocean north east off Hokkaido the most northerly island of Japan we are closer now to the Russian Kuril islands, the weather is good and the air temperature is 10oC we are doing 22 knots.
Our planned route which is much different than i had expected. Will be to track north about 055 degrees past the Kuril islands in the pacific and enter into the Bering sea going past Rat islands would you believe then we will follow our track with the Alaskan Aleutian islands to our starboard side, we then sail through the Unimak pass and into the Gulf of Alaska through Dixon entrance into the Harbor in Canada called Prince Rupert.
I didn’t realize till i boarded that we are to make a call into Prince Rupert as if i would have known i would have got the car off here, the agent Transglobal solutions in Mannheim didn’t give me this option and now the car is in a container about 20 ft below decks in number 15 hatch in the front part of the ship covered with other containers that are not coming off in Prince Rupert, also the paperwork and agent is already organized for Vancouver so Vancouver it is!
The Mv Hanjin Madrid has three cabins available to passengers the Super cargo on E deck which is a single cabin but looks more like a 3/4 double to me then on F deck you have the pursers cabin which is a double were i am and the owners cabin which is next to mine, i wasn’t told if their would be any other passengers till the day before as i asked the company in London Desey at the Cruise people office and she said just one an English man. I had no idea who to expect but i am happy to meet a fellow brit and when i was at lunch yesterday the ships officer told me that the other passenger was a 75 year old man they called Mr Whipp. At afternoon tea at 3 p.m. Alan Whipp appeared he had been in Yokohama visiting the town for 3 hours and remarked on how organized the Japanese were and how the school children were so neatly dressed in school uniforms looking almost military, he had walked into the mess and i had just had my tea and was going back up to my cabin i shook his hand and said to him that i had wondered who had booked the single cabin as i had wanted that room as it was a little cheaper than taking a double as a single person rate. Alan had joined the ship in Hong kong and Tokyo was the second stop after china. We agreed to sit down to have another cup of tea and i thought how i felt like i was in the officers mess at sandhurst as he was an organized chap steely and intelligent not freely speaking as i wear my heart on my sleeve he is cautious. He didn’t look 75 years old but much younger and you could tell he had experience of an organized past.
Alan had booked with the same company as i had in London and this was his second journey on a freight ship with this company, the company we booked with has a policy not to take any passenger over 75 years old so he just manages to get onboard he had to undertake a medical as did i, he had taken all his papers to london and had met the Cruise Company in London as he felt this was easier for him, Alan lives in Hythe southern England and has been in the army for 34 years and has lived all over the world in postings so he is used to Gibraltar Belize Hongkong and other military places overseas, before Alan retired he moved into military intelligence and now he has retired and lives a quiet life helping his local community in Kent. Alan was married until his wife passed away in 2005, he told me how is wife would never have gone on a ship like this and when i asked why he said well she wouldn’t have enough to do. Well i have known Alan for about 48 hours and i don’t know too much about him as we mostly talk about general small talk about the ship or what i am doing, i think he is curios of what i am actually doing and who i am, he asked me at dinner when i was going to settle down and also when i was late for breakfast looked at me with surprise and said “I didn’t think you would be here for breakfast” and “I no someone like you who is useless in the mornings too” their is no doubt he is from another generation that maybe would find it difficult to see exactly how my life works and life on this vessel with its very organized crew of officers and Captain would remind him of his former life in the forces and would give him some comfort that he may have missed before the death of his wife.
Mr Alan Whipp i think it is such a fitting name for him and he looks so much like your dad’s army type of military man. He is on this ship reliving a journey he took in 1956 when he traveled on a troop ship from Southampton to Japan via the Suez canal he had spent some time in Japan and Korea before returning a year later sailing around the Cape of good hope as the suez canal was closed. I think he would have some incredible stories to tell he told me of how the Japanese inflicted horrid torture and the war years must have been hard times but do we learn anything from the past i wonder. Alan will disembark in Vancouver where he will spend some time with family before heading to New York for one of those “well i will never come here again” kind of few days and he is splashing out on himself for a night at the Opera which is his main passion.
07/11/2008
I have enjoyed the company of Alan and we have had a laugh about our differences and he told me i’d be no good in the Army and that’s positive to know because i would never want to be in the army. He did tell me that i was good at the project that i was working on and that many would have given up faced with some of the logistic set backs that i have faced, overall our meeting has been positive and i admire him, for he is in the real world doesn’t go on about the war and can send a txt message and email people, some 60 year olds can’t do that, he has a good sense of humor too, more 75 year olds could try sailing around the world on freight ships, it certainly is getting him out the house so to say.
Alan hope you have a safe and enjoyable trip across Canada to New York and return home safely. From Tim