I remember my first time on a Tall Ship. I remember friends being cool about it when I could tell they really wanted to say: Wha!? How high? And I can remember teachers at school seeing the romance of it, asking one or two questions. Square sails? Really? Today? There just weren’t that many Tall Ships around in the mid-70s. I had signed up for a course on the Sea Cadets’ Brig Royalist and although I was quite cool about it as well I already knew it was going to be a fantastic experience.
A history teacher became fascinated that we would be taking our uniform with us. He, like me, could see me stepping into a past that Britain had all but forgotten. Rod Stewart’s Sailing had been number one for four weeks the previous autumn – but the video was on a power boat roaring up New York harbour.
Actually going on a ship, powered by the wind, was properly quaint! On hearing me describe the famous blue-black square rig uniform in serge he really paid attention and seemed delighted that I knew the argot for it was a tiddly suit.

Actually going on a ship, powered by the wind,
was properly quaint

I think I had already decided that sailors who could harness the wind were a cut of salt above the mere mortal, and at that age it was mostly what I wanted to do. Needless to say the voyage on the old Royalist was all it was cracked up to be, more, and I can still run sections of it in my mind. One of the most enduring memories was our landfall and getting ashore in Alderney – an island locked in its own time capsule for different reasons.
Crossing the Channel, taking our watches, reporting oncoming ships and the feeling of being a necessary part of the crew felt like great life-affirming episodes; I was learning things I’ll never forget, and feeling useful.
I didn’t really understand back then how healthy it was to have that experience. I had a kind of inner knowledge that things had changed and one of the aspects of that was that new didn’t always mean better. In fact, as we seem to become increasingly like butterflies, pinned to the rim of a wheel that really is now going a little too fast for comfort, I do look at Tall Ships in terms of being good for our health and wellbeing. Gotta leave that screen behind though, the stars to steer by are going to be overhead.
I think sailors take this aspect of wellbeing from their sailing for granted and think it’s not such a big deal but if there are any readers out there who want to expand or expound upon the subject then I’d be happy to run those articles.