Posted by Laurence Monkhouse on October 15, 2007 at 20:18:36 from 82.27.24.149 user Laurence_.
In Reply to: La Mance (was Re: Blue water) posted by goltz@goltz.pl on October 15, 2007 at 20:03:11:
I didn't realise that Blue Water was more than a poetical phrase until I came home from Portugal in the Lowestoft sailing trawler Excelsior ten years ago.
Previously I had mainly sailed the North Sea, Baltic and Channel. These can appear blue on a good day, more often green and grey.
But when you leave the Continental Shelf and look at the Bay of Biscay from a small ship it is brilliantly blue. Quite unexpected and miraculous.
And incidentally after hearing all the tales of woe about the near extinction of whales I was amazed to find that the Bay was positively boiling with the creatures. Mainly smallish, but a lot of big ones too. The small ones played around the bows, but only seemed to want to stay if the crew were leaning over watching them. If we were busy they went away.
I don't know why this sea was so blue, but it was utterly unforgettable. I'm not surprised that Peter Duck was nostalgic for it.