Four trips on four different ships with totally different crews in a year and a half. I avoided the Murmansk route! Every trip started by going to the Mediterranean. One trip went on through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea to India. The last trip got to Europe after the war in Europe was over. We loaded up stuff to take directly to the Pacific. Two days after we passed through the Panama Canal was VJ Day. We sailed on to Yokohama anyhow, sat in the harbor for a week or so, then sailed back to New York, arriving just in time for Christmas.
VJ Day! An important milestone in the world. But on our ship? We still had a load of stuff bound for Japan. We were still under signed Ship’s Articles to complete the voyage. The only difference in our lives was that we no longer needed to use blackout curtains at night. And as we sailed on across the tropical Pacific, that fresh air every night meant more than all the long-term implications that the war was over.
Four trips on four different ships with totally different crews in a year and a half. I avoided the Murmansk route! Every trip started by going to the Mediterranean. One trip went on through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea to India. The last trip got to Europe after the war in Europe was over. We loaded up stuff to take directly to the Pacific. Two days after we passed through the Panama Canal was VJ Day. We sailed on to Yokohama anyhow, sat in the harbor for a week or so, then sailed back to New York, arriving just in time for Christmas.
VJ Day! An important milestone in the world. But on our ship? We still had a load of stuff bound for Japan. We were still under signed Ship’s Articles to complete the voyage. The only difference in our lives was that we no longer needed to use blackout curtains at night. And as we sailed on across the tropical Pacific, that fresh air every night meant more than all the long-term implications that the war was over.