Surprise Returns!

I woke up late last Sunday morning. This caused me to make a mad rush to get ready, and head down to San Diego. I drove way too fast to get down there on time, because I was worried that if I missed muster or was late, I wouldn't get a chance to head down to the shipyard to sail the Surprise back to the museum. Turns out I rushed for nothing. I was stopped short during my power walk from the parking lot to the Star by the sighting of a beautiful tallship coming around the back of one of the cruise ships. It was she! Oh beautiful ship of the sea!

Muster was thus a little disorganized, because as we usually give Jim Davis our undivided attention, too many of us kept sneaking looks over the bulwark at the Surprise as she maneuvered in the bay to get into better position for approaching the docks. Eventually Jim let us go, and there was quite a crowd that headed over to the dock where the Surprise was coming in.


She came in a bit of a wonky angle, and attempted to take out the aluminum walkway with her whisker boom, but eventually with the help of the Pilot and a line to the Star, we brought her home. After the gangway was fixed to her ramp, we piled on and began the long process of clearing her decks of the all the detritus of the weeks in dry dock. Tools went back to the Berkeley, junk was swept up, etc. I eventually headed below, and found an even bigger mess. A bunch of us began cleaning up the partial gun deck, and since all the gun barrels had been removed from their cradles, we proceeded to put them back to rights. I'm still sore from all the heavy lifting and maneuvering in tight, cramped spaces, but it was fun nonetheless.

After a few hours of cleaning up, sweeping, moving heavy objects, and putting all the parts of the unstepped mizzen mast on the poop deck, it was time to call it a day. Unfortunately (well, I guess fortunately really) the museum has decided to replace all the shrouds on the mizzen mast, which means months more work, and little chance that we (the Surprise crew) will get our long awaited chance to sail on her till probably the end of summer. *sigh*

Cheers!