SEVEN CONTINENTS & SEVEN SHIPS
Presented by Ted Scull
September 17, 2021 @ 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm
Ted Scull, former PONY Branch Chairman and worldwide sea traveler, entertained PONY Branch members and guests with his recollections of visiting the seven continents aboard seven different ships, ranging from cruise ships, expedition vessels and scheduled liners, spanning the years 1962 to 2008.
In 1997 and 2000, Ted cruised the Hawaiian Islands board the SS INDEPENDENCE and was delighted to see how well she took to the last chapter of a very long career. These two sailings filled in a gap for Ted, who had never experienced a major U.S. flag liner.
When Antarctica beckoned in January 1995, he chose Hapag-Lloyd’s HANSEATIC, chartered by Radisson Seven Seas. The expedition embarked in Ushuaia, Argentina (see above photo) and first visited the Falkland Islands, then turned south to the Antarctic Peninsula with a week of numerous landings. The Drake Passage lived up to its reputation for tempestuous seas.
In March 1993, Ted fulfilled a long-time desire to sail the remote Upper Amazon, embarking at Iquitos, Peru, the largest city in the world that is not accessible by road. It’s by air or river. The ship, COLUMBUS CARAVELE, had been built in Finland in 1990 for Ukrainian owners, and she carried up to 330 passengers, mostly Germans, for this 1,000-mile passage down river to Manaus.
In 1968 Ted boarded British India Line’s KARANJA at Mombasa for a 10-day coastal trip to Durban. On board were Asians and Europeans forced to leave East Africa just then entering the post-colonial period. They were headed to new lives in Southern Africa, Australia and Europe. They all had stories to tell.
Perhaps the most remote cruise itinerary on the planet took place in 2008 along Australia’s Kimberley Coast from Darwin, Northern Territory to Broome, Western Australia. During the 10-day coastal voyage aboard the German-built ORION, with nearly an all-Australian passenger list, they never encountered another soul ashore and saw just two other vessels.
Lastly, in the fall of 1995, Ted and his brother boarded the MARCO POLO in Singapore for a 12-day voyage with calls on the Malaysian and Thai coasts, then crossed the Bay of Bengal to Colombo, and on up India’s west coast to Cochin, Goa and Bombay. The ship that began as the Soviet ALEXANDR PUSHKIN in 1965 is now being broken up 56 years later.
(Photo: Ted Scull)