Editor Pick
The Tall Ship at Glasgow Harbour
- August 15, 2006
- Rated 4 of 5 by
Drever from Ayr
The Tall Ship Glenlee is one of Glasgow’s newest attractions. During the July River Festival, my wife and I visited this captivating beautiful ship. She is one of only five Clydebuilt sailing ships now afloat in the world. A barque she has two masts rigged with the traditional square sails and the stern mast with a fore-and-aft rig to allow her to point closer to the wind. She now serves as a The Tall Ship museum at Yorkhill Quay, Glasgow.
The ship was constructed using Scottish coal and iron ore. Imagine the deafening noise as the Black Gang of the Port Glasgow Shipyard in 1896 hammered a thousand rivets and shaped the beams, plates and frames to fashion the ship’s hull. With a length 245 feet, beam of 37.5 feet and depth of 22.5 feet she is astonishingly large for a sailing vessel. Built for a solely functional purpose these ships are among the most beautiful of man’s creations. More than 200 of these vessels were built in the 1980s and 1990s, during which time Clydeside yards established an enviable reputation world wide for constructing them.
These sailing ships prospered as the bulk carriers of their day for coal, steel, lumber, hides and guano. A big increase in insurance rates for sailing ships in 1897 and the opening up of the Panama Canal in 1914, making the dominance of sailing ships in the trip around Cape Horn an irrelevance, hastened their end.
Today they have a fascination because of their beauty but also because they represent an age which is lost. These majestic vessels were outstanding pieces of engineering. Their immensely powerful hulls withstood all but the fiercest of elements. With her full sails harvesting the ocean breezes, she would have been majestic.
Just imagine the excitement and danger of rounding Cape Horn in the teeth of a merciless gale or running before gales of the Roaring Forties in the Great Southern Ocean or sleeping under canvas in the idyllic calm of horse latitudes of the tropics. The courage of the sailors working hundreds of feet above a foaming ocean or struggled waist-deep in the maelstrom of the main deck awash with angry ocean must have been immense.
I was surprised and my wife delighted that the first immense deck had been turned into a market with many stalls set out. Behind the stalls and many other places were posters outlining details about the ship and the time period into which she fitted. Being a bulk carrier she was devoid of portholes, so it must have been eerie working below decks. At some time a generator had been fitted to alleviate the problem.
Working down through the decks, we came finally to the bilges with stone ballast still stacked neatly. I found a marker indicating just how far we were beneath surface level – truly down the Clyde!
Admission: Adult - £4.95, Concession - £3.75, Free child entry with every adult.
From journal Glasgow, Medieval and Maritime