Friday, August 10′ 2012….Bud Oxley’s #1 item on his Bucket List came to fruition..we boarded the Rickmer’s Shanghai for a four month trip around the world. We are still in the Port of Houston watching the intriguing ‘dance of the cranes’ as they load and unload valuable cargo. One of the amazing ‘crane transfers’ is watching enormous wind turbines being exchanged to trailers hundreds of feet below.

The crew is phenomenal and we were surprised to have the pleasure of joining four male ‘ship mates ‘ also traveling around the world from various ports. Peter is a retired pilot from New Zealand. Paul and Lynton are sailing buddies from Australia and retired Alcoa supervisors, mechanical engineers and project managers. Peter was from Britain and is now living in Brazil….our retired ‘financial policeman’ of the group. The guys get along fabulously and have welcomed us into their midst with great tales of their adventures.

The Captain and officers are Romanian and much of the crew Croatian and from the Philippines. They speak English and we are attempting to learn each other’s dialects!! The food is hearty to keep the crew sustained for their hours of intense and skillful mastery of the ship and her cargo.

I want to share a few pics of what it took to get us ‘on board’!!! Yes, they are taking that luggage up over the side with ropes…..how else might one do it??

Here is a glimpse of the ‘Owner’s Cabin” with one tired “mate” already snoozing from the ‘move in’ even though we didn’t touch a thing…the crew was terrific on helping us out and making us feel very comfortable.

The ‘dance of the cranes’ was amazing to observe….here are some attempts to give you a feel for the work of a cargo ship :

Now, all of you who know me ….that is Buddies’s wife and ‘shipmate’ …(notice the other wife’s of the boys opted not to try this excursion…..I think they could be missing the adventure of a lifetime!)…you may all know how claustrophobic I am….well take a good look at the rescue boat which we all must board during the ‘muster safety drill’:

Well, your’s truly ‘practiced’ today and all is well as long as I am observing from the ‘gathering area’…:)!!!

Never fear….as Bud is now ‘fully trained’ to launch and take over in the event of any emergency!!!

We won’t disembark port for a few days yet…so we will keep you posted on the freighter fun!!!