Part I: Seals teeth and whales ears - Scott Polar Research Institute ...

Chapter 19
A whaling voyage on Balaena: 1953-54
T
owards the end of October l953 Maureen and I travelled up to Newcastle and
Whitley Bay by train and a few days later Maureen and Dad saw me off at the
quayside on MS Blenheim to Oslo. I was going to join the Floating Factory ship
Balaena and would be away at sea for seven months. When I got back Maureen and I
were to be married in Portugal. Although the months stretched ahead, we were
happy. After I left she was to stay on for a few days, selling subscriptions to a
magazine, ‘Canada Review’. Shortly, she would go to Lisbon to stay with her
parents until our wedding in June l954.
The trip across was uneventful, flat calm all the way with fog and mist. I read a
little, slept a bit and talked with Commander Henry Buckle, RN ret., who was to be
the senior Whaling Inspector and had several years of experience on the job on F/F
Balaena. He was a retired Royal Navy officer and I thought he was a very agreeable
chap. It was dark when we arrived at Oslo in the early morning of 29 October and
went through the customs, to be met by the Secretary of the Balaena, Ole Ness-Jensen.
After seeing to 83 members of the crew, he took us to Tonsberg and the ship, owned
by Hector Whaling, a British Company. I found the ship tidier than I had expected.
She was lying near Husvik in deep water close inshore - moored to rocks on the
beach - and a small motor boat ran between ship and shore. Husvik was a small place
where the Norwegians came in the summer for the fishing. The houses were all
jumbled together on the wooded shore with roofs of all colours and mostly white
walls.
My cabin was aft, to one side of the slipway at the stern up which the whales
were hauled. It was small and I was to share it with the young Third Chemist James
Clifton, although after we left Cape Town I might get a cabin to myself. Our
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