Seasick
The North Sea is a majestic beast – a natural wonder to the east of the British mainland. It’s a rugged, freezing body of water which creates a unique quality of light, and carves up the coastline to create an ever-changing landscape incorporating ancient castles, coastal defences hastily erected during WW2, beautiful beaches, stunning geological features, and harbours which provide sanctuary to fishing vessels.
The agency brief was simply to provide a body of imagery to accompany the event organised by Northumberland Tourism called “From Catch to Table”. A group of catering people, PR guys, hoteliers, and tourism execs were invited to go out to sea on a small fishing boat from Amble, see how seafood is caught, then head back to land and cook the fresh produce on the harbour-side. Easy enough. I packed a Nikon D3 with a 70-200mm lens, and a D300 backup camera sporting a 24-70mm standard lens, both fitted with SB800 flash units.
Mother nature unfortunately had decided that she needed to teach these office monkeys a lesson, and whipped up a wind that created a good ten foot swell in open water. Attendance at the event was also over subscribed, so a second boat was quickly employed to take the overspill. I was allocated to the very small vessel, along with the resident chef Richard Sim, & his business partner, while the others climbed down the ladders onto the larger boat. We chugged out of the harbour in fine spirits alongside each other. This gave me an opportunity to shoot the main vessel from a distance. Unbeknown to anyone, a young couple of Spanish tourists had boarded the boat as well – apparently assuming it to be some sort of trip round the Coquet Island lighthouse. Nobody challenged them, as they seemed to be having a nice time.
This is where things started to go a bit awry. Sea legs are something you either have, or develop over time. A lot of city dwellers whose experience on the open waves is limited to the odd trip on the Banana in Kos have absolutely no idea of the movement in a fishing vessel once you leave the safety of a harbour, and the instant that this threshold was crossed, the swell began to take effect. The bow of the boat raised high into the air, then smashed down as the wave passed, again and again and again. I’ve been on boats the world over, and seasickness has never been an issue, and I was on board with the pilot, and two experienced sailors. The other ship however, was littered with a bunch of lily-livered landlubbers who developed green-gills as soon as they reached the open seas. Within minutes, there were heads appearing over the edge – disgorging the stuff they’d had for lunch a few hours back. Having a beetroot salad, a chicken and pepper sandwich, and a chocolate mousse before heading out to sea isn’t a great idea.
It was ROUGH
The boats then separated – the big one went further out, and we circled Coquet Island. I’d never been here before, despite living a few miles inland, and it was incredible being surrounded by hundreds of flying puffins, and seeing seals bobbing out of the water all around us. We also headed out into deeper water, and landed some lobster pots which had been placed that morning. The shot of the huge langoustine (destined for Spain) was a shot that resides on the Made in Northumberland website – and also features in Rich Sim’s menu at Zecca restaurant in Amble.
After about two hours, everyone headed back to dry land. We got back first, so I set up to catch a few of the participants as they disembarked. One of the PR people (who shall remain nameless), covered in their own vomit looked me straight in the eye, and growled “if you take a picture of me like this, you’ll never f*****g work in this county again.” Point taken.
The Spanish honeymoon couple hadn’t faired much better – they staggered away for a lie-down somewhere. We’d caught a fair bit of stuff, but nobody was in any mood to watch fish being gutted and cooked. They took over a couple of big benches outside the chippy, and started downing cans of Fanta. The organisers did buy fish & chips for whoever wanted them after the landlubbers had recovered, so I had an early tea.
I’ve been out on fishing vessels a few times since, and every time I go, there’s always a couple of victims who succumb to the effects of the sea. You have to feel sorry for them……a bit.
