Good night, gentlemen, and good sailing All aboard for Hua Hin

In a recent PostScript featuring BBC Radio’s Desert Island Discs, one of the more obscure record requests mentioned came from Dame Judi Dench, who asked for an excerpt from the daily Shipping Forecast, saying she liked the “romantic names”. It struck a chord with me because as a kid I was also fascinated by this late-night forecast, primarily due to the exotic names: Viking, Cromarty, Dogger, Fisher, Rockall, Fastnet, Finisterre (now FitzRoy), Heligoland (now German Bight), Bailey, Fair Isle and so on. Part of the appeal was that these names were rarely heard in any other context. I was particularly fascinated by Heligoland, as it sounded like a place in a fairy tale or a kingdom that JK Rowling might have dreamed up.

The shipping report had a language of its own: “Southwest four or five, veering northwest, moderate to good.” On occasions there would be an announcement delivered in stern tones: “Attention all shipping! Gale force winds.” At times like that it was most comforting to be tucked up in bed and not stuck out on the North Sea aboard a fishing trawler.

The programme always finished with the reassuring words of presenter Frank Phillips: “Good night, gentlemen, and good sailing”.

There was something lyrical about the place names and the way they were read out, especially if you were sitting in the comfort of your home. Although few landlubbers would specifically switch on the programme , many of my generation became familiar with it and recall it with considerable nostalgia.

As one listener commented: “It’s the loneliest, the saddest, most beautiful thing I’ve heard on radio.” While in a seafaring mood, it is encouraging to see the Pattaya-Hua Hin passenger ferry service has finally been launched, although it might have been a bit more useful if it was car ferry. Let’s hope its priority is safety, not speed. Still, anything is preferable to a six-hour road journey aboard those frightening minivans driven by sleep-deprived maniacs.

It wouldn’t be a bad idea if they introduced a Bangkok-Hua Hin ferry. Admittedly it would be be a bit on the slow side, but it couldn’t get any slower than the rail journey.

However, the rail trip is worth taking once if only to experience Hua Hin railway station, which must be the quaintest in the kingdom. The station doesn’t seem to have changed in five decades. Unfortunately, the rolling stock appears not to have changed in five decades either.

From West to East

Not having seafarers’ legs, my maritime experiences have been limited to feeling ill on assorted ferries around the globe. My original overland trip to Thailand began in 1969 aboard the Folkestone-Ostende ferry. The stimulating entry in the diary on that murky January day read “Arrived Ostende feeling grim” after an uncomfortable voyage across the choppy English Channel. Not the most auspicious start to the long trek.

The next boat journey, four months and 9,000 kilometres later, would be a trifle warmer aboard a freighter from Songkhla up the Gulf of Thailand to Bangkok. An English friend and I had arrived in Thailand about two weeks before and being broke had hitchhiked from Bangkok to Malaysia to pick up some money in Alor Star. We had enjoyed Thailand so much we decided to return to Bangkok, this time in more leisurely fashion aboard the Bangmara, a Thai Maritime Navigation Company vessel, from Songkhla. Sleeping on the deck, it cost us the grand sum of 75 baht.

The crew were mainly young lads who seemed delighted to have a couple of farang on board. We ate with the crew and not surprisingly it was fish for breakfast, lunch and supper. In the evening they would get their guitars out and serenade us with Thai folk songs. It was a wonderful experience and totally relaxing.

By the time we eased down the Chao Phraya River towards Klong Toey, I suspected I might be staying in Thailand a little longer than planned.

The loveboat

One of the more interesting ferries I experienced was in the Philippines back in 1977, from Zamboanga in the deep south, up the Sulu Sea to Cebu. It was advertised as a “loveboat” and I wondered if the fellow passengers might be honeymoon couples or maybe businessmen having a naughty clandestine cruise. You could even buy “lovecakes” on board, but it quickly became clear that the boat was packed with smugglers, not lovers.

I had booked a cabin berth, sharing it with a friendly Filipino fellow who was extremely nervous about all the boxes stashed under his bunk that he wryly described with a wink as “just a little excess baggage”.

He had obviously been around a bit and related a host of exotic yarns, many of which seemed to feature “Mestisa chicks”. After a while, I found it a little claustrophobic in the cabin and eventually spent the night sleeping out on the deck with hundreds of other Filipino passengers — and very pleasant it was too, although the sea was a little choppy.

In the morning, as we approached Dumaguete at the southern tip of Negros, I returned to the cabin and was surprised to find my smuggler friend lying on his bunk groaning and looking quite ill. This guy who had seen it all was suffering from chronic seasickness. Perhaps he had consumed too many lovecakes.