Courtesy of Mystic Seaport
BOURNE – Those who missed an opportunity to visit the historic whaling ship the Charles W. Morgan on the Cape earlier this month will have one more opportunity.
The ship will be at the Charleston Navy Yard for the next couple of days and then will return to Cape Cod in time for the Cape Cod Canal Centennial celebration.
Ship historian Matthew Stackpole described the boat.
“She’s 105 feet overall from the end of her jib-boom to the end of her spanker-boom. She’s 27 1/2 feet wide and she has the capacity of being home for 35 sailors and being able to carry 95 gallons of oil,” he said.
Stackpole said that during the ship’s 80 years of being a whaler, she experienced just about everything.
“She survived 37 voyages to every ocean in the world, which meant she survived uncharted waters. She was in any number of storms, hurricanes and typhoons. Around the Horn multiple times. She survived fire at sea. There was a small mutiny at one point in her history. But she’s always made it back,” he said.
This summer’s journey from the boat’s home port at Mystic Seaport through the Cape Cod Canal, out to Provincetown and the whaling grounds of Stellwagen Bank and north to the Charleston Navy Yard and back to Boston is her 38th voyage.
For those aboard, it is the experience of a lifetime, Stackpole said.
“Until about two and a half weeks ago nobody alive had sailed on a whale ship until we sailed again. It’s fun to hear the crew talk of her ability,” he said.
The 1841 ship will be open to visitors at Massachusetts Maritime Academy on July 26 and 27.
