I have often smiled when visitors in the Lookout try to orientate themselves after their last Falmouth visit – sometimes many years ago. Now I understand their problem.
On our recent cruise holiday I was delighted to be visiting Gibraltar again. I was last there for two months in 1959 when aboard a destroyer in drydock after a rather serious collision. The town was full of Jolly Jacks and Jenny Wrens & the harbour full of Grey Funnel ships. In 2010, had it not been for the large lump of rock in the background I would not have recognized the place. No RN ships, no sailors – just acres of new flats and offices – I couldn’t even find the drydock!
Oh well, in a few days time
we were in Livorno (Leghorn). I was operating there every four weeks for a year in 1961. Yes! There is the breakwater and the detached mole – and the small quay where we loaded Carrera marble; but it appears to be a Marina area now. Sure enough, we entered the harbour, but steamed past the old town and headed north into a vast new port area some 4 kilometres away. Vast container cranes abounded, there were thousands of containers on the quayside and an immense Hapag Lloyd ship disgorging even more. They told us it was Livorno and we flew an Italian courtesy ensign, so I must accept that it was.Maybe it’s not a good idea to re-visit old haunts, at least not 50 years later.
