Inspired from another thread, here are some joints that seem to act as unoffical Seamen’s Clubs in various ports. Now, some of my information may be dated; and of course much has changed since the early 90’s.
Stoney’s in Tampa, also mentioned in the other thread.
South Port Raw Bar in Port Everglades/Fort Lauderdale. Back in the days before cell phones, the pay phone there was a hard one to get to. Lots of tanker crews in there.
Freddie’s Anchor Inn in Port Everglades/Fort Lauderdale. As I recall, one got a free round for supplying a life ring. Lots of life rings on the walls.
Gator Bowl Inn in Jacksonville, Florida. Very handy when in the North Florida Shipyard.
Annie’s in Lake Charles, but largely due to the Crowley presence there. Joint is still open, but with Crowley gone, not too many maritime folks hang out there.
Chateau Inn in Corpus Christi, Texas. Gone now.
New Shamrock Bar, Manila
London Bar, Jumbo Bar, Radio Bar; Tanjung Priok
Rainbow Gardens (Bugo Hilton), Bugo, Phillipines
Ned Kelly’s Last Stand, Hong Kong
Willie’s Hawiian Hut, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Colacho’s, San Juan Puerto Rico
Lots more that I cannot recall just now. . . .(or probably just erased or intentionally forgotten)
Doula, Cameroon.
the fine hilltop German Seamans Mission: views, pool, bar, library, jiggy-jiggy girls, food, live music, wifi & telephone, hotel, city center location, chapel & drinking priest, free pick up & drop off right at the dock (every night 7 pm shuttle bus comes down the pier) and CHEAP AS HELL.
Fond memories!!!
The old Scandinavian Seamen’s Club in Manila was also a decent joint, but not really a dive; in fact anything but. I did like the cheap membership (80cts US or close to it) for a year with a Z card. Sounds like I missed the Doula club when I was there a couple of years ago, but I was cooling my heels at the Le Meridien, waiting for my Nigerian visa to be processed. For a week. . . As I recall, the watefront Seaman’s Mission at Pusan was also pretty good, although the uh, dives, and such were up on Texas Street.
Texas street in Busan/Pusan. What a gas. Hahaha. Good memories of wild misspent youth.
[QUOTE=c.captain;70912]Borie’s Place of course! I totally forgot to add that to my other thread listing Ballard seaman’s watering holes. I also forgot to add the Sunset Tavern on Ballard Avenue too. What was the place down on Dock Street across from Dock Street Brokers called before it became “Bad Alberts”? There was also “the Bitt” just up the road and across Leary Way and the Viking up on 65th & 24th but then again, that was not stumbling distance to the Ship Canal.[/QUOTE]
I forgot about the Sunset, that was right across the Ballard Ave from the apartment that I rented when I was studying for my 3/m test. That place was the dive of dives, the beer wasn’t even cold. Borgie’s was the only place I went on a regular basis, the apt I had was on 20th and Ballard and it was across 20th from me. The bar had a chart of Alaska under plexiglass, big King Crab mounted on the wall and lots of photos of fishing vessels. It was next to the Owl Tavern which was yuppie bar. Borgie was a Dane and had gotten hurt on a boat and had used some money he’d saved to open the bar, good guy.
A old shipmate of mine was a regular at the Sloop Tavern.
K.C.
[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;70921]I forgot about the Sunset, that was right across the street from the apartment that I rented when I was studying for my 3/m test. That place was the dive of dives, the beer wasn’t even cold.
A old shipmate of mine was a regular at the Sloop Tavern.
K.C.[/QUOTE]
how many more can you add to this map K.C.?
Thinking about it, we probably were in the same dive bar at the same time once. We obviously know the same people, boat and companies.
Next will be pics of Alaskan sailor’s drinking meccas!
[QUOTE=c.captain;70922]how many more can you add to this map K.C.?
Thinking about it, we probably were in the same dive bar at the same time once. We obviously know the same people, boat and companies.
Next will be pics of Alaskan sailor’s drinking meccas![/QUOTE]
I was there in '84 and '85, that was when I got my license. I took a date to Hattie’s Hat for breakfast one morning there were a couple of guys in the bar either ending late or starting early doing shots. When we walked out my date turned to me and said" don’t ever take me in there again" I didn’t and today she is my wife.
K.C.
I’m glad my older thread about seaman’s clubs could inspire a healthy dose of blissful reminiscing about the days of glory, past, present and future, in ports near and far around the world. Having just started out in the industry I can’t compete with the stories and memories here but I hope that I too will one day have a deep dark catalog teeming with such stories.
Oh man I think I have visited everyone in SE.
[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;70923]I was there in '84 and '85, that was when I got my license. I took a date to Hattie’s Hat for breakfast one morning there were a couple of guys in the bar either ending late or starting early doing shots. When we walked out my date turned to me and said" don’t ever take me in there again" I didn’t and today she is my wife.
K.C.[/QUOTE]
Hattie’s Hat and the Smoke Shop are the places for the real hard core Ballard drunks to go to start VERY early every day. I don’t know how they have licenses to serve shots at 5am.
Your wife was a wise woman to not want to return to such a “colorful” establishment but at least HH has windows. It is good that you didn’t take her to the Smoke Shot which is truly a “black hole of Calcutta” on Ballard Avenue. If you had she might have run screaming into the morning swearing to herself to never see you again! You should have taken her to the Salmon Bay Cafe instead. I always wondered why they never got a liqueur license themselves. Sitting where they do would make them a natural first stop/last stop place.
It is a shame that Blazes is no longer as that was one of my favorite dives and they had a really mean Ribeye! Today the old Lunde Marine Electric is the Market Arms which is too nice of a place for the ordinary seafaring riffraff of Ballard. Actually all of Ballard is losing the working stiff personality it always had and is rapidly becoming cutsyfied with Bistros and such. Horrible! I can only imagine what Ballard Avenue must have been like in the day when steamers and squareriggers still would call the Ship Canal home? Man, that must have been awesome!
At least fishing vessels can be found in abundance there will at Pacific Fishermen and Ballard Oil but Marco is now a yacht center, Fisherman’s Terminal has more yachts that old wooden seiners, trollers, gillnetters and longliners. I remember in my youth then the cedar and plywood mills were still in operation and there was log storage right in Salmon Bay immediately north of “Fishermens Dock”. Of course, I also remember the “old” Fishermens Dock" before the Port of Seattle ruined it.
[QUOTE=PaddyWest2012;70924]I hope that I too will one day have a deep dark catalog teeming with such stories.[/QUOTE]
Aye lad, me’s glads that ye be singin a new songs. Now I can tell you will do well and in 30 years be able to sit back and smile quietly to yourself as well as to be able to spin a colorful seastory to boot!
Enough now with this nonsense about “clubs” but if you ever end up in Tampa head for Ybor City. I mean that is a party every night right next door to the port! WOW…what a time when I was there for a month at TampaShip!
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[QUOTE=c.captain;70927]Hattie’s Hat and the Smoke Shop are the places for the real hard core Ballard drunks to go to start VERY early every day. I don’t know how they have licenses to serve shots at 5am.
Your wife was a wise woman to not want to return to such a “colorful” establishment but at least HH has windows. It is good that you didn’t take her to the Smoke Shot which is truly a “black hole of Calcutta” on Ballard Avenue. If you had she might have run screaming into the morning swearing to herself to never see you again! You should have taken her to the Salmon Bay Cafe instead. I always wondered why they never got a liqueur license themselves.[/QUOTE]
Yes, I was a knuckle head, I didn’t know HH was so hard core, luckily I wised up a little before she did. It was Salmon Bay Cafe after that, and Burkes Cafe
In Alaska there was the Arctic Bar in Ketchikan, Juneau had The Red Dog Saloon and the Alaskan Hotel, In Homer the Salty Dog on the spit and Alice’s Champagne Palace in town, Rose’s Bar in Pelican, the Road House in Akutan, The Unisea Inn and The Elbow Room in Dutch.
K.C.
I forgot Kodiak, the only place I can think of is Toni’s, there were a bunch more.
I can’t believe that nobody has mentioned the Elbow Room and the Unisea Inn in Dutch Harbor, or Tony’s, the Mecca, and the Beachcomber in Kodiak, or Alice’s Champaign Palace and the Salty Dog in Homer, or Humpies, the Bush Company, F Street, Darwin’s Theory, the Irish Setter, and the Captain Cook in Anchorage. I’m afraid that my memory of the Seward, Juneau, and Ketchikan watering holes fails me.
Please don’t call me a Yuppie, but I preferred Ray’s Boathouse, the Owl, the Ballard Firehouse, and the place in the basement with the good concerts (maybe across from Scandies) on NW Market St. I hated the Smoke Shop and Hattie’s. For breakfast you couldn’t beat the Salmon Bay Cafe, or the place at Shilshole Marina.
It’s been since the late '70s but in Seward was the Pioneer, Yukon, Gene Thorn’s Showcase. Yakutat had the Glass Door.
Florida Bar in Rio…swarms of street urchins tugging at you from every angle while you’re trying to enjoy your Brahma Chop at room temperature. (an open air bar on street level)
Red’s Java House on the San Francisco Embarcadero. A short walk from the SUP hall on Harrison Street for a double cheeseburger and a beer/soda for three bucks. (well, that was back in 98…prices have come up as I discovered on my last visit this past April)
Montero’s Bar on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn.
The Cat’s Eye, Helen’s Hollywood, Chios, Sherry’s Showbar…all in my homeport of Fells Point, Baltimore. Or as I knew it as a kid, The Foot of Broadway.
[QUOTE=capnfab;70933]The Cat’s Eye, Helen’s Hollywood, Chios, Sherry’s Showbar…all in my homeport of Fells Point, Baltimore. Or as I knew it as a kid, The Foot of Broadway.[/QUOTE]
Fell’s point of the '70s is a far cry from now.
I tried to make every bar in Brazil from Belem to Rio Grande do Sul but the one that stands out is the Yara in Aracaju. (Some may remember Peixe the pilot)
Bombolulu VIllage - Mombasa, Kenya - 1992
Kenyan shilling at the time was 57 to the dollar. I had a Tony Soprano WAD of cash. I was one of say only FIVE Americans in the joint - TWO of us were awaiting USS SAVANNAH the other three were Merchant Seamen. I was very stupid and threw a lot of money around, swilled a lot of Tusker and drew WAY too much attention to myself. We ended up skedaddling out of there a little after midnight after the LARGE group of assembled locals was beginning to get pissed with us for ‘buying’ the attentions of the dancing women. Fortunately no one was hurt, rolled or robbed.
There also was a Florida Club and Casino in Mombasa.
[QUOTE=PaddyWest2012;70924]I’m glad my older thread about seaman’s clubs could inspire a healthy dose of blissful reminiscing about the days of glory, past, present and future, in ports near and far around the world. Having just started out in the industry I can’t compete with the stories and memories here but I hope that I too will one day have a deep dark catalog teeming with such stories.[/QUOTE]
Don’t know, over the years there were a lot of long boring watches, endless tricks on the wheel, hours on deck out in the cold wind rain and snow, repetitive, heavy work, rough weather, cramped uncomfortable rooms , crappy food, unpleasant shipmates, clueless mates, loud mouth captains.
K.C.
[QUOTE=tugsailor;70930]Please don’t call me a Yuppie, but I preferred Ray’s Boathouse, the Owl, the Ballard Firehouse, and the place in the basement with the good concerts (maybe across from Scandies) on NW Market St. I hated the Smoke Shop and Hattie’s. For breakfast you couldn’t beat the Salmon Bay Cafe, or the place at Shilshole Marina.[/QUOTE]
Ah my friend you remember well. Ray’s Boathouse…over priced but fine ladies at happy hours. The Owl (now Conner Bryne) and Firehouse ROCKED! In fact, Ballard Avenue was always quite a party on weekends. The place in the basement of the Ballard Building you are thinking of was “the Backstreet” if memory serves me…some FABULOUS names there in a great venue. I forget the name of the bar at the old Shilshole Marina building (was it the Spinnaker?) that had all the great pics of fishing boats on the walls. Some fine times there but I think the port tore the building down. DAMNED!..I miss the days when I used to call 34th Ave NW home.
Still planning to get to the Alaska sailors bars soon. Really, port for port more hard core crusty seamen pounding them up north than anywhere on the planet I believe. Makes me miss Alaska even tho the weather sucks most of the year.
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[QUOTE=Kennebec Captain;70937]Don’t know, over the years there were a lot of long boring watches, endless tricks on the wheel, hours on deck out in the cold wind rain and snow, repetitive, heavy work, rough weather, cramped uncomfortable rooms , crappy food, unpleasant shipmates, clueless mates, loud mouth captains.
K.C.[/QUOTE]
eff that…as the years pass, I am only remembering the good times! Thankfully, all the shit is fading into the distant gauzy vague memory. A one grows older it’s like we create a past for ourselves that soothes us the pain of all the ugly wounds suffered over the years.
Much as I am not a fan of the bloated version of Jimmy Buffet that continues to be marketed long after the brand should have been retired, I still have a deep affinity for the man who sang “Changes in Latitudes”. A song that today still mean something to this seaman’s soul.
Reading departure signs in some big airport
Reminds me of the places Ive been
Visions of good times that brought so much pleasure
Makes me want to go back again
If it suddenly ended tomorrow
I could somehow adjust to the fall
Good times and riches and son of a bitches
Ive seen more than I can recall