Essays · Harbour life
The quiet work of ferries
A winter on the Askell crossing, and the people who make a boat arrive on time.
By Wren Hollis
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The first ferry leaves Askell pier at ten past six, before the gulls have decided what kind of day it is. Thirty-one people make the crossing most mornings: nurses coming off nights, two boys with a cello between them, a man who has sold eggs from a cool box on the upper deck for nineteen years. Nobody talks much. The engine does the talking, a low, patient note you feel in your knees.
I rode it every day for a winter, meaning to write about the boat. I ended up writing about the people who keep it running, and about how little of their work anyone sees.
Nobody thanks a ferry for arriving. They only notice the morning it doesn’t.
Ines starts at half past four. She checks the ramps, the lines, the lifejackets under every bench, and the coffee urn, which she counts as safety equipment. When the fog comes in she stands at the bow with a handheld radio and reads the buoys aloud, one to eleven, for a skipper who cannot see them.
There is a word in the harbour for this kind of care. It doesn’t translate, so mostly they just call it the work.