Visits to Britanny - Petite Cornouaille - Festivals and fishing.

Making the Breton connection, the ex-fishing boat Solveig was one of the few classic working boats to visit Newlyn in the late 1970s........

eventually, interest in such vessels provoked the organisation known as Chasse Marée to hold a working boat festival in 1988 after the success of a very small fête a few years previously, the '88 event was such a huge success - as much to the organisers surprise, well over the 500 invited boats turned up - from all over the world - some as deck cargo on merchant ships - and the number of musicians topped 1,000.........

many Cornish boats made the journey including the classic yacht, Providence owned for many years by the Minns family of Restronguet and built by Pascoe's in Porthleven for the designer Nigel Warrington-Smythe in 1934.........

she was just one of many boats that enjoyed an event which drew a quarter of a million visitors over three days at the end of that July.........

including the top Douarnenez fishing boat Le Royale that used to target monk, megrim and hake on the Great and Little Sole banks - renowned for her willingness to stick out any weather the boat was never seen in Newlyn until she changed hands in the early 1990s........

looking back across a crowded harbour - and not a safety barrier in sight - and, amazingly enough, no one fell in........

everywhere you looked there were masts - the event spawned the hugely successful boat festivals that now take place every two and four years in Douarnenez and Brest - next year will be the 20th anniversary........

also visiting Brittany on occasion was the Newlyn netter, Keriolet seen here making her way in to Guilvenec for a major engine overhaul in 1992........

crewman Billy Bunn asked one of the local boats for a feed of fish as the engine job was going to keep the boat there for well over a week.......

in which time some of the boat's Breton friends paid social visits, like Bruno the engineer from the Kas Dei........

alternativley, the Keriolet's skipper and crew ventured north to St Geunole to visit old friend Jean-Claude who treated the boys to an evening meal in the Crepsicule Restaurant........

where it seems much gwin ru flowed, judging by the ruby cheeks on skipper Traz and Mr Bunn........

yet another sojourn, this time to see good friend and skipper, Christian and his wife Sylvie along with Annie Le Palud (left) of Le Doris Bar in Kerity - Annie's brother was lost along with the rest of the crew when their boat capsized in mysterious circumstances while fishing for langoustine on the Smalls - a submarine was suspected to have dragged her under - shades of the Buagled Breizh many years later. The Keriolet was fishing in the area at the same time.

More pictures of the Petite Marie Claude from Douarnenez.

Tuna boat, Petite Marie Claude up the river at Douarnenez........

gutting the catch at sea.......

using the boat's dinghy to ferry spares aboard......

there was skipper and crew.......

not tuna fishing.........

back on the tuna making up gear......

 

time to eat. A big thank you to Didier Beillevair for sending in the photos.

Tuna fishing update - Gloria Maris

It seems the video clips of the Petite Marie Claude fishing for tuna have provoked plenty of interest in the Breton ports of Douarnenez and beyond.
In particluar, the fourth video has a sequence where the skipper and crew appear to have some sort of altercation with other boats, at one point a firecracker is seen being thrown in the water by the skipper. I have added a narration kindly provided by Jacques Blanken, a Douarnenez fishing historian who has tried to make sense of the incident recorded in the film.

Voici un essai d'analyse...

Le premier bateau filmé (film n°4), le rouge et blanc est à l'évidence un basque (l'avant est frégaté et la passerelle au milieu, typique du pays basque Français ou Espagnol), les deux suivants sont soit Audiernais, soit Douarnenistes et apparemment, l'un d'eux (le bleu) se met devant la Petite Marie-Claude, ce qui énerve l'équipage et au delà, a au moins deux effets
1° Risquer d'embrouiller les lignes lorsque la Petite Marie-Claude relèvera son poisson mais surtout
2° Lui "piquer" son poisson... ou au moins le faire partir...
Je pense que celui-là est peut-être bien un Audiernais... Ensuite on en voit un autre (blanc) vu de côté, navigant de conserve, ce doit être un Douarneniste. Mais ce n'est que pure hypothèse. Au passage, il est intéressant de voir qu'en pêche, pour ne pas trop rouler, tous les bateaux envoyaient deux ou trois voiles!



Suivent quelques images des lignes (mais on ne voit pas les perches) et deux bateaux très loin au large et effectivement après, il semble qu'il y ait une excitation à bord. Manifestement on n'est pas content et on voit d'ailleurs sur l'image suivante, pendant que le patron parle à l'équipage une zone d'évitage ce qui semble confirmer que le bateau va ailleurs... ou est obligé de manoeuvrer ! Puis la scène se termine par l'envoi par dessus bord de ce qui semble effectivement être un pétard...et on voit de nouveau le bateau bleu qui pêche très près, sur babord arrière et va donc passer là ou a été envoyé le pétard... 


Serait-ce une vengence pour faire fuir le poisson ? Il faudrait avoir le témoignage d'un des matelots pour savoir exactement ce qu'il se passait...Après on (plie les gaules) en fait, on love les bas de lignes pour rentrer, pêche finie. Car en pêche on est à 4 ou 4,5 noeuds et en route on est à 9/10 noeuds...Toilette... et arriviée à Douarnenez avec les mauritaniens au port et sur le slipway !

Bonne journée
Jacques


Here is a translation of the explanation provided by Jacques:

In the fourth film, the red and white boat is obviously a Basque (the bow is typical of the Basque Country or Spanish), the other two are either Audierne or Douarnenistes and apparently one of them (blue) goes to the Petite Marie-Claude, which upsets the crew and appears to have two effects:


1 the potential to cross the lines when Petite Marie-Claude hauls his fish up but mostly


2 he pinches the fish ... or at least takes them from the Petite Marie-Claude


I think this one is perhaps an Audierne (a gentle sneer)... then we see another (white) from the side, navigating according to the rules of the road, it must be a Douarneniste - but this is pure speculation. Incidentally, it is interesting to see that while fishing, they all have two or three sails set to steady them.


In the next scene are some views of the lines (but you cannot see the poles) and, in the distance, two boats, when it seems that there is an agitation on board. Visibly they're not happy and we see also in the next shot, while the skipper is talking to the crew, a wash in the water which seems to confirm that the boat has turned hard or was forced to manouvre! Then, the scene ends by the skipper throwing what appears to be a banger and again we see the blue boat that is fishing close to the port quarter who will then pass where the firecracker was - is this revenge or an attempt to scare the fish? We should have the testimony of one of the crew to find out exactly what happened.  


The final scenes show them stowing the poles and lines ready to return, fishing over. When fishing, the boat does 4 or 4.5 knots and they are steaming at 9-10 knots, spending the time cleaning down the boat while heading for home. When arriving in Douarnenez you can see several big Mauritanian langoustiers in the port and one on the slipway!


Alain Gourret has also sent over a photo of Newlyn's own ex-tuna boat, the Gloria Maris, now Ben My Chree when she was working from her original port of St Guenole. Her decks appear freshly painted so this could be the first trip for the season when the chances are she would steam as far south as the Azores - there are several 40 gallon drums (fuel?) on the deck and a ladder at the foremast to aid fish spotting - unlike the giant tuna pursers with their helipads today!


Gloria Maris steaming with tuna poles rigged.
©Gildesein

Vessel details from the French equivalent of Olsen's Almanack.
©Gildesein




  

Tunny fishing aboard the Petite Marie Claude from Douarnenez.

 Tunny boats on landing day in Douarnenez......

Robert George holding his first tuna of the trip caught by line and pole ........

Looking every inch the movie star, skipper Xavier Quennec.

In the summer of 1967, Robert George (ex-skipper of the top Newlyn seiner Dew-Genen-Ny) filmed his voyage aboard a pole and line tuna boat from Douarnenez in Brittany. The boat, Petite Marie Claude DZ185081, was built in 1959 by Chantier Naval, Douarnenez for skipper by Xavier Quennec.

More information provided by Alain Gourett:

The boat Petite Marie Claude was a wooden hulled vessel built in 1954

The owner called Xavier QUEINNEC
Registration: DZ3886 then DZ 185081
Length 16.78 m
Beam 5.62 m
Draught (Draughts) 2.80 m
Gross tonnage  48.15 tx
Speed 7 kts
Engine: 128 hp / engine MAN

Robert used 8mm cine film which was subsequently converted to digital by 3S Films in Penzance.

•  Tunny fishing part I.

• Tunny fishing part I.

• Tunny fishing part III.

• Tunny fishing part IV.  Look out for a fully laden 'Langoustier' - an example of the huge wooden pot boats that fished thousands of miles from Douarnenez as far as Mauritania and filled their vivier tanks with crayfish or langouste. The last of these boats sailed from Douarnenez in the early 1980s with a few surviving examples still to be sen at the Musée de Pêche.