Old Fishing Boat Deck

An old wooden fishing boat lying within a boatyard in El Jadida for repairs leans over upon its side waiting to be rescued from time and the elements. Many of these traditional vessels are now becoming redundant as more sustainable modern fiberglass and metal hulled fishing boats replace them in the fishing and sailing industry. Wooden hulled boats cannot go out as far and catch the bigger fish that bring in more money,they require overhauls and repairs more then the modern boats do, and thanks to global warming are now more vulnerable to attack from Teredo (mollusc) "woodworms" as the recent outbreaks in Moroccan ports have shown. As the Moroccan fishing industry moves forward to keep up with competing countries like Spain and Norway, more older boats are being removed from the water and left in boatyards to be broken up for timbers to use on other boats or sold to collectors...or just left to decay and end up as firewood someday. It is a shame that progress comes at the expense of history and long tradition.

I found the structure, textures and grain of the painted wood vessels to be fascinatingly beautiful, harking back to a different age when mankind wandered the seas of the world insearch of fish, or adventure, or even treasure and conquest, A time defined by wind in sail and a wooden hull slapping against water.

Done