The text on the back of the card says this was the "meeting of great sailing ships (August 1994)". The card itself was sent in 1999 so the publishers were certainly making the most of their photo opportunity. Of course it's very understandable, with such beautiful ships.
The background shows the walled city of St Malo which is in Brittany in north western France. During the middle ages, it was a fortified island and declared independence from France. The people there called themselves "Malouins". Interestingly, if you follow the news about the dispute over the Falkland Islands, the islands were originally settled by sailors from St Malo who called the islands les Îles Malouines. The Spanish version of this became "Islas Malvinas", still used today by Argentina.
The sender of the card was obviously a sailor himself: "We start the sail to Scotland on Friday and the weather forecast is OK". I wonder what sort of a boat he was on. It must have been a reasonable size to be going to Scotland.
I love these old sailing ships. And no comment about Scotland allowing only reasonably-sized ships. :) I promise, no comment about that.
ReplyDeleteIt's a long way to Scotland....
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Deletevery interesting info about Malvinas Islas.
ReplyDeleteI hadn't realised the name came from the French.
DeleteOooh, a walled city! My interest is immediately piqued. I love those ships, they seemed to transport me in time to the era of rum runs and pirates!
ReplyDeleteAs much as I enjoy cruising on ocean liners, these tall ships always take my breath away, especially when I see them with sails unfurled.
ReplyDelete