Ladies and gentlemen, may I congratulate you all in providing one of the most fascinating sea stories on this site, made all the more interesting by your own personal recollections of the ship, her crew, her passengers, and the voyages you sailed on.
Norman V, Mary, Marilyn, and ex-crew; I am sure it would be of great (personal and historic) interest to all if you could submit any further photographs and/or movie footage to add to the SS Lakemba`s history.
Many thanks for sharing your experiences.
Below is a letter from my grandfather, George B. Finch, on the voyage Dec. 1966-Feb. 1967, "Life on board Lakemba":
Today’s lesson has to do with “Life on the S.S. Lakemba”. I might mention in passing that the name “Lakemba” is the name of one of the lesser islands in the Fiji Group.
The deck house under the bridge contains the passenger lounge and five cabins of which ours is one, being the owner’s Suite, and the largest on the ship. It is about 18’ x 14’ including a bath room that contains the only tub on the ship. There is one bunk and two davenports that make down into beds --- happily seven feet long. Aft on this same “A” deck there are seven more cabins that open on the deck. We call these the “suburbs”, because those in them must brave the elements to get to the lounge. “A” deck is about two thirds covered and one third open. On “B” deck below is the dining room that seats 50 people and a line of cabin down each side of the vessel. These are quite nice and all have toilet and showers. On “C” deck there is a bar where courage is sold for $A.15 per jolt from 5 to 7 and from 9 to 11. There are also some cabins in C that do not have private facilities and being at the water line, are, with all, quite grim.
At 7.30 ever AM comes Alec, the Fijian East Indian Lounge steward with the get up chimes. At 8 AM he chimes breakfast and all 48 passengers who were not too late in the bar, rush in for chow. Grape fruit or juice, eggs to order and bacon from Australia cut from some obscure portion of a hog. It looks like a cross between jowl and Canadian back bacon. Sometimes wheat cakes and sausage, but the latter, like English sausages are a delusion and a snare, being mostly cereal. Also too there is a fish item, herring or bloater. Also toast, hot scones, butter from “Enzed” and jam.
After breakfast Gran and I generally do half an hour of fast walking. A lap about A deck is 94 of my paces. Deck games are also played at this time. Deck quoits is much tougher than it sounds as the tip and tilt of the ship, direction and speed of the wind, and the wetness of the decks are all variables that make pitching tough. During this time, the East Indian Cabin Stewards shake up the beds and police the cabins.
“Mug-up” coffee, tea and wafers at 10 AM. The ‘Strylians call the wafers “biscuits” for some reason. Next, reading, Scrabble, cards and checkers. 1 PM lunch. Fine soup, green salad, Steak or chops with also cold buffet or a lunch dish like Pasties or a Chinese dish. Always good cheese. Dessert very apt to be a pudding and jello choice.
After lunch, we take a nap of an hour. Then, stroll on deck and more reading etc. Oh yes, after lunch we go to the bulletin board and see who won the ship’s tote, (total day’s run in miles*) and what our position on the chart is. We also get a one page summary of world news out of Australia. At this time, it is also posted what the clocks are going to do the next 24 hours. The ship’s day runs from noon to noon.
3:30 PM, mugg-up again. At 5 the free style drinking starts. Some of the busy-bodies feel that the young folks drink too much. They refer to the four students that are going to Australia to go to school and to the four girls who are going there for jobs and adventure. In any event, we have not been bothered with noise nor unseemly conduct. The young people seem pretty nice to me. About six, we change for dinner. This involves getting into a shirt tie and jacket for most of us.
Dinner at 7, is much like the noon meal except that we always have a fish course and generally a “joint”. Fruit is also issued which we take to our cabins ---- oranges one night, next bananas, then beautiful B.C. apples. Evenings are devoted to movies, quizzes, games and bingo. The captain loves to play a Fijian game called “Last Card” which he says is a variation of the Australian gyme of “Cryzy Eyeights”.
At 10 PM, mug-up again --- this time with wonderful sandwiches. To bed about 11 PM. being tired out with hard labor.
Being of low silhouette and laden with 6,000,000 board feet of timber, the ship rides beautifully. Being steam driven it is very quiet and free from vibration.
The Fijian deck crew are a happy lot. New Year’s Eve they invaded the lounge and sang Fijian War songs with the help of a uke, a guitar and bongo drums. They had plenty of volume --- helped out, I fear with liberal applications of beer.
And such is life on the Lakemba as we wear down our southing at 10 knots per hour --- flank speed 11 knots. It is getting warmer air conditioning turned on today. Many pleasant people our age aboard. 6 from U.S.A., 6 from Australia, balance from Canada. Elapsed time, Victoria to Honolulu, 10 days. We stop for bunkers, water and stores. Then – Suva 12 days where we break cargo then 7 days into Sidney. And so goes life on the bounding Main ---- that has not bounded so much to date except for Cape Flattery and vicinity.
