FERRY TALES
Anonymous dispatches from a Washington State Ferries deckhand
WRITTEN BY ALBERT A. SHORR
ILLUSTRATIONS BY JED JUDT
From across the emerald water, a giant goofy floating smile appears. Is that a boat? Oh yes, it’s one of Puget Sound's favorite vessels. They are green and white, though a little amber with rust. They’re diesel, they're hybrid, they are big aging girls. They’re our beloved and disdained Washington State Ferries, and they are my office.
Welcome to “Ferry Tales.” My name is Albert A. Shorr, and I’m a deckhand for Washington State Ferries (WSF). Okay, fine. That’s not my real name. But it is my real job. In my monthly column, I want to take you behind the scenes of our state’s intrepid ferries. We’ll talk about the mundane, the wonderful, the popcorn, the grime, and the many characters both running the show and riding along. My hope is that these stories will make the public fall even deeper in love with the boats — but really, I'm just here to report.
I’ve been working in the maritime industry for many years. I fell in love with the ocean in my teens, after I begged a friend to teach me to sail. I was terrified of capsizing, but I wanted to know what it felt like to let the wind carry me. I wanted effortless wandering. Turns out it’s not rocket science; neither was the mind-numbing office job I took in my early twenties, which involved a beautiful commute over a bridge at sunrise every day. One day I realized I wanted to spend my mornings at eye level with that shimmering blue. I made some changes. Fast forward several seasons, and I became well-traveled by water and developed the skin damage to show for it. But I got older, I got tired, I got lonely. I started looking for a boat job where I could go home every night. Four years ago, in Seattle on my way to work elsewhere, I saw a state ferry gliding along the golden summer Sound. Oh, the romance of the ferries when the mountain is out! That’s how they get you: The ferries are an institution in need of no marketing. Maybe that would be a good job, I thought. Plus, there was the allure of a state job — “great” benefits. It was enough for me to drown out the warnings from the higher-ups that “it can be pretty rough at first.” I signed on as an on-call janitor — I mean deckhand.
Going from one boat to another can feel like you’re on moving staircases.
We’ve got a long cruise ahead of us, so I thought I’d start “Ferry Tales” by setting the scene. Since I’m an on-call, my floating office can change day to day, and can vary in size, location, and setup. Going from one boat to another can feel like you’re on moving staircases. Each boat belongs to one of seven “classes” or types. There’s one remaining Evergreen State, the Tillikum, built in 1959. That’s a 67-year-old boat! The Supers, the Kaleetan and Yakima, are the next oldest in the fleet, and considered to be real workhorses. The Spokane and the Walla Walla are the two Jumbos — ’70s girlies, maybe a little spacey, but definitely fun. The Jumbo Mark IIs, like the Tacoma and Wenatchee, carry the most traffic and humanity, so it’s understandable that they need to melt down sometimes. The Issaquahs, like the Kittitas and Cathlamet (Crashlamet), were built in the ’80s, and are the most numerous in the fleet. Maybe it’s more about the routes they are on, but if you’re working the cabin on an Issaquah, you’re having an easy day. The Kwa-di Tabils — the Kennewick, the Salish, and the Chetzemoka — are the smallest boats in the fleet, and some folks say they are the hardest to pilot. A lot of ferry workers seem to love the Olympics, but to me they feel too tall, too sterile, and don’t have many cabins. Yep, there are beds, and sometimes we sleep on board.
Boats in the same class have the same general layout, but each boat feels different, and has its own personality. They all have long pleather bench seating. But the Spokane’s is adorned in maroon, black, teal, and mustard. The Tokitae has one of the strictest, most senior captains in the fleet, so you can almost safely eat off of the floors. The boats that work Bainbridge can feel and sound like a New York City street — laughter, mediocre buskers, general bustle. The Mark IIs have two upstairs bring-your-own-book “libraries.” They’re lovely, quiet spaces. But in one of the Puyallup’s libraries, the thermostat is broken, so it’s a library and a sauna. And finally, the Wenatchee generally feels like a work in progress and really has been struggling since its conversion into a hybrid-electric boat; it’s hard being a Prius.
For all their quirks and unique characteristics, WSF’s boats still feel like a unified fleet, and are home to a shared set of rituals. Cars drive in on the first level — the fluorescent cement-and-steel car deck. A WSF worker will tell you where to go, and some of us are better at that than others. Pedestrians (we call them “walkers”) often enter via a retractable walkway on the next level. They step on board at a green-fenced part of the bow we call the “pickle fork.” Visitors take their selfies and do laps looking for the bathroom. Regular passengers traipse on, headed with determination to their darling seats.
Every boat has a restaurant, or galley. You can turn up your nose at reheated frozen tater tots and bagged soups, but a galley sausage egg and cheese has saved me on many mornings. Few people turn up their nose to a good ol’ ferry beer: I like them when I’m off duty, mind you. And every boat has public puzzles, with just enough missing pieces to drive you mad.
On any day where the weather’s decent, you should be able to go upstairs to the gray nonskid sun deck to get blasted by the wind and stare up at massive stacks expelling exhaust from park bench-style seating. Once underway, someone presses a button, and the safety message I could recite in my sleep echoes through the car deck, fills the main cabin, and drifts through the gusts on the sun deck. (“Welcome aboard the Washington State Ferries. The following message is an important safety announcement…”) Other noises abound: Toilets flush, toddlers squeal, old men expel alarming wet coughs, the engine hums.
In terms of couture, employees are dressed in the same blue or white-darted poly button-downs they’ve worn since the ’80s. Our shoulders are decorated with epaulettes (stripes that indicate our rank or lack thereof). We stop to sweep up pounds of popcorn, dog hair, tickets, tissues, dust bunnies, toilet paper, toenails. As the announcement fades, we make our way with varying degrees of purpose through a nondescript door to the day room, our breakroom. If we’re lucky, it has a small galley and generous seating, but at its worst it’s a glorified closet with a microwave and minifridge. The worst day room in the fleet is nothing more than a dirty cubicle with a few seats and six inches of leg room.
I want to invite you aboard whatever vessel I’m riding. Maybe the Tacoma today and the Issaquah tomorrow. I’ll be writing to you as the days get longer and the summer mania of the Pacific Northwest sets in. As I trade my hazard orange jacket for a very cool safety vest. As we all make our way to the sun deck in search of the largest dose of Vitamin D we can muster and maybe the chance to see the J-Pod orcas. Here’s the caveat: I like the job, or at least, I’m not ready to be fired yet. So I think the best way to proceed is anonymity. Also, isn’t that just more fun?
– Al A. Shorr
If you enjoyed the illustrations, check out Jed’s website and Instagram.
Al A. Shorr’s identity is one secret we will never tell! But yes, Albert is a real-life employee of the Washington State Ferries.
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