| Friday, 24th | Working coal and iron, I being in the boat and painting. Pretty rough today. Large breakers are running inshore. Makes boating very hard. Scotch barque The ‘Anamba’ (Glasgow) came in. | ||
| Saturday, 25th | Extremely squally and rough. Have been in gig all day. Bad day for boats. Finished bar iron, knocked off at 4 p.m. | ||
| Sunday, 26th | Went aboard the coaster a lot today. Also went ashore. Very hot onshore. The fellows off the ‘Anamba’ were aboard today. | ||
| Monday, 27th | I have been working very hard all day, filling, sewing and slinging bags of coal. Splendid weather. | ||
| Tuesday, 28th | Unloading coal all day, and by “knock off” time was almost finished. Grand weather. | ||
| Wednesday, 29th | Started unloading the fire bricks. We have 36,000 of them. Almost finished the iron plates. Also had to shift grain bags. | ||
| Thursday, 30th | Discharged 1,900 bricks today. Had a narrow escape of being killed today. A tear of bags falling burying Charlie [- ? -]. He got badly wounded. Bailing bilges. | ||
| MAY 1896 | |||
| Friday, 1st | Working hard at the coal, bricks and iron plates. Almost got them finished. Greek ship ‘Methusa’ finished loading today. She burned a lot of lights. Also a lot of cheering. | ||
| Saturday, 2nd | Finished unloading today. As the last sack of coal came up I was made to sit on, as I had slung the lot. | ||
| Sunday, 3rd | Did a lot of washing today. Went aboard steamer and had any amount of fruit. Then went ashore. Remainder of the day was spent in Bunk, singing hymns. | ||
| Monday, 4th | Started taking in ballast. Took two lighters off a Chilian Barque. It is Chilian soil. | ||
| Tuesday, 5th | Took three lighters of ballast in today. Now got 100 tons in. | ||
| Wednesday, 6th | Loaded 3 lighters of shore ballast. Tonight had a good 5 mile pull to the ‘Loch Torridon’ to pilot her in, but there was not enough wind, and had to pull about 7 back. Got on board about 11 oclook. | ||
| Thursday, 7th | Loading ballast and chipping lower hold. Taking ballast from ‘Loch Torridon’. | ||
| Friday, 8th | Finished today, and got all gear ready. ‘Balmore’ fellows were aboard till 9. | ||
| Saturday, 9th Sailed for Iquique |
At half past 5 a.m. we droped our stern moorings, and hove about. Then went into lighter and hauled in chain and anchor. Then brought them on board. Then hove up anchor, and set all sail. All the ships except the German saluted us and we in turn saluted them. The captains of the ‘Loch Torridon’ and ‘Balmore’ along with the apprentices came on board to give us a hand. | ||
| Sunday, 10th | Doing very little all day. Principally washing. Hardly moving. The sea is like glass. It seems like a pleasure trip. We are quite close inshore. | ||
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