{"id":1572,"date":"2016-10-21T11:00:18","date_gmt":"2016-10-21T00:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/?p=1572"},"modified":"2016-10-10T16:34:20","modified_gmt":"2016-10-10T06:04:20","slug":"blessing-fleet-liz-harfulls-almost-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/2016\/10\/blessing-fleet-liz-harfulls-almost-island\/","title":{"rendered":"Blessing the Fleet from Liz Harfull’s Almost an Island"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Almost<\/a><\/p>\n

Liz Harfull’s\u00a0Almost an Island<\/a> is full of fascinating information about Robe on the Limestone Coast.\u00a0<\/em>One of the great traditions of the area is the blessing of the fleet, which happens every spring. Liz explains:<\/em><\/p>\n

Blessing the Fleet<\/strong><\/p>\n

Every spring, at the start of the rock lobster fishing season, people gather at the\u00a0Robe marina for an important ceremony. The Blessing of the Fleet brings peace of\u00a0mind to the fishers and their families who are involved in what remains a risky way to\u00a0earn a living.<\/p>\n

According to celebrant Jan Bermingham, the tradition started sometime in the 1950s\u00a0under the influence of immigrants arriving in Australia from Italy and Greece. Blessing the\u00a0fleet is a strong tradition in Mediterranean countries where it is held every season to ensure a\u00a0safe and bountiful fishing season. When the custom was introduced in Adelaide, an Anglican\u00a0priest serving on the Limestone Coast thought it worth doing at Robe too.<\/p>\n

Fishers have a reputation for being superstitious and the ceremony has real meaning for\u00a0the community. At one stage it was moved to the end of November, weeks after the season\u00a0started, so it could be part of a village fair designed to draw tourists to the town. \u2018The local\u00a0fishermen had the Church of England priest down here on the morning the season opened\u00a0to bless them as they went out to sea. They were not going to wait a whole month,\u2019 says Jan.<\/p>\n

\u2018Even though a lot of fisherman don\u2019t grace the doors of a church they are very, very conscious\u00a0of their God.\u2019<\/p>\n

The ceremony involves a brief service, which seeks God\u2019s blessing and commemorates the\u00a0lives of fishers lost at sea. Teenagers then dive into the harbour to retrieve a wooden cross.<\/p>\n

As the daughter, sister and aunt of professional fishermen, Jan knows the worry\u00a0many families experience. \u2018When we lose a boat everybody feels it,\u2019 she says.<\/p>\n

\u2018They don\u2019t like to show emotion but they are so bonded together, and they know\u00a0it could have been one of them.\u2019<\/p>\n

\"Blessing<\/a>

Decorated fishing boats gather for an early Blessing of the Fleet ceremony, c. 1950s. (Courtesy Met Riseley)<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Liz Harfull’s\u00a0Almost an Island is full of fascinating information about Robe on the Limestone Coast.\u00a0One of the great traditions of the area is the blessing of the fleet, which happens every spring. Liz explains: Blessing the Fleet Every spring, at … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[94,432,430,137,93,433,429,431,434],"class_list":["post-1572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-extract","tag-almost-an-island","tag-boats","tag-fishing","tag-limestone-coast","tag-liz-harfull","tag-religion","tag-robe","tag-ships","tag-superstition"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4v1Of-pm","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1572"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1572\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1623,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1572\/revisions\/1623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}