The 'Soren Larsen'


The sailing vessel the 'Soren Larsen' was constructed by the Danish family of Soren Larsen & Sons at their shipyard in Nykoping Mors in Denmark in 1949.

The ship was mainly employed on the Baltic sea routes and north European waters, and occasionally ventured as far afield as Iceland, and the United Kingdom.

In 1972, the ship was gutted by fire and was laid up until 1978, when the hull was bought by Square Sail Britain. Being fully restored under their watch, she was re-decked with iroko timber and re-masted with Douglas Fir, and finally re-rigged as a 19th century-style brigantine. The vessel's new homeport became Colchester in the U.K. 

On resuming operations in 1979, the 'Soren Larsen' saw extensive use in television and film productions, which helped in a big way towards her overall restoration costs.

She became well known for her regular appearances in the BBC Series 'Onedin Line',  the films, 'French Lieutenant's Woman', 'In Search for the Mary Celeste' and 'Shackleton'.

During the filming of the latter in 1982, she became the first sailing ship in 70 years to reach the Greenland Arctic Circle. 

Following that she became a sail training vessel until 1985 under the charter of the Jubilee Sailing Trust. During 1991, she sailed around the notorious Cape Horn! In late 2011, she was purchased by Sydney Harbour Tallships where, happily, she continues to sail the South Pacific.

I fondly remember the 'Soren Larsen' visiting Wicklow Port during the summer of 1982. It is  not often that you would get such a majestic sailing vessel visiting the port. The ship berthed at the East Pier where the crew and passengers were amazed by my murals that existed at that time on the pier wall. During their short visit to the harbour, I started painting a mural of the ship, much to their delight! 

At the time of their visit, I recall that the ship was being filmed by a HTV Television unit as part of a documentary. Definitely quite an interesting vessel!

I took this photo on the day the 'Soren Larsen' visited Wicklow Port - its first and only time! The lads searching here for rag worm were not able to access their usual fishing area due to filming that was going on that day.



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