"Neptune" - Roman Polanski's Pirate ship in Genoa

On my recent visit to Italy, I paid a special visit to "Il Galeone Neptune”.
She is berthed in the harbour at Genoa.

This remarkable ship was built in the early 1980s in Tunisia as a movie ‘prop’ for the Roman Polanski film, “Pirate”. The movie starred Walter Matthau but a DVD edition was never released due to Polanski's personal/political problems.

Though suffering from neglect (though some restoration work is going on below decks) the intricate detailed carving of her bow and sterncastle galleries are breathtaking.

Weighing 1500 tons, 65m long and 16.4m beam, the ship is impressive as it is larger than an actual Spanish Galleon.

'Neptune is a fully rigged ship but beneath her elaborate wooden facade she has a steel hull and is equipped with a diesel motor.
Internally she has spacious gundecks and cabins. And some restoration work is being done below decks.

It cost only 5 euros to step aboard but few people seemed to be taking advantage.
Of for few coats of paint and varnish!

The LEAGUER and NELSON’S BODY

Nelson was not the only senior officer to return to England in a barrel.
“The large barrel standing at the ship’s side represents the original water leaguer in which Nelson’s body was contained for its journey back to England for burial.
To preserve the body, Surgeon Beatty had the leaguer filled with brandy. Although carried in the ship as an alcoholic drink, brandy was the best available spirituous solution suitable for this purpose.
Under tow by the 98 gun ship ‘Neptune’, the ‘Victory’ finally anchored at Gibraltar one week after the battle.
Beatty used this opportunity to dilute the brandy with preservation fluids comprising spirits of wine and myrrh. The leaguer was then placed in the steerage and lashed secure to the mizzen mast.
The ‘Victory' sailed home Monday 4th November and anchored off Portsmouth Thursday 5 December. Arriving off Sheerness 18 days later, Nelson’s body was transferred into its coffin and taken up river in the Chatham yacht to Greenwich where Beatty found the body in a good state of preservation.
The idea of preserving a body in a cask of brandy was not just done for Nelson but was the accepted common practice for preserving senior naval officers who dies at sea.”

HMS Victory - Portsmouth Historic Dockyard.