The currents at the mouth of the Columbia River swallow ships, sailors and time itself in regular gulps.
This tour, recommended for children 11 to 13, will stop at the port where clipper ships, sailors and soup kitchens once thrived.
The Finns, and Danes too, complain that the Estonian ships' sailors get "slave wages" which undercut those of their Nordic comrades.That riles the free-market Estonians, who point out that their seafarers, who earn some $600 a month, are already some of their best-paid workers, by Estonian standards.
There has even been speculation that these releases of gas might explain the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle colossal bubbles of gas seeping from the floor of the Caribbean may have suffocated ships' sailors or destabilized airplanes.
The sea is a harsh and forbidding place that swallows ships, sailors and tools for exploration with impunity.
When news of Dale Earnhardt's fatal crash in the Daytona 500 two weeks ago reached her husband's ship, a sailor on his watch chewed on his home-cured deer jerky and said, "I feel like Superman has died".
The library played the whole thing: the great big clipper ship, the sailor suit and cap, the spike in the vein, the blood in the head, the closing in on death, the Jim-Jims in this town, the politicians making crazy sounds.
At one point during the harrowing but deadly rescue of the transport ship Governor, sailors above deck could hear "the bubbling cry of drowning men".
"MRCC wants to know: how many can we take?" Around the MSF team, the ship's sailors are donning overalls and gas masks.
I think of those balconies on the upper floors of colonial homes in old ports, where pacing wives would gaze out to sea, seeking the long-overdue ships of sailor husbands: widows' walks.
