Salty Sam’s Marina celebrates 20th anniversary of pirate ship
The longest time the “Pieces of Eight” pirate ship was sidelined in its 20 years as an entertainment attraction, was after Hurricane Ian. In a testament to its sturdiness, craftmanship and the care it has been given by Salty Sam’s Marina over the years, the ship was only on the shelf for about four months when it returned to the hurricane-savaged waters of Fort Myers Beach for tours again.
That craftsmanship started at another beach, Virginia Beach, with its builder Capt. David Braithwaite, who piloted the ship for many years.
Braithwaite, who built the “Piece of Eight Pirate” ship in Virginia Beach where he was born and grew up, said his only previous experience building boat was when he and his dad constructed a fiberglass and wood boat when he was a teenager. “My dad and I built a 39-foot sailboat in my backyard when I was in high school,” he said. His dad wasn’t a boat builder by any means. His job during the day was selling typewriters for IBM. But the family loved boats and David spent much of life around boats.
“I always had a love for boats. We always had boats. We lived on a canal. We had a powerboat behind the house. On the sand dunes on the beach side we had a sailboat,” he said.
“You don’t think about building your boat. You need to weld this piece of steel on that piece of steel,” Braithwaite said about the process of constructing one. “You don’t think about the big project. It’s too overwhelming.”
The construction took about 19 months at Little Creek on Chesapeake Bay, Virginia. He relied on help in the form of guidance from naval architects he knew, and from reaching out to the U.S. Coast Guard.
Before he built the boat, he was a boat captain on and off for years. He and his wife Lori ran a court reporting business as a stenographer.
He credited Lori with the idea for the pirate ship, after she saw another pirate ship in Florida.
It took him two years to build what Salty Sam’s Marina considers their version of Disneyland on Fort Myers Beach.
“I would like to acknowledge (Salty Sam’s Marina marketing director) Ryan VanDenabeele for putting this all together,” Braithwaite said.
Braithwaite thanked Salty Sam’s Marina owners Matt and Darrell Hanson for “indulging me for the past 19 years. It has been an incredible journey. I walk on this property and I feel like I am home.”
Braithwaite operated the boat in Virginia Beach in 2006 for two seasons before bringing it down to Fort Myers Beach. “We realized after the first season, we needed to find a winter home,” he said. After taking the boat around to various marinas around Florida to find a home, they finally found a taker for the boat at Salty Sam’s Marina.
The boat spent a winter season at Salty Sam’s Marina before Braithwaite took it to Key West, and then brought it back to Fort Myers Beach. The Hansons bought the boat from him.
“We were looking for a winter home for the boat, just thinking it would be here for the winter and we would take it back to Virginia Beach. But then we really liked it here and then the opportunity came to take it Key West. We thought ‘let’s try that.’ Daryl told me if I ever wanted to bring it back here, the boat always had a home on Fort Myers Beach,” Braithwaite said.
“It has been an icon of Fort Myers Beach ever since,” Braithwaite said. “It was designed to entertain a six and an eight-year-old kid and mom and dad.”
The Hansons were concerned initially when Braithwaite went to Key West, that he might not come back. So when he returned, they promptly bought the boat from him.
“It’s our Disneyworld,” Darrell Hanson said. “If he wasn’t going to give me the boat, I was going to build it.” Braithwaite said he gave the plans for the boat to Hanson when he sold it to him.
“He came in that first year, he was getting people from all over the county to come here. When he left, we were a little disappointed because we got exposure from a lot of different parts of the county,” Hanson said. Matt Hanson, who helps run Salty Sam’s Marina, said “it fit in real well. We were trying to create a real family-friendly location. It fit that model very well.”
After all of the hurricanes Fort Myers Beach has gone through in the last 20 years, there are only a few marks on the Pieces of Eight pirate ship to show for it. Hanson refers to them as cannonball hits.
Braithwaite said the pirate ship has helped boost traffic to Salty Sam’s Marina restaurants, which include Parrot Key Caribbean Grill and Marina Cantina Waterfront Tin Tiki Restaurant. The popularity of the restaurants in turn bring business for the pirate ship.
On Thursday, Braithwaite joined more than a dozen current and former crew members to go on a birthday cruise. The boat can can handle upwards of 100 passengers.
Braithwaite said some of the crew that were on board on Thursday, were among the first crew members he had when he started out on Fort Myers Beach in 2007.
Ryan Abel, who goes by Capt. Pick Pocket Pea when he is overseeing the ship’s tours and engaging with children and families in various games abord, has been taking part in pirate ship cruises for the last 17 years.
The time “goes by fast,” Abel said of his 17 years working the tours. “I get to see a lot of families,” Abel said. “The crew is the most important.” Abel usually has about five other crew members abord assisting him.
“My favorite thing is when you see a shy kid at the beginning and then at the end they are playing with swords and dancing,” Abel said. “Parents say it takes them out of their shell. You can really make a difference.”
Aaron and Amanda Wennerberg, of Illinois, were among the families who brought their children with them on the pirate ship birthday cruise on Thursday. This was their first time visiting the state of Florida. “It was awesome. It was really fun,” Mr. Wennerberg said of the pirate ship cruise. Mrs. Wennerberg said she enjoyed the birthday cake that was served. Their son Austin said he liked the swordfighting.