The Harbour Master

"This is a conch shell, I love finding this. You can hear the ocean, if you listen..... That's funny. The ocean sounds like a...oh it's the telephone!"

— The Harbour Master, Northumberland is Missing, fourth season

The Harbour Master is the narrator of the series which we also see him at the start and the end of each episode in the Harbour Master's Office. He was played by Denny Doherty. Rodney pulls pranks around him most of the time.

Bio

He has seen most of the world's waterfront but still has not figured it all out. Of all the vessels he has seen or worked on through his former career as a captain, he likes the tugboats the best. The stories he tells are from their point of view, and his affection for them is obvious.

It is his role to be in charge of the busy Big Harbour. It's his office that sets out the code of conduct for the harbour, balances the sometimes competing interests of all the various harbour users, and determines which docks will be assigned to which boats.

It's a demanding job that usually keeps him in his office overlooking the harbour (sometimes overnight), where he tries to keep on top of everything with a collection of charts, two-way radios, scanners, harbor radar, phones, and his trusty binoculars.

Generally, he remains only the narrator and keeps out of the model series. However, in one episode, while narrating, he claims a ship was moving dangerously close to his office.

Trivia

• In the European dubs of the series, the Harbour Master scenes are left out, but in the Finnish dub, the intro and credits are dubbed over with what he would say.