Cheers Charlie! Did you know Winslow Homer used to live near my homeland when he stayed at Cullercoats? He stayed in the old Bay Hotel, later home on the legendary Bay Hotel Folk Club, alas long since demolished and replaced by a new block of sea-side flats called... Winslow Court. I think The Gale was painted at Cullercoats - references say Tynemouth which is only a few miles away, but Cullercoats was his haunt, and a thriving fisher community in its day. Even now the atmosphere is very strog in that respect - you'd love it...

Not sure when The Belfar was lost, but I think the song has a more modern feel than Winslow's Cullercoats painting. You get the sense here in Fleetwood of a deeper, more lingering lore of personal grief & loss - just look at how the promenade sculpture of the mother and her children waving out to sea has become a shrine for floral tributes.

http://www.fredmoor.com/thefylde/pix/wave.htm

It's not a million miles from the Wimnslow Homer painting either...