Pirate Links

Thar be pirate sites galore on the World Wide Web, and we’ve given up tryin’ to list ’em all. Here’s a smatterin’ o’ sites that have captured our fancy. If ye’ve got another and would like to swap links, give us a holler. We’ll check out yer site and consider it.

We’ve culled this page down to the essentials, killing off the 404s and favoring links to unique, high-quality products and services, pirate festivals (when we hear about ’em), just plain good stuff … and oddities that tickle our funny-bones.

We don’t sell ads, and we don’t do banner exchanges, although we’ll consider almost anything if you offer us great gobs of money (pirates gotta eat, too). We aren’t, in any real sense of the word, a business, so spare us the emails asking us if we want to buy your Chinese machine parts or SEO services. We don’t.

Disclaimer: Some of the sites below contain content that may make yer eyes cross, yer ears bleed or yer hair stand on end.  Parental discretion advised.

First things first:

Our close personal friend and Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist, Dave Barry

The TLAP Team on Social media

The links

Kindred Souls

  • The work o’ fantasy and pirate artist extraordinaire’ Don “Foulbottom” Maitz, responsible fer (among other things) the look o’ Captain Morgan’s Rum – and the cover of the Pirate Guys’ first book.
  • Seattle Seafair Pirates – Pirate King of the Northwest since 1949!
  • Bilgemunky.com – No longer active, but he was a steadfast mate and has archived some good stuff
  • Mutiny – A terrific e-zine aimed at “the untapped adult pirate audience,” from our pal Talderoy and the pirates o’ Studio City. Cap’n Slappy and Ol’ Chumbucket are occasional contributors. You have to sign up for a membership, but it’s free, and they protect your privacy like buccaneers protecting their treasure. And the magazine looks great!
  • Pirates & Privateers – The regularly updated website of of author Cindy Vallar, offering articles on the history of pirates and reviews of recent pirate books and movies. Cindy is one of those people who – if you need some specific pirate information, she knows it or knows who does and is willing to share.
  • How to Talk Like A Pirate – complete with sound files and phrases – on How Pilgrim, by Kevin K., who offers other how-tos ranging from “how to stop a dog humping your leg” to “how to quit your job.”
  • The International Brotherhood Of Neutral Pyrates, aka The Pyrates Union
  • The Lady Sarah Out of Worthing – Cap’n Reg Miller’s labor o’ love, turnin’ a common garden shed into an entirely uncommon pirate ship. It’s amazing.
  • Ocular Melanoma Foundation – Dedicated to research and support for people with eye cancer; one of their founders is a TLAPD fan whose husband “rocks the eyepatch.” Good cause, worthy of yer donations.
  • One Tough Pirate – HIV/AIDs educator Bob Bowers definitely qualifies!
  • PirateJokes.net – More than 1,000 pirate jokes. And yes, we’ve heard them all …
  • The Pirate King – Rob Ossian (pronounced “Ocean”) has an amazing trove o’ nautical lore on his most excellent pirate-themed site.
  • The Pyrates Way – Pirate-themed webzine, plus lots o’ booty to buy.

Pirate Performers

We recommend:

(There are literally hundreds of other fine regional/international pirate bands and re-enactors out there – far too many for us to keep up with. Keep an eye out for them at pirate festivals and Renaissance Faires)

Pirate Songs

See our Songs page(s) for a bunch of fantastic TLAPD-specific songs by some of our fans, including the Official Talk Like A Pirate Day Song by Tom Smith

People who (unlike us) take their piracy seriously

Pirate Books

We recommend:

Our own books, including:
  • Pirate Santa – A heart-warmin’ tale about tattooed pirates in the Caribbean who save the day!Join our own Cap’n Slappy, Tal, Ninja Boy, Pirate Baby Girl and crew in one of the best children’s books ever about a Christmas pirate adventure.
  • Chrissie Warren, Pirate Hunter – Ol’ Chumbucket’s first YA novel, about a 13-year-old girl who disguises herself as a boy and signs on to a Caribbean-bound merchant ship to find and rescue her father after he’s kidnapped by pirates.
Books for kids
Books for teens & adults

Web books:

  • Ile de Torture – A participant-written on-line “novel” of the high seas. (Requires registration to read or post).
  • Raging Gail, the Tale of a Daring Pirate and the Crew that Sailed Under Her, by James Ryan. A serialized pirate story in blog format.
  • (And don’t forget our own serial, The Ship’s Log o’ The Festering Boil!)

Pirate comics

Pirate comics

Pirate arrrrt, video and animations

We recommend:

More art, videos & animations
Pirate Fun & Games

We Recommend:

  • Puzzle Pirates – on-line games community about, well, pirates. Pretty popular a few years back, and still active.
  • Sid Meiers’ Pirates – Revival of a great game, for the PC, XBox – and now the iPad!
More  fun & games

Pirate Festivals

Pirate Excursions & Experiences

  • The good ship Jolly Pirates, sailin’ the treacherous charter seas off Aruba, and havin’ way too much fun doin’ it.
  • Pirate Adventures on the Chesapeake – Join a merry band of pirates on the mighty ship Sea Gypsy for swashbuckling family outings, birthday parties, field trips, and exciting adventures.
  • Pirate’s Dinner Adventures – ” a dinner show attraction that puts you and your family right in the middle of all of the swashbuckling action.” Orlando, Fla. and Buena Park, Calif.
  • Salty Sam’s Pirate Cruise – out of Ft. Myers, Fla.
  • Looking for pirate fun beyond Talk Like A Pirate Day? Sydney Treasure Hunt arranges pirate-themed treasure hunts on land and sea, in and around Sydney, Australia, as team-building activities.

Pirate gear & garb

We’ve decided to ditch a gazillion links to companies that offer the same mass-market Halloween costumes  in favor of a handful of purveyors of custom and high-quality garb favored by re-enactors and other true enthusiasts. No offense to the former – ye can find ’em by Googling “pirate costumes (or “pirate fancy dress” in the UK). There are just too many of them to keep track of. Instead, here’s the Good Stuff – not cheap, but worth every penny.

  • The official ITLAPD Pirate Booty store on CafePress, where ye can purchase official TLAPD T-shirts, mugs and other gear (and help keep us in grog).
  • Captain Jack’s Pirate Hats – the favored pirate hats of Ol’ Chumbucket
  • Sword and the Stone – Tony Swatton, weapon-maker to the stars, and a mate o’ Cap’n Slappy’s.
  • Baltimore Knife and Sword – Top-quality weaponry, favored for stage combat for decades.
  • Rogue Steel – Quality custom swords and other blades suitable for stage combat
  • SCA Boots – As worn by Ol’ Chumbucket hisself, who calls his Sir Henry boots “honest-to-god the most comfortable footwear I own.”
  • DressLikeAPirate.Com – Clothing-quality pirate and wench costumes, garb & accessories; Shayna helped dress Team Pirate & friends for Wench Swap
  • Caribbean Rose – Gorgeous, handcrafted pirate hats for lads and lasses, custom designed, handblocked, and hand stitched.
  • Michael Elledge is an artist who makes well-crafted, non-firing replicas of historic cannon and their carriages. They’re things of beauty!
  • Museum Replicas – Established weaponry and costume house (since the 1970s), they supplied props for the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Quality stuff.
  • The Pirates’ Lair – offers authentic restored antique 100 – 150 year old pirate chests, sea chests with a pirate theme and decor; and vintage nautical furniture from restored WWII Liberty Ship wooden hatch covers to U.S. Navy-issued nautical dinnerware and tableware.
  • 826Valencia, a program for young San Francisco writers. They have a downright eerie pirate store that helps fund their writing programs.
  • Jezebel’s Booty Bag – Free .pdf knitting pattern for a capacious, felted, doubleknit pirate bag, designed by our erstwhile Webwench.
  • … and don’t forget our own pirate booty store on CafePress for official TLAPD shirts, mugs and more!

Everything Else

We Recommend

  • Ye Olde Tattoo Shoppe/Studio City Tattoo – Our good friends, offering tattoos, body jewelry and one hell of a TLAPD parrrrty. Tell ’em Cap’n Slappy (who sports a good deal of their ink) sent ye!
  • The Marie Curie Cancer Care – this fine UK charity has been using TLAPD almost since the beginning to raise funds to help cancer patients receive home care.
  • Davy Jones’ Locker – More about science than pirates, but a fine piratical look at sea-floor mapping and coastl GIS by our mate Deepsea Dawn Wright, now chief scientist at ESRI, which makes ARC-GIS mapping software (pirates would’ve killed for it!) If ye’re interested in mapping, check them out.
  • Pirates@home is a test of the Berkeley Operating Infrastructure for Computer Networking (BOINC), harnessing the power of a gazillion home computers to help with important experiments in computing, physics and other fields. Because nerds can be pirates, too!
Miscellany
  • Arrr.Net – Every joke you’ve ever heard of (and some you haven’t) with “arrr” in the punchline.
  • Avast! – Lean, mean, effective anti-virus software protects yer computer against the bad kind of pirates. And if yer wiley, you might get a prate-talk Easter Egg on Sept. 19…
  • Classic-Pirates.com – Dedicated to the original pirate LEGO sets.
  • Feathered Friends Forever – Where would a pirate be without his parrot? Feathered Friends Forever works to improve the lives of companion birds and promotes avian welfare through humane education, rescue, and by providing a temporary and/or permanent safe haven for abandoned birds. Throw ’em some doubloons!
  • International Scurvy Awareness Day . No, really.
  • PiratesPassions – an on-line social-network and dating site for … pirates!

    “Official” Talk Like A Pirate sites

    Which pretty much means they e-mailed us and asked “can we be the official …?” We’re pushovers, so we say yes a lot. Don’t let it go to yer heads.