"I must go down to the surf again, to the sunny beach and the sky,
And all I ask is a bitchin' board, and a wave to make me fly..."

It is unknown whether the first verse of this is simply composed of Masefield's half-remembered schoolboy history classes, or whether he actually intended to cram it with as many historical and geographical absurdities as possible. Here are some:

Nineveh was the capital of the Assyrian Empire, but by the time quinquiremes (5-banked rowing ships) were invented, it had been sacked and was a backwater village, if that. Even at its height, it was located far from the sea and could never have supported such large boats. In any case, quinquiremes were warships, not cargo vessels.
Ophir was a semi-mythical source of many ancient luxuries, and has been located everywhere from East Africa to Arabia to India to the islands further east. One thing all those places have in common, though, was that they were south of Suez, and any boat would have found it impossible at that time to get from there to Palestine.
Cedarwood would have been readily available to Palestine from neighbouring Lebanon. Wine was produced locally and throughout the Mediterranean, not imported from the East.

This is the third, and most ambitious, in my series of classic poems set to music. John Masefield's Cargoes, set to a surfin' beat, with an international cast of musicians:

Production: Glen Cram
Lyrics: John Masefield.
Vocals
Quinquireme: Shalev Cohen, Israel
Galleon: Ana Zoli, Mexico
Coaster: Easydan, UK
Instrumentals
Oud: Ramal Rasul, Azerbaijan/Pacha Mendes, Argentina
Spanish Guitar: Ry Jones, UK
Surf Guitar: Edu Ferre, Spain
Tuba: Micko Damnjanovski, Macedonia
Backing: Steve Guitar, USA/Jim Dooley, UK

See all my classic poems set to music at
   • A Song of Innocence and Vanity - Hats...  

For a 90s Eurodance take on William Blake's The Tyger (Burning Bright) & The Lamb, starring Japanese idol Hatsune Miku and rapper King Marino, see    • A Song of Innocence and Vanity - Hats...  
For Do Not Go Gentle Into That) Good Night Boogie, the epic collaboration between Dylan Thomas and John Lee Hooker, starring me, see    • Dylan Thomas & John Lee Hooker - (Do ...