Pros
Huge emphasis on safety to the point of 'no one moves, no one gets hurt'. New employees generally come in and really want to contribute. Quite often the public is lovely. They're on their vacation or off for the weekend and they're happy and having fun. Visitors from out of province love the experience of going on a ferry. I worked as both a terminal attendant and a deckhand so there was a fair bit of variety. You don't have to sit in a cubicle. The company is quite happy to train employees in other areas of operations although there's generally no crossing over to other departments (ie - if you're at a terminal, you stay at that terminal)
Cons
Toxic work environment. Massive amount of 'c.y.a'. You're being watched by the so-called management all the time. Any little discretion is noted and you're called on it. The entire organization is handicapped by the amount of administration. Employees are afraid to do anything for fear of being picked at by their supervisors. The rules and supervisors change constantly so that on Wednesday you have to follow the rules of Supervisor A and on Thursday you're doing it all wrong because you now have to follow the rules of Supervisor B. Horrific work/life balance. Being on-call is ridiculous. The expectation is that they can call you anytime and you're supposed to drop everything and race to work. They see no problem with calling you at 5:45 in the morning and expecting you to race to work for 6 a.m. You will actually get reprimanded if you don't do this for them. Management at the lower levels is a joke. (I can't speak for the upper levels) Insecure personalities with little or no true management experience who are jockeying for position and trying to make themselves look good at the expense of others. Little to no actual teamwork.