Spring is just around the corner Well several corners and a couple of straights really

Three minutes and forty four seconds.

Not a lot, you cant do much in that small amount of time.  I can type about 100 words, walk a hundred and fifty yards at a gentle pace, paddle around twice that if I am pushing it along, or brew a cup of tea.

Today I’m working on taking off the plank offsets for SEI, and I can tell you that although it’s not a complicated job, it takes a great deal more time than that. I’ve been on it most of the afternoon and it’s a job nearly done.

But todays time here in the southern hemisphere between sunrise and sunset will be three minutes and forty four seconds longer than the shortest day a couple of weeks ago. The seasons are heading for springtime and we’ll soon be able to tell the difference! 

I will be heading for summertime in 10 days time though, the long trip to Port Townsend has become an annual event for me, SCAMP Camp is a fixture these days, usually run just before the Port Townsend Wooden Boat festival in September this one has had to be scheduled early due to the Maritime Center being booked for our usual time so I am in there in a couple of weeks time being a Schoolmaster teaching people to put their kits together.

It’s a long trip, and most of the airlines go through LAX That place is my least favourite airport on the planet and I’d got to great lengths to avoid travelling through there, so this time I’ve managed to get a decent deal on the tickets with Hawaiian Air, flying via Hawaii then into SeaTac. No I don’t get a stopover, drat.

But its going to be an interesting northern hemisphere summer for me, Jackie Monies and I are touring, from Port Townsend to Michigan, back to Toledo Or for their boat show, then Port Townsend for the Wooden Boat Festival, then wandering south to Oklahoma, Texas and the Port Aransas PlyWooden Boat show.

Once we can get our heads together in PT we’ll be working out where we’ll be, who we can call on, what we’re doing. Our thoughts are to post our schedule so people will know when we’re in their area, stop for a day to meet builders and interested people, talk boats and other nonsense, then drive to the next stop.

All this takes time, more than the 90 days that my visitors permit allows, so I have to leave not only the country but “neighbouring countries and Island territories” as well.  So it looks as though we’re going to Belize, just for a few days. 

Could be a lot worse.

It will be well into spring when I get home to New Zealand again.

Hope to see you somewhere along the way.

JW

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Wooden Boatbuilding in Castro Chiloe Chile!

Well, the Boot brothers have been doing a lot of walking, together of course, you’ll rarely find them apart from each other.  I went along with them, it keeps them out of trouble you know.

We’ve been exploring part of Chiloe Island just off the coast south of Puerto Montt which is well south of Valparaiso, one of the more southerly of the major ports here in Chile.

We took the ferry over, perhaps a 30 minute ride on a drive on drive off ferry which was an amazingly slick operation. There were at least a dozen of these ferries working when we were crossing, they carry around 30 vehicles each and  operate across a straight where the tidal streams run at ( guessing here, but not exaggerating) up to 8 knots.  This means that they’re going sideways as much as forwards, and the skippers know where all the major eddies are and work them just the same as a white water canoeist does.

On our travels on Chiloe we found a couple of boatyards and stopped with the camera. No problem with walking around in there, the “boatyard” where these pics were taken is the bank between the road and the waters edge, no more than about 20 metres wide, some very simple roofs on poles, and a few truckloads of roughsawn lumber in stacks.

There are repairs going on, and several new builds, I took pics of the biggest, and one of several small boats in frame, and you’d be amazed at how rough, and how basic these are. “Lofting”? All by eye!

Fitting? Axe and adze, and absolutely no more than just enough to get two pieces of wood close enough to get a bolt through. Those bolts? Hardware store mild steel hot galvanised, no fancy stuff here.

This is how the old square riggers were built, no frills, and way cheaper than the current way of building replicas. The fastest and cheapest path to the water, built under a very simple roof on poles with a monster bandsaw and a thickness planer being the only power tools,  axes and sledgehammers being the preferred tools and muscle being the main prime mover.

Have a look!

This little ship in build is about 20 ft long, shes partly planked, the frames are bent in using two temporary ribbands between the keel and the gunwale on each side, shes fastened with galvanised nails bent over on the inside. Some of the material appears to have been salvaged from older boats, and that monster piece of wood in the foreground is a stem removed from a much larger boat which has been demolished and saved for another build.

 About 70 ft by 18, the stem is more than a foot square, shes of much the same shape  and style as the boats weve seen everywhere along this coast.  Raked stem, very full at deck level, fine on the waterline and strong sheerline.

 Another view under the roof. There is a second ship in, shes been stripped out, engine and shaft removed and is being reframed. There are new garboards and some more plank replacements in the forefoot area, those planks being about 1 1/2inches thick, and as with all the others fastened with galvanised mild steel nails.

 Wed stopped to see what was happening in Ancud, the town at the northern end of Chiloe island  and down by the waterfront came across a maritime museum.  Sadly it was closed but this was visible through the fence.  Ive no idea as to what or why but shed be 80 ft, and I suspect typical of a type which would have serviced the coastline in this area. Shes a big heavy lump of a ship, cargo carried in a midship hold and on deck, shes no cruise liner but has a certain elegance.
Shed be built in very much the same manner as the ones in the boatyard and the bow end of her is much the same shape and style as the big motor fishing vessels, just the stern being straightened and squared off to cope with the higher speeds given by the big diesel engine.

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Christmas greetings and a couple of other things

With Christmas still happening in many parts of the world, Id like to wish everyone all the best for the festive season and a happy new year.

Advertising, this blog is running at about 10K page views a month, thats astonishingly good, thanks all who are interested enough to come and read. But its attracting increasing numbers of people posting advertising, anyone wishing to do that should first contact me so I can vet for appropriate content and work out what its worth, or Ill pounce on each post with the delete button.
Too many, or off subject ads are a distraction that we dont have to put up with.

Me? Ill be bathing the dog, he found some interesting things to roll in while we were out for a walk yesterday, then Ill be using my new sawbench to make the boom and yard for SEI. I want to be out sailing her very soon and will report as I get on with that project.

So all the best from summertime in NZ, its a near perfect morning here with the temp at about 20 deg C and rising, perfectly calm and clear weather and its looking like a perfect day.

Trekkies will know this one "Live long and prosper".

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Hiding from the spring weather

But its not a complete loss of time.

Its Thursday evening, Im still house sitting my sisters house up in the bush at the top of the hill. This ia a very peaceful place, and I’ve been able to spend some time working on the drawings for both SEI and the Saturday Night Special.  I’ve written building guides for both, materials lists, and some words of general advice.

Both sets are now done, all ready to go out and help people create their dreams. They will be sent off to the print shop and I’m expecting them to be scanned and back to me in digital form about Wednesday next week.

Tomorrow though I’m onto the next one that’s the boat that I’m drawing for my own use, for a particular project / voyage / adventure I have in mind.

“Long Steps” is  if you like a slightly larger version  of Walkabout, long and slim, a reasonable rowing boat that I expect will sail well. She has though the centre area of SCAMP including the self draining cockpit floor with a water ballast tank under, a similar raised locker and veranda “cabin” which like SCAMP provides high up bouyancy to assist righting after a capsize, gives much dry storage and some shelter from the elements.

She will be cat yawl rigged, that’s two masts, a big balanced lug main and a triangular mizzen, will have the same offset centerboard that has been so successful on SCAMP, that gives space in the cockpit which is to be wide and long enough to sleep in, and I am drawing in an area aft of that with the full depth and width of the boat in which to stand and move about when sailing.

Ill be carrying a swimming pool bean bag in there so can sail in some comfort.

The boat is intended for very long range voyaging, at times in areas where there are no harbours for overnight refuge so she will be set up to lie to a sea anchor.

Im going to get this far enough along to allow me to start the new boat, I’ve got two other design projects plus a couple of small modification drawings to do as well.  I need to get them done so I can get out sailing when summer gets here.

Adventure cruising? The years keep ticking past, there are only a limited number of them and no one knows just how many each of us have, so its time I got out there and did some serious adventuring.  My philosophy is that life is what you use to build up the memories that sustain you in your old age.

I’ll have a pic of Long Steps in the next posting on this blog, the current working drawing is a work in progress, and as with all works in progress it’s a mess and wont make a lot of sense to anyone but me.

Oh yes, it will be back to sandpaper and paintbrush on SEI next week.

Watch this space.

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