Classic Sailor No11 August-September 2016 by Dan Houston

WWW.CLASSICSAILOR.COM

AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2016 £3.95

Bargain boats And why now is the best time to buy

The Brits at Brest Our village at world’s best maritime festival THE £1500 SCOD SCHOONER CREW THE NEW SWALLOWS & AMAZONS FILM TRAILERS FOR YOUR BOAT CRUISING AN ENTERPRISE NELSON’S PICKLE

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PHOTO: BREST EVENTS

Contents

22 Editorial

Signals

Calling for a new festival of the sea Charming Contessas; Fire damage to Altricia; Round the Island sinking; ‘Not Yogaff ’ a success; Two Round Britain challenges

Around the yards

A new Thames sailing barge, and a new Riva-style launch, as well as a kayak and a Contessa

Brest is best

COVER STORY: Best time to buy

Cruising an Enterprise

Hotfoot from the greatest maritime festival in the world, we bring you the flavours, the feel, the Gaffers, the people... Prices for well-built GRP and wood yachts have never been keener, and with winter coming on, now’s the time to strike a good deal They’re really racers, but a few mods give a great dinghy cruiser

Cowes classics

Vigilance 40

Association news

Mariette 46

Classic Coast

Swallows and Amazons on screen

Smylie’s boats

Venice Lagoon Raid

HMS Pickle returns from Trafalgar

This cruising life: by canals to the Baltic

Tow and go – all you need to know

On and Off Watch

Practical: SCOD restored

Practical: the mitred joint

Calendar and Next Issue

The last word: Cheese dreams at Brest

Dragons finally make it to the Classics Enterprises, Westerlys and Aldeburgh Lapwings The Deben Bar

Clovelly Picarooner

The Post

The boat before Jolie Brise, and other matters

Andrew Bray

Food, glorious (maybe) food

Nardi’s nods COVER: PHOTO BY DAVID HARDING / SAILING SCENES.COM

The Kim Holman-designed Centurion 32

16 19 21

Sailing in the Brixham heritage Regatta Racing a 101-year-old schooner

It’s the most talked-about film this summer. We review it, and meet the people who made it Around the backwaters of the historic city by sail and oar The replica of Nelson’s ‘fast, clever schooner’ is sailing again Helen Lewis and the Skipper ‘go foreign’ for the first time Part2 of our complete guide to trailer sailing

Kit list, books, Shoreside and more gin Rescuing a ‘yard orphan’ from the flames can be a rewarding task A step-by-step guide to making one Events for the coming months and what’s in our next issue Mike Smylie’s surreal experience starts in the Kipperhouse CLASSIC SAILOR

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Editorial Dan Houston

People at Brest seem to have come from another century, some a good way back

irstly can I apologise? This is a combined issue, with August pushing into September. We didn’t start the year with that plan but as June developed our commitments to the Brest Festival became more clear and I realised there was no way with our small team to be able to attend Brest as part of the British Village and to also produce a magazine that readers might want to read. So push came up to shove and I think what we used to call a command decision was made. August was given leave and put back in the box while we packed the car, including Guy (our very own cocktail maker), and drove, via Plymouth and Roscoff plus the overnight ferry to visit France’s pre-eminent naval base for eight days in July. The first time I went to Brest was on the newly built Russian Frigate Shtandart – so named I sometimes think, because she’ll shtandart in a crowd. We had leaks and wild weather, breakages and the implacable Russian sense of how things will get done. This time the now 16-year-old Shtandart was on a quay with two other reconstructed vessels, both 18th-century and French - Etoile Du Roi and the overwhelmingly beautiful L’Hermione. Brest was hot and busy, 712,000 people in an international jamboree of street food and trad rigs – lateeners cutting the air like something out of the Nile, squaresails and heavy stacking lug rigs wherever you looked like an old masters’ painting and the quintessential gaffers, jaunty, English-looking and smart. The effect of these festivals is kind of palpable like theatre. You get used to looking at things

that just don’t occur in our modern world. Even a lot of the people seem to have come out of another century, sometimes quite a way back. Some of them look like Baldrick in the Blackadder series; tricorn hats and greasy ragged trousers but you get the feeling maybe this is how they are; they seem to have their own pewter mug and knackered spoon, as if they know that sharing cutlery might give them the plague. You don’t get many straight-on double-breasted yachtsmen but that’s the joy of being an old gaffer – the clothes, even a fishing smock and those canvas-like Curry trousers get you into this amorphous maritime club, where a love of the sea and its historical significance is simply celebrated. Thus did our English village become a part of this event of parts. And I think we acquitted ourselves well. We had the skills on show that make it possible to keep these boats afloat. The caulking, the wirework, the woodwork, the rope-making all played a worthy role. We noticed that the other countries’ villages were noticeably absent in any display like this. And we did hear that as a criticism, mainly from the French, that apart from us and the boatbuilders at Chantier Guip on the next quay that was not as much technical knowhow on show as there had been in the past. But you couldn’t imagine that anyone was too fussed about that; the boats were here and their wacky salty crews were in the bars or sculling lazily-fast across the little basins where you could just relax the gaze and be in that other century, but in summer-lit colour this time. Will we ever see a festival like that over here? In Brexit Blighty it seems as far off as possible. But I’d love to help if it happened.

Will we ever see a festival like that over here? In Brexit Blighty it seems as far off as possible. But I’d love to help if it happened CLASSIC SAILOR 5

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Signals No stuffed shirts at the Contessa 50th, vets sail around Britain, Kate and William support Ben Ainslie and goodbye to Mr Perkins GRP CLASSICS AT LYMINGTON

The Contessa still charming at 50 “We had so much fun, it was an absolutely brilliant event! To be honest I am finding it hard to come down,” was how Fiona Rogers, of the Jeremy Rogers family boatbuilding company in Lymington described the 50th anniversary of the Contessa 26, at Lymington over the 29 to 31 July. In the end 46 of the venerable glassfibre cabin cruisers turned up to enjoy festivities under stunning sunshine with a barbecue on the Friday and dinner at the Royal Lymington YC on the Saturday. And it sounded superb fun! “Everyone was saying this is how sailing should be – how can we just make this last forever!” Fiona beamed. “There were no stuffed shirts around and we did some pretend racing. They really are the greatest bunch of people.” (See Quay people photo opposite) Jeremy Rogers, on the left of our photo (left) hands the outgoing secretary of the association David Houlton a half model of his own boat Elinor made at the factory with a presentation travel case. Right: 26s on the start line.

CORNWALL

ROUND BRITAIN CHALLENGE

Altricia suffers fire damage

Turn to Starboard

A classic yacht which was a feature centrepiece of this year’s London ExCel Boat Show, has been damaged after a fire caused by arsonists. Altricia is now back at Mylor Yacht Harbour’s yard where she’d had a three year restoration prior to the show. The 50 year old McGruer 8-M Cruiser-Racer, suffered cracked windows and blistered topsides in the attack. At the Boat Show she attracted thousands of visitors with her sleek varnished

The Turn to Starboard round Britain charity crew sailed back into Falmouth on 31 July Falmouth after their epic voyage around the UK coast. The military vets have battled strong winds, rough seas and undertaken hours of complex repairs when their engine gave up on them. The team was welcomed back as the Spirit of Falmouth,

Damage to her topsides. Below: during sail trials last autumn

mahogany planking. After the show owner Peter Methven placed her in storage near his home in Gloucestershire – but police confirmed an adjacent hay-barn was set alight in an arson attack and consequently she suffered serious heat damage to her starboard side. Under Mylor’s Marine Team manager Henry Goldsmith, the 8-M will soon be sailing again.

their 92ft gaff-rigged wooden schooner crossed the finish line after her two-month 2000-mile voyage. A team of 38 veterans – many with little or no sailing experience – took part in the epic voyage; 14 completed the whole voyage with the rest doing shorter sections, along with beneficiaries of the Prince’s Trust.

The crew of mainly ex servicemen looking quite salty on Spirit’s bowsprit

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He was then given a suspended prison sentence after the schooner ran down a French 6-M, killing Jacques Bourry, a doctor at the 1995 Nioulargue event QUAY PEOPLE

SPITHEAD

AC success for Ben and the new young ruler of the waves

STEPHEN PHILP

Is it too soon for Brits to start dreaming of a return of the America’s Cup to the Solent? With Ben Ainslie’s catamaran Landrover BAR winning the two day’s racing (with six races) overall, putting them one point ahead of the Americans’ Oracle in the series so far, it has started to look like they really can do it, with the final in larger boats in Bermuda next year. Classic Sailor was lucky enough to be invited out to see the America’s Cup 45s racing in their July clash featuring teams from France, Sweden, Japan and New Zealand as well as Britain and the USA. The second day’s racing, July 24, was especially spectacular as the wind conditions proved perfect for the boats to foil. It was great to snap Kate and Prince William giving the event their support too.

HENLEY

BOAT SHOW

Thames Trad adds more See us in Southampton In its second year the ‘new’ Thames Trad – now billed as a Festival rather than a Rally – offered more, much more. An extra day, opening on Friday to make a three-day weekend of it. More stalls and exhibitors, ranging from service charities to vintage frocks. More boatbuilders. And probably more visitors, delivered by ferry from points along the river. But at the heart, thank goodness, it was the same timeless formula of picnics on the banks, to watch the processions of rivercraft. Stars of the show were, as ever classic motor yachts. The 57ft Judith R, built in 1935 for a Hollywood movie mogul, and newly relaunched after a 10-year restoration by Thames-based Woottens Boatyard, won four prizes including Best in Show. Runner-up was Chinda, the Silverleaf restored by Harbour Marine Southwold and featured in CS4. One of the most eyecatching builds was the replica of a Switzercraft Bullet, an early 1950s USA marathon racer, built by H&H Woodworks.

The Switzercraft Bullet from H&H Woodworks

Just a year since our launch and we can’t believe it has come around so quickly, but it’s soon time to pack up our things and head to the Southampton Boat Show again. Here’s our stand from last year with some giant sailors. This time we’re teaming up with Team Sailing, so come and find us for a chat in the Mayflower Hall. We’re keen to meet all our readers and hopefully some new ones. See more online.

Tom Perkins, We were saddened to hear of the death of Tom Perkins – one of America’s best known classic sailors – at the age of 84 after a prolonged unspecified illness. Tom Perkins is best known as the owner/builder of the Maltese Falcon, one of the world’s largest yachts and with a revolutionary unstayed clipper rig. The rig had been designed in Germany in the 1960s for ships in the looming oil price crisis, but was never needed until Tom developed it. Before that he was the owner of Mariette (p46) and was gaoled and then given a suspended prison sentence after the schooner ran down a French 6-M, killing Jacques Bourry, a doctor, at the 1995 Nioulargue event off St Tropez. Never to do anything by halves, Tom, a pioneer investor of Silicon Valley red-carpeted the entire boatyard of Camper & Nicholson when he relaunched Atlantide in 1999 after a refit. He sold the Falcon in 2004 and apparently went back to cat boat racing. We’ll put more of his fascinating story online.

Quay people on the quay: Contessa 26 sailors gather in Lymington for the 50th

CLASSIC SAILOR

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Signals Around the British Isles, from the Isle of Wight to the Norfolk Broads, and Fambridge to Strangford Lough NORFOLK BROADS

NOT YOGAFF

Three rivers race

Gaffers reclaim Yarmouth

The annual Navigators Three Rivers Race lived up to its billing as the UK’s most popular long distance inland yacht race at the beginning of June, reports Richard Johnstone-Bryden. Within 24 hours of leaving the start line in front of Horning SC’s clubhouse, competitors must reach – in any order they choose – a marker near Ludham Bridge on the River Ant, buoys on South Walsham Broad (just off the River Bure), up the River Thurne towards the Pleasure Boat pub on Hickling Broad, and down the Bure towards Great Yarmouth. Competitors can decide on their route in order to make the most effective use of the tide and wind direction before returning to the finish line. To participate in the race, all boats must be crewed by two or more people and be able to lower their masts to pass under the fixed bridges at Acle and Potter Heigham.

Paddles out as Ladybird prepares to pass under a bridge in the Three Rivers Race

A total of 91 sailing craft including classic Broads yachts, half deckers, dinghies, Thames A Raters and production GRP cruisers crossed the starting line for this year’s event. It was won by the Merlin Rocket Quiver on a corrected time of 9 hours 22 minutes 20, followed by the Broads yachts Zingara and Ladybird.

In recent years the Yarmouth meeting of the Solent branch of the Old Gaffers Association (OGA) has included massive shoreside entertainment, and been known as Yogaff. This year however there was no shoreside public shenanigans, just gaffers enjoying ourselves, reports Garry Flashman. Despite, or perhaps because of this the weekend attracted some 92 vessels, from Provident, a huge Brixham Trawler to little Miss Ningi. Events included the Gaffel race, introduced to us by our Dutch brethren – a test of navigation and tide/wind in which skippers can decide in which sequence to round the three marks.

Saturday saw the main event, the Gaffers Race. In previous years the race committee would set a course which brought the boats close to the pier head for the benefit of the many spectators but often to the detriment of the race itself. This year they could set the course to suit the conditions. The afternoon was dedicated to ‘Fun on the Water’ – log racing and dinghy jousting. After the frivolities musical instruments came out, shanties were sung and glasses raised. As more than one veteran commented it was much more like the Yarmouth Gaffers rally used to be, and much the better for it.

ROUND THE ISLAND

Alchemist sinks after hitting Varvassi wreck Hampshire Police Marine Unit’s vessel Commander had already taken four of the crew off before the remaining two were rescued by Mudeford RNLI’s RIB. The owner, Mark Wynter, who is the Commodore of the Island Sailing Club – the host of the race was not on board at the time and had lent her to a friend. Mr Wynter, to whom our sympathies go out, commissioned her to be built in 1978 in Cowes at the Lallows boatyard.

LESTER M c CARTHY / SEASCAPER.COM

The Dubois half tonner classic yacht Alchemist tragically sank during this year’s Round the Island Race on July 2. It is likely that she hit the sunken wreck of the SS Varvassi, a well known obstacle of the course, created when the Greek cargo steamer ran aground in 1947. Despite attempts to tow or to pump her out she quickly sank in 17m of water in Scratchells Bay east of the Needles making the possibility of salvage tricky, but not impossible.

The sequence of events as the wreck of the Alchemist unfolda. A useful transit to avoid the Varvassi is to keep the top of the Needles light below the old coastguard station behind.

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Musical instruments came out, shanties were sung... As more than one veteran put it, it was more like the Yarmouth Gaffers Rally used to be, and much the better for it QUAY PEOPLE

SKIFFIES

Strangford Welcomes Skiffie Worlds

Barney Sandeman, is a yacht broker of some renown and also owns the gorgeous 1949 S&S yawl Laughing Gull. “Can we come sailing for an anchoring feature?” we asked. It was agreed, with lunch thrown in. More next issue.

Around 40 Skiffs from all over the British Isles and North Ireland, and crews and friends from the USA, Canada, Australia, Scotland, England and the Netherlands, totalling 1000 or more converged on this beautiful area just South East of Belfast in North Ireland, for the third Skifﬁe worlds, Strangford Lough Festival on Saturday 30 July, writes Robert Ayliffe. The towns and villages in the area were festooned with sponsoring signage and related events throughout the district. The event was very professionally run, with good backing from local councils, sailing clubs and businesses. And the weather was kind, resulting in large crowds and very enthusiastic cheering as races progressed. Strangford was chosen by the Scottish Coastal Rowing Association as the host venue for this world-class rowing event. The St Ayles Skiffs concept came form Alec Jordan 7 years ago, who, with the support of the Scottish Fisheries Museum, in Anstruther, commissioned famed small boat designer, Iain Oughtred to design a modern version of the miners skiffs once ubiquitous on the Scottish eastern seaboard. The Fair Isle skiff was chosen as the starting point. Around 150 are now on the water with communities and yacht clubs seeing the beauty of building a simple boat that can be enjoyed by young and old and with some great competitions. Building two is even better. You meet all the best people at Beale Park, like Likely Lads star Rodney Bewes, aboard his river cruiser Cera. Rodney said he was going to the Edinburgh festival in August and at 79 expects he will be the oldest actor there.

SAIL4MACMILLAN

£6K challenge After 8 weeks, 2000 nautical miles, 32 different ports, one dolphin escort and various technical problems, the two Round Britain boats from First Class Sailing completed their challenge arriving back at Fambridge Yacht Haven, Essex, on Saturday 25 June. The boats left the marina on the River Crouch in early May sailing anti-clockwise around the UK while raising nearly £6,000 for Macmillan Cancer Support. After entering the Crouch, the team were escorted across the finish line by family and friends. Orchestrated by Colin Stracey, Principal of First Class Sailing East Coast, the challenge has been several

First Class Sailing’s round-Britain boats return to Fambridge. Note the Classic Sailor decal. Thanks First Class!!

years in the making. Colin explains “This fundraiser was to thank Macmillan nurses who had offered support when my son James was rushed into hospital with stomach pains in late 2013 only to discover that it was bowel cancer. James had surgery and chemotherapy and thanks to the wonderful medical staff and superb care and support by Macmillan, he has made a full recovery”.

While circumnavigating the UK, the boats stopped at each of Yacht Havens coastal UK marinas. At Plymouth Yacht Haven, the sailors were given a surprise when they were welcomed by the entire Yacht Havens Group management team. Managing Director Dylan Kalis said “We’ve been tracking the boats every step of the way and it has been wonderful to hear their stories.”

We had an invitation to a medal giving ceremony at the Brest festival aboard the magnificent 18th century replica sailing frigate Hermione where Captain Yann Carriou was awarded the National Order of Merit for his work with the vessel.

CLASSIC SAILOR

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Signals: Around the yards A new Thames Barge is launched in Cornwall, and a Riva-style super launch is unveiled in Cambridge POLRUAN CORNWALL

Thames barge Blue Mermaid launched A moment of historic maritime significance took place at C. Toms & Son Ltd, Polruan, Fowey, at the end of May, writes Nick Ardley. A full-sized Thames spritsail barge was launched. Named Blue Mermaid, she is a reincarnation of her namesake, which was mined in July 1941 during the second world war off the Essex coast. The vessel has been constructed using original 1929 blueprints. The original was launched in 1930 when barges were sailing towards their twilight. The new vessel, built for the Sea-Change Sailing Trust, will carry freight as well as people, working as a common entity under sail alone. The Trust wanted to build in Essex, but options were limited. A Polish yard was interested and Holland had a price! The Sea-Change Sailing Trust works with young people with a range of social, educational

and special needs, their approach, “concentrates on high quality personal support and training with ongoing mentoring, entrenching the development of small groups of students for the long term rather than limiting the experience to time spent aboard.” After the launch, Chair of Trustees, Hilary Hilajko, said, “This is the future. We found carrying cargo, even a token one, generated a change in client attitude. It gave meaning. The impact of getting somewhere in a positive way produced a sea-change.” Richard Titchener, Trust Executive Officer said: “When I visited the yard with Jim Dines (Heritage Marine) to discuss Toms’ tender, Allen Toms said, ‘I was expecting two suits...’ he connected Essex with London. I’d come off a barge. I quickly realised this family firm was

Celebrations as Blue Mermaid’s hull slips into the river at Polruan

committed to their product.” The ‘no nonsense’ approach saved a percentage. About the need for a new barge, Richard said, “it’s a no brainer really, we’re not here to preserve. That’s not our mission. She’s a means to achieve our aims.” He added: “Topsail Charters have served well and will continue, but we’ll have flexibility: we can use two hulls.”

CHESAPEAKE BAY

WIVENHOE

The Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum is hosting a nine-day workshop to teach the basics of building a skin-on-frame kayak and Greenland paddle from Saturday, 24 September, to Sunday, 2 October with all participants taking home the kayak and paddle they built with the help of skilled craftspeople. Participants will work under the direction of Kiliii Yuyan of Seawolf Kayaks, with the final day of the workshop including a group paddle along the Miles River. “At just 28 pounds,these kayaks are extremely light weight and durable,” said

Another Brightlingsea One Design is to be restored to join the ever expanding fleet. Wivenhoe based Boatbuilder Rob Maloney who has restored several other BODs in recent years has brought C23 Shadow to restore for himself. She was built in 1952 by James & Stone in Brightlingsea. “She is in fairly good shape compared to previous ones I’ve restored,” he says. There are a couple of new planks required and a few to repair. Some new ribs will be steamed in and floors will be fitted, along with a new centreplate case. Most of the

Brightlingsea OD restoration

Build a skin-on-frame kayak

CBMM Boatyard Program Manager Jenn Kuhn. “The framing will be locally sourced Atlantic white cedar, with the skin of ballistic nylon.”

A set of blueprints was digitally enhanced by Paul Spooner Design. Welded rather than riveted construction was used, with minor additional stiffening in the run aft, a known wooden barge weakness. Toms had to gain class accreditation to build having previously only worked with fisheries authority vessels.

Make your own kayak

BOD Shadow to be restored

deck frame is intact apart from a couple of split beams that will be replaced. She will have a new rig made and a new suit of sails. Rob is aiming to get her finished ready to launch for the 2017 season for the class’s 90th year.

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“This is the future, we found carrying a cargo, even a token one, generated a change in client attitude. It produced a sea-change” QUAY PEOPLE

CAMBRIDGE

Riva style launch This ‘Super Launch’ from Tom Neale’s Cambridge-based Fine Wooden Boats is expected to turn heads wherever she goes. His press release declares “Handcrafted in Great Britain, every stunning line exudes style, every beautiful chromed fitting radiates luxury, the sheen of the new pearlescent paint, protected by 25 coats of varnish speaks quality.” Tom Neale, specialist in restoring Rivas on Lake Como in Italy had once brought his restored 1964 Riva Ariston Lady Lina to the 2014 London Boat Show. The new Super Launch features a beautifully-planked hull in Iroko with copper fastenings and t decks in Teak and Mahogany. Fittings have been handmade in

Hilary Halajko is chairman of the Sea-Change Sailing Trust which has built the new Thames Sailing Barge Blue Mermaid’s hull (see opposite). The barge was towed from Cornwall around to SeaChange’s base at Maldon at the end of June and will now be fitted out for her role which includes taking freight under sail whilst also acting as a training vessel for four trainees; she will not have an engine.

brass, then chromed for resilience and style. It is fitted with Riva intakes, Italian leather benches that seat five in comfort, and boasts a handmade steering wheel in the style of a vintage Bentley. Tom Neale carefully selected the best seasoned timber and made fittings to suit, at his Marina workshop in Cambridgeshire. 24-ct gold leaf on the port and starboard

internal cover boards was supplied by Wrights of Lymm – the people who supplied gold leaf for Her Majesty the Queen’s Jubilee barge. The engine is a Beta Marine 35 hp Marine Diesel in special exhibition black finish, accessible from a large hatch with lighting. The price of the Category D Super Launch is likely to be in the region of £300,000+.

Cockpit of the new Super Launch from Tom Neale

LYMINGTON

Contessa 32 in build – lid’s back on

We have been following this Contessa 32 new build at Jeremy Rogers’ yard in Lymington where they build new yachts and refurbish older ones, including wooden boats as well as the Contessa 26, see page 6. She is being built for a Norwegian customer and the work has started on her interior. This is her deck being placed on her topsides to check for the fit. The team will next begin laying the strips of her teak deck while work on her systems continues. The build process takes nearly a year to complete.

Allen Toms sails a Troy class dayboat at Fowey near Polruan where he runs the C Toms & Son shipyard which has just completed the Blue Mermaid hull (opposite). Discussing the project he said: ‘This is something special. At the beginning we went up to Maldon and were astounded. Barges are a way of life. It was unbelievable. I want to see her sailing, man and boy...” The steel was rolled in Holland with compound curves. “She was like a jigsaw puzzle... a few plates needed wedging,” said Toms. “But we’d like to build another. The next one would be cheaper too...” CLASSIC SAILOR 11

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Signals: Cowes Classics There’s always something new at Cowes Classics Week: this year it was – at last – the arrival of an entry by vintage Dragons COWES CLASSICS WEEK

JAKE SUGDEN

Vintage Dragons put more class in Classics The whole ‘thing’ about Cowes Classic Week, is that it is a bit of a jolly. It is just a shame that the weather was not playing ball and entering into the spirit of the occasion this year, introducing a touch of autumn in the height of summer for the start of the week. For the uninitiated the Charles Stanley sponsored week has over the last nine years become a must-do event for those who feel squeezed out of Cowes Week and who appreciate classic pretty lines, lashings of varnish and tea and cake provided for the competitors at the Royal London Yacht Club. Although the event played host to the World Championships of the Tempest class, mainly travelling from Europe to race for top honours, the rest of the fleets were the classic keelboats classes from around the Solent like the 50- strong XOD, the Bembridge One Design, Solent Sunbeams, Daring and from further afield, like the pretty Loch Longs – from Aldeburgh of course. Alongside these raced the Metre Class keelboats of the magnificent 6s and 8s. While outside the keelboats the Old Gaffers put in a good show, and the classic cruiser racers of the 60s and 70s from the Swans to the Folkboats and their GRP derivatives. And to keep up appearances, two iconic yachts were floating about: Mariquita, the beautiful 38m (125ft) 1911 Fife design, and Opposition, built in 1971 for the then Prime Minister Edward Heath as his second Morning Cloud which went on to win the Admiral’s Cup. If it is the Corinthian spirit that embodies Cowes Classic

Week, maybe nowhere was it more apparent than with four Vintage Dragons that competed in the Yellow fleet. The Dragon class is obviously a pure classic. As the winning design for the Royal Gothenburg Yacht Club in 1927, they were originally intended to encourage young yachtsmen with a less expensive option than the Metre yachts, ideal for racing, complete with Spartan accommodation for hardy Scandinavian types. The accommodation went by the board when it was chosen as an Olympic class in 1948, and it was given a further boost in popularity in the UK when the Island Sailing Club gave Bluebottle as a Coronation gift to the Queen and Prince Phillip – the national championships is called the Edinburgh Cup in his honour. Galvanised by Col Tim Street, who is responsible for the strength of the 6-Metre class in the UK, the four Dragons that lined up for their Yellow Fleet start included a 1960 Morgan Giles-built museum piece, an ex-Olympic boat, a farmyard revival, and 1938 K49 Aurora, the oldest competitor from the UK fleet. On Monday - supposedly the first day of racing, Mistress, the museum piece that had once sat in the Newport Classic Boat Museum, was at the back of the queue to be launched, after a mix up over emails. Fresh from two years sitting in the garden, while long-time Dragon sailor Bill Daniels had an affair with a newer plastic Dragon, Mistress was rigged and prepared after the Monday race briefing in time for midnight.

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For those who appreciate classic lines, lashings of varnish and tea and cake provided for the competitors at the Royal London Yacht Club Left: Solent Sunbeams cut a dash in a fleet start. Middle left: our Dragons Wanderer, Mistress and Tschuss in line at Cowes; other photos: diverse boats are welcome at Cowes Classics although fleet racing of classes makes for most of the boats which attend. The 8-M Helen is bottom left

Meanwhile Mark Downie, who had travelled up from Salcombe with HKG6 Wanderer was shouting “Dragon! Dragon!” so that he could borrow a mainsail. Fortunately, by Tuesday they had discovered that the main had been packed in a genoa sail bag, so there was no need to confuse the committee boats with two boats with 363 sail numbers. Originally an Olympic competitor, Wanderer had been shipped out to Hong Kong to race in the keen fleet at the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club. Mark had bought her off a friend’s widow and shipped her to Salcombe, where he has just cruised her for the last 10 years. Meanwhile at the RYS pontoons outside Castle 1, Rupert Street was putting the finishing touches to the Dragon that had started this little vintage revival - Tschuss. With his beloved 6-Metres getting a bit much for him in his advancing years, Tim started looking around for something a little less demanding. Dragons were a natural choice as he had been successful in racing them in Cowes back in the 1970s, and so he started casting around for a suitable vintage Dragon. In the past the classic Dragon fleet had suffered from people buying an old wooden boat, and then stripping it out and putting on Petticrow systems, that put a large price tag on the conversion. The presence of winches is a talisman of the Vintage approach. Despite poor interest in recent years from wooden Dragons in regattas, the Commodore of the Royal London YC and organising Cowes Classics offered an invitation to wooden Dragons. Armed with this, Tim contacted everyone he could who owned a classic Dragon. A lot of enthusiasm was then tempered by the reality of the condition of many of the boats;

in the end there were six who confirmed they would be able to compete, and four who jumped the last hurdle to enter. Having compiled a list of possible candidates, Tim was told about one in the New Forest. “My eldest son found it on Google Earth, and then we went and had a look at it. What we found was a very beautiful Dragon in a very poor state. On 19 January I bought it and put it into the Elephant Yard, and it only got into the water last Thursday, and Rupert had Friday, Saturday and Sunday to put it together,” he said. Armed with second-hand sails and mast, and with a crew including his girlfriend who had never raced, and his 16-year-old son Louis who had never seen a Dragon before, Rupert managed to peg up a win on the day they first flew a spinnaker. For Bill Daniels, and his pink-decked Mistress the opportunity to race again was a welcome one. Built in 1960 by Morgan Giles, she was the last Dragon to come from the yard, and is quite unusual, with very narrow 10mm planking. He was keen to do well in the racing, and had managed to persuade his former neighbour, and last year’s winner of the Edinburgh Cup, Julia Bailey to do two days in the middle of the boat. She liked it so much, she cancelled the golf she had committed to, and raced the rest of the week, to secure the first of the Vintage Dragons, and second for the Yellow Fleet. But the esprit of the Vintage Dragons is in the willingness to go out and enjoy sailing the boats in a competitive environment. Dr Adrian Green, with the oldest competing Dragon Aurora that he and his brother inherited from his father, was only too pleased to have a focus to get him out on the water. Hopefully with more wooden stalwarts next year Dragons will get their own start CLASSIC SAILOR 13

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Signals: Association news Showcasing clubs and classes around the country – send us your stories

Enterprise: 60-year love affair with the people’s boat continues... It made front page news in January 1956: “Family Dinghies Cross the Channel. The News Chronicle Boat Makes Its Debut.” One of the crew was the designer of this new dinghy, Jack Holt, and the boat was called the Enterprise. It was to be the start of a love affair with this little boat with blue sails which continues to this day (see also p38). Sponsored by the News Chronicle newspaper, which wanted to encourage the public to get sailing, the new class of boat was not

only cheap, but also easy to own and use. The Enterprise was the result and with its distinctive light blue sails, and relentless promotion from the newspaper achieved immediate success. Over 250 sail numbers were issued in the first ten months, making it the fastest-growing dinghy class in Britain. Sixty years on, and the Enterprise class remains as popular as ever, with over 23,000 registered boats. Anniversary events have included two events on the

Enterprises pass under Putney railway bridge during the 60th anniversary Thames Tideway Race

tidal Thames. The Tideway Race saw 32 Enterprises sailing past the birthplace of the class, starting from Barnes, past the original Jack Holt workshop on the river frontage at Putney and up to Chelsea with the tide, then, once the tide had turned back to the starting line opposite Fulham Football Club. Further down river, the Commons vs Lords race was revived opposite the Houses of Parliament. In the early days of the Enterprise, it was Joseph (Jo) Grimond, leader of the

Liberal Party and a director of News Chronicle who hosted a dinner for the class at the Houses of Parliament. Sixty years later, MPs and Lords competed in a race to mark the relaunch of the House of Commons Sailing Club and the Enterprise’s diamond anniversary. The day ended with a prize giving on the Terrace at the Houses of Parliament where the House of Commons was awarded with the coveted trophy, with plans already afoot for next year’s race.

Aldeburgh Lapwings

Westerlys mark 50th Jubilee

The Lapwings are a class of pretty 12ft 6in varnished clinker dinghies unique to the Aldeburgh Yacht Club. Designed about 70 years ago by Morgan Giles, and raced on the River Alde they are a great introduction to sailing for young people. But, “they became terribly unfashionable until about three years ago,” explains Emma Close-Brooks, organiser of the second annual Junior Lapwing weekend this July. She credits the revival to the joint class captains Fiona Lewington and Lucy Vinten Mattich. Both adults and children sail Lapwings – grown-ups with full-size white sails, Juniors with cut-down red ones. The fun weekend “aims to get lots and lots of children into Lapwings – it’s much more about having a go than racing,” says Lucy. The weekend also saw the launch of the first new Lapwing in many years – Peewit is built of mahogany ply – the originals were solid mahogany or spruce planks – but she incorporates some fabric from an older boat, including the transom. PW

When the Westerly company was first set up in the 1960s, only the first few had been prised out of their moulds when a timely London Boat Show suddenly produced orders for more than 30 of the newly affordable GRP yachts. Ultra compact they may have been by today’s standards, but they were the fore-runners of a long line of successful boats whose design and durability produced a mammoth fleet of more than 12,000. The Westerly 22, with triple keels, four berths in an openplan hull plus chart table, hob, sink, and even a Lloyds production certificate was discovered by a growing army of would-be leisure sailors who wanted nothing more than to buy an accessible small boat, hoist sail and put to sea. Along with the Nomad from which the 22 evolved, these

Westerly 22 – over 600 sold

tiny craft sold in big numbers – more than 600 came off the production line. The most successful Westerly was the muchloved Centaur, 26ft long and another bilge keeler, available new between 1969-80 and in that time sold an astonishing 2,444 boats – by far the best selling British yacht ever. With Laurent Giles design, a generous specification,

safe cockpit and even good headroom below, she was a winner from the start. The company closed in 2000, but its boats are still in demand. This summer the Westerly Owners’ Association is celebrating its 50th Jubilee year with events in Portsmouth as well as on the Isle of Man, the Essex coast, Channel Islands and elsewhere. John Ruskin

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Smylie’s boats

Classic ClassicCoast Coast

Itchen Ferries Clovelly Picarooner

PETER WILLIS

The Deben Bar and Felixstowe Ferry

A shape-shifting hump of shingle, the Deben Bar lurks at the mouth of the river, demanding rebuoying of the channel around it every year (at least) and discouraging the more nervous yachtsman from entering the By the time youit’s read this,to thethank very Deben. Thus, partly realthe possibility of this imposing for fact that hugely structure tumbling intomore the sea attractive river is not may have beenthan averted, least for overcrowded it is.atTh at and another winter.toUnusually severeto the necessity time passages south-easterly storms have and from Woodbridge to pushed juggle coastal erosion the Suff olk coast’s passing the baron(above half-tide Orfordin, Ness within few feet out) going onto the flooda coming of thecoverage lighthouse’ foundations, with ofs the sill at the and members of theMore Orfordness Tide Mill marina. details on Lighthouse Trust have been working debenestuarypilot.co.uk. flatTh out to installcoast ‘soft defences’ – e adjacent is well worth of (you shingle wrapped abags look may be ableintosausages pick of high-performance geo-textile up a buoy off Bawdsey). On the bonding – to keepwest the sea at bay more populated side, with(see its orfordnesslighthouse.co.uk). two Martello Towers, Felixstowe The all 98ftclapboard lighthouseshacks, was built Ferry, fishing in 1792and andgeneral decommissioned boats maritime by Trinity House in 2013, viewpub of picturesqueness, has aingood the threat encroaching (the Ferryfrom Boat), two cafés,sea. a Itshmonger, has alreadyasurvived an attempt fi sailing club and nice by the National inland walks. Trust, which owns theTh Ness, impose a policy of ere’stoalso an actual ferry ‘controlled (ie let it fall across the ruination’ river to Bawdesy (or down). to and from your boat if you’re The Lighthouse Trust aims toBawdsey keep it standing, open Manor, asand seen fromtothe visitors, ‘for as longside as possible’ . Felixstowe Ferry of the Deben Visiting, on open days only, involves a short ferry trip and a 40-minute walk, each way, across the Ness. Dates for 2016 are still to be announced, and are dependent on the continuing stability and safety of the structure and its surrounds.

moored there), with another café, and some shoreside walks. Bawdsey Manor is actually best viewed from the far side of the river. This elaborate Victorian pile, now a boarding school, was built in 1886 by Sir Cuthbert Quilter Orford Ness itself is a classic example of an ever-changing coastline. The long, shifting spit of land that separates the River Ore from the sea is quite capable of closing the river’s mouth and forcing a breakthrough higher up, where the river’s alternative name is the Alde. It’s mecca for connoisseurs of bleak, exposed seascapes (and WWII military detritus on Havergate Island). Access, by boat, is carefully restricted by the National Trust. A good everyday alternative on the nearby mainland is the equally bleak stony beach known as Shingle Street. Orford village has three pubs, who established a steam-powered including thethe Jollyriver Sailor ferry across in down 1894 by the harbour; excellent fish which ran untilan 1931. restaurant, During, the andButley prior Orford to, World Oysterage, and theRSAF fine Pump Street War II it became Bawdsey, Willis abakery. radar Peter research station. Both the manor and the transmitter block have some open days.

Orfordness Lighthouse

The spiral staircase at Orfordness Lighthouse may still be climbed by visitors

owned an he Itchen Ferry once andof have memories of her beached picarooner is one thefond surviving sail and oar fishing alongside the oldthat Supermarine at Woolston, across the river boats still workshed the waters close to the shore. Having of Itchen she was calleddrift though was and no from Southampton. said that, Pal there’s only one working netsshe today pal of the new they were at the time. – me and the my that bridge picarooner is, inbuilding fact, a replica builtWe only within Pal that is – were the first crash into oneamongst of the support pillars. last decade. Atones 15ft,toshe’s probably the smallest This was mostly downbut to two facts: that the sailswith didn’ther really fit the ever built, is nonetheless pretty delicate boat and the Stuart-Turner engine startedlook. throughout my time wineglass transom and never traditional with the boat. It was, experience ‘why not to buy . The picarooner gets though, its namea great from learning the Spanish for ‘seaon robber’ or ‘pirate’ aOne boat’ . I oftthat en wonder whatthe happened story they were washedtoupher. tenders from the wrecked boats Wonder was,Armada in fact, a–1588 fine example of an–Itchen Built by the given great of the Spanish remember seemsFerry. highly unlikely, haslate been lovingly restored Dan Hatcher in 1860, the picarooners didn’tWonder, appear SU120, until the nineteenth century.and No,sails I from Faversham. I remember seeing her a few years back during the Swale prefer the one about these being Barge Match. lighter boats.Daniel G Hatcher, known as King Dan to his contemporaries, wasYou a very builder of yachts at his Belvedere yard between 1845 see,successful Clovelly has a drying and 1880dating and thus his many working boats were equally renowned for their speed. harbour back was necessarily Not that Wonder centuries, and herring fishing his fastest, but speedy she was. e rootsgreatly (and name) hasTh figured since time of these craft came immemorial whenfrom the shoals the small village of in come intofishing the bay to spawn Itchen Ferry lying the herring late autumn. The on earlier river Itchen in the eighteenth boats were heavy, awkward boats century. Small sprit-rigged and some enterprising fishers saw clinker-boats off thesmaller, the advantageworked of building beach, fiboats shingwhich out as far as them lighter enabled theget Isleout of Wight. Their size to to sea sooner as they grew asbodily they trawled could lift the further boats into the away from theirthe base. water whereas heavy boats had Consequently they adopted to wait. As is always the case, he the gaff rigout as many working who gets first, gets the biggest fellowsand did.itTh e boats prize was oftenwere the case that, three-quarter decked withjust a off the with the fishing literally small cuddy with berths, would be home with the catch before the harbour wall, thetwo picarooners a cupboard andboats coal stove older herring even to set out. “Bloody pirates,” the old timers would while away theyou, hours when shout, “avast you sea robbers,” as the picarooner fishers returned with not fishing. Gaff-rigged their fine catches of the silver darlings. with a long-boom over the of the power of the herring fishing. Of course it Yes, all highly evocative stern and two headsails, wasn’t always like that, and many a boat capsized, sometimes claiming the someof were long as 30ft inin Clovelly was at the very heart of village life lives theaslocals. Fishing length. Much thealmost catch on a cliff overlooking the sea, there’s little other for, when youoflive was shrimps oysters place to turnand to to makeand a buck. they raced homethe to land. Nevertheless picarooner, with its single dipping lug and tiny mizzen In 1872, according to the fishing registers, there second-class standing lug, was a successful fishing boat. At onewere time570 there were said boats working the Solent another 61 inonly Poole where the boats were to be 70 such craft in theand harbour. Today one traditional herring similar. TheStephen design was widespread Waterthese and the fisherman, Perham, whosearound familySouthampton have been fishing waters Solent– some being to as Hythe fishing Little Lily and for generations, usesreferred the ‘new’ picarooner. Thiscutters. one is Other called well-known builders Alfred Payne Fay, both of Northam, whose was builtwere by students at theand Falmouth Marine Schooland andLukes, launched in 2008. beforefor hethe moved Hamble. yard was about the same spot as I keptasPal Stephen regards ‘his’ picarooner perfect job to even if she They were mostly worked by fiClovelly shermenEstate who crewed for the yacht-racing fraternity actually belongs to the Company. “She’s a solid platform during andfor thenets fishermen raced their own to fish,the hasregatta plentyseason, of room and fishtoo and, ” heaboard adds, “is easy tocraft row..” Freda CS110, Black Bessdownstream, , CS32, been survivors: He Itchen shouldFerries know have as I’ve seen him scull her, from half a mile Nellie, SU71, but see www.itchenferry.org for more engine against the current, loaded with a TV crew and fiassh.they Theadapted way hetofishes power quite well and others lurk in and, way-out places. One I’ll ask them if the herring is almost carbon free as such, has to day be one of the most of Itchen anyone knows whatever happened to my sustainable fisheries in the country. So, Pal whilst many. other fishers can be regarded as ‘pirates’, times have changed and his little picarooner is now no more a ‘sea robber’ than you or me.

The earlier roots (and name) theseheavy, craftawkward came The herring boatsofwere from and the small village of Itchen boats some enterprising ﬁshersFerry, saw thelying on the river insmaller, the eighteenth century. advantage ofItchen building lighter boats CLASSIC SAILOR 15 17 CLASSIC

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The Post Email or post letters and replies to the editor – see opposite; we’ll make sure responses to queries are forwarded on. Book on iron?

showers to weary mariners. Keep up the good work, Ian Fraser Cheshire and Baltimore.

I am interested to know if there is a book in English or another language that is about ironwork for boats and marine applications. There are many traditional designs and patterns for ironwork, from cranze irons to spider bands and keel bolts, or items of rigging and sails etc and I wonder if anyone has gathered these together with the designs, methods of construction and dimensions into one volume. Thierry Colombier, Forgeron (blacksmith) Cassel, France

Mark on the prow

Book on Mylne

I am in the process of writing a book on Alfred Mylne, trying to capture the essence of the man whose work I have been studying for the last 10 years. We have much factual information in the form of be reduced by art. As a bit letters, books and designs, of Classic Coast St Ives will calculations, drawings etc. attract crowds of visitors, We have also tracked down drawn by golden sands and around 200 Mylne yachts luggers, alleyways and cafés; around the world. What thanks to its artists, who we need to capture are the simplify the busy scene, the anecdotes and personal stories town “just manages to rise that bring his character, and above the status of tourist those around him to life. If honeypot… Its true heart you, or any of your readers has to be Barbara Hepworth’s have knowledge of first hand studio and garden”. accounts, perhaps from aged A third and more direct relatives (and they will have answer to Bray’s question to be 90+ to remember an refers to the idea or plan of old man) I would love to hear doing one thing at a time. Guy more. Venables sketches a single Best regards mariner on a raft with just one David Gray C.Eng MRINA paddle and a bath towel rigged SNAME MYDSA as a squaresail. Director Never having seen this Mylne Yacht Design raftsman in British waters, I cannot believe Venables drew The simple Sailor from life but suppose his The July issue suggests three mental image to have been answers to Andrew Bray’s key gleaned from Kon Tiki or question, ‘How do you define Robinson Crusoe or Admiral simple?’ Lord Cochrane’s account of Simplicity is an idea that learning to sail on the Forth may be expressed in terms of around Culross. Here is the hope such as your editorial, genius of Peter Simple, a classic book for boys written “looking forward to nights by Cochrane’s disciple and under canvas at Beale Park”. understudy, Captain Fred Moreover, the opposite of Marryat RN. simplicity, complexity, may

My purpose in this letter is simple enough. We have had for hundreds of years a passion for water sports. During the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century that passion was fed by books addressed to schoolchildren, and by seaside resorts or sailing clubs. The literature was realistic and informative; some of it, from Marryat to Ransome, of very high quality, matching Izaak Walton’s Compleat Angler. I am trying to define the tradition to which Classic Sailor belongs. Yours sincerely, TPMH, Coventry

Jolie Brise Cafe

Good to hear about the new pub named after the eponymous Jolie Brise. It’s not the first though - a restaurant/cafe of the same name has been offering welcome succour to sailors in Baltimore, West Cork for nearly thirty years. What’s more it sits next to the perfect pub, Bushes, that offers hot

Trevor Turpin’s restored motor launch with its Austin Seven engine. But what is the significance of the logo on the prow: WB, with the letters separated by an arrow?

Do we have less than four years to find a new title for the Brest Festival?

I wonder if your knowledgeable readers might be able to help me? I am having restored (by Richard Welch of Christian Malford) a clinker-built 15ft motor launch. (I have had my Austin Seven for 49 years and living by a canal and a river thought I should have a boat and it should be powered by a marinised Austin Seven engine. Well, after about 10 enjoyable years we’re almost there – see photo…) However, what’s always puzzled me is the mark on the brass prow of the boat. As you can see it is WB with an arrow reminiscent of War Department signs. The boat (I think) spent many years around Poole and/or Weymouth and was originally a dinghy but was motorised when I bought her with a Stuart Turner. I’ve tried the Imperial War Museum and the National Maritime Museum but no luck. Any ideas? (The boat is now called Herbert – after Herbert Austin of course!) More details can be provided if needed but this is the only distinguishing feature – a boatyard/builder name perhaps? Trevor Turpin, Avoncliff, Wiltshire

Titty or Brest

Now that the producer of Swallows and Amazons has realised the need to rename Titty as Tatty, does this mean we have less than four years to come up with a new title for the Brest festival? And what title might we choose? Best wishes, Chris Beeson (the other one) via email

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Letter of the month Jolie Brise, Griffin II... and the Commander

I was interested to read your short article ‘Jolie Brise... the pub’ in your July issue. It is so good to hear that this venerable old pilot cutter is still going strong in the ownership of Dauntsey’s School. How and why Dauntsey’s came to sail, care for and eventually own Jolie Brise goes back a long way, back to 1970, back to Bill Parish, a master at the school and a keen sailor. With the encouragement of a group of boys Bill started a sailing club and advertised in the local press for some kind owner of a large yacht who would allow the school to sail her in exchange for working on her during the winter. One owner did respond with a postcard instructing Bill to report to the Royal Dorset Yacht Club. That owner was Commander Newcombe Hoare, retired naval office and my uncle. So from 1970 until 1976 Dauntsey’s pupils sailed the Commander’s yacht Griffin II, a Class 1 ocean racer, and did sterling work on her during the winter. In 1976, disaster struck – Griffin dragged her moorings in Portland Harbour during a particularly severe gale, was

Bound from South Australia

Hi Dan, I’ve been a reader of most classic magazines and I’m hoping this new mag of yours is closer to the ideal that classic boats don’t have to be in concourse condition to be appreciated. I live at the bottom of Australia, in Goolwa, South Australia. We have a thriving classic boat scene with 18 timber yachts regularly racing in our river, fresh water,1-3m deep, and a large group of some 250 classic river cruisers,

classicsailor.com

✉

7 Haslar Marina, Gosport, Hants. PO12 1NU Commander Newcombe Hoare

admin@classicsailor.com Editor Dan Houston dan@classicsailor.com +44 (0)7747 612614 Art Editor Stephen Philp Sub Editor Peter Willis peter@classicsailor.com Contributing editor Guy Venables guy@classicsailor.com

driven onto the breakwater and sank. She was raised but was certified a total loss. Once again Bill and his well established and keen sailing club members were boatless. With the Commander (and the insurance payout) they sought a replacement and in 1977 Jolie Brise came on the scene via a long-term lease with her then owners, the Exeter Maritime Museum and the ISCA. Sadly the Commander never got to sail Jolie Brise – soon after she was acquired he died of cancer. The Commander was a great character, a people person and from Halversons to retired work boats , all in going condition, some better than the day they were launched, others kept afloat by the owners and their mates doing patch-ups and bodge jobs. I myself own two classic yachts, both I restored with my crew and staff in-house in our workshops. My business started out doing yacht rigging and stainless-steel work but sort of drifted into wooden boat repairs and renovation – careful choice of words there, most of our customers can’t

a doer – I am sure he would be very proud that his postcard to Bill Parish in 1970 was the beginning of a unique sailing journey for Dauntsey’s and Jolie Brise. Chris Hoare

Write for some fizz Each month our letter of the month will be sent a bottle of de Bleuchamp Champagne

afford a full blown resto. So we brace them up, paint them, sort out the rigs and send them on their way. So I’ll be in Brest, currently staying in Venice, and hope to check out the Classic Sailor stand and buy the copies I don’t have. Randal Cooper, Goolwa, S Australia PS good to see you have Guy Venerables (sic) on board. Ever since his article on gin, my wife and friends have found a new passion in life.

Columnists Andrew Bray, Federico Nardi Clubs and events liaison Oliver Houston oliver@classicsailor.com Advertising Catherine Jackson catherine@classicsailor.com +44 (0)7495 404461 Ian Welsh ian@classicsailor.com +44 (0)7711 069544 Admin Evie Farrelly evie@classicsailor.com Publishing director John Clarke Chairman David Walker Classic Sailor Ltd Published monthly: ISSN 2059-0423 Subscriptions See our latest deal at classicsailor.com or call: + 44(0)1273 420730

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Andrew Bray If you read any logs of ocean crossings, you’ll notice that after a few days, one subject begins to dominate: food

“After a while it becomes difficult to distinguish between boeuf bourguinon and chicken supreme”

for a good appetite and almost anything is greeted with enthusiasm and discussions about what to eat “when we get there” can last long into the evening. I once sailed a ten-day passage (singlehanded, luckily) surviving on little more than fresh onions and pease pudding. Variety is the key to success. Once the fresh food has run out foil packed meals and the like become very bland after a while and it becomes difficult to distinguish between boeuf bourguinon and chicken supreme. The palate demands something tart and different. Nothing beats a freshly caught fish and grilled dorado steaks are

a meal supreme, only bettered by yellowfin tuna. Most boats will still sail with a selection of tinned food as back-up. The rules for stowing tins are simple: take off the paper wrappers and write the contents on the can with an indelible pen. One friend stocked his boats with Army Compo rations, where everything from medical supplies to food is packed in tins. He stowed them in the bilge and the paper wrapping dissolved. He heated up two cans, one, he thought, was steamed pudding and the other custard. The result, hot surgical bandage in custard was, he said, too much even for a hungry solo sailor.

GUY VENABLES

o her credit the girl at the supermarket checkout barely batted an eyelid when I unloaded my trolley. In fact I doubt whether she would have been at all fazed even if I did tell her that the six Fray Bentos tins of steak and kidney pie, half a dozen cans of mince and a similar number of stewing steak, not to mention assorted tins of vegetables were to be basic stores for a trans-Atlantic crossing in a small sailing boat. This was over 25 years ago and while Fray Bentos might not top the menu for an ocean passage today, the basic principles of provisioning remain the same. Early ocean crossers took with them livestock, chicken, goats and sheep to be butchered as and when needed along with salt pork and hardtack or ship’s biscuits. Tinned food changed all of that, although for the crew of Franklin’s Arctic expedition ships it may have proved fatal with the cans’ high lead content. Tins today are in fact steel and are highly effective in preserving food. With changing preservation methods came much more palatable foil-packed foods in the 70s and 80s which in turn improved the diet of the long-distance sailor. You’ll notice that I haven’t mentioned fridges and freezers yet, with good reason. Large yachts with dedicated generators can have large freezers fitted and filled so that their crew can enjoy their cordon bleu cuisine as they cruise the world’s oceans. Smaller boats might run to a fridge and a freezer that might just produce ice for the happy hour g&t but little else. Not only that, they will take longer for their crossing so will need more food and be less reliant on chilling and freezing. Modern provisioning is as much an art as a science. The El Corte Ingles supermarket in Las Palmas has shopping trolley jams in the week before the start of the ARC each year, with each crew outdoing the next in the volume and variety of food. On the quayside hands and arms are purple with potassium permanganate as fruits and fresh vegetables are washed, nets are strung under deckheads, bottles and flagons of water are stored all over the vessel, eggs are greased and all kinds of preserved and fresh meats are stowed. If you read any accounts and logs of ocean crossings you’ll notice that after a few days one subject begins to dominate: food. Meals become the punctuation marks of the days, overriding any records of weather or navigation. It becomes an obsession, with each day’s cook trying to outdo the others and hiding his or her culinary surprises until the last minute. “And today,” announces the chef of the day, “it’s chicken bits supreme, garnished with mushy peas and served up with a soupçon of flying fish.” Sea air makes

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Nardi’s Nods

by Federico Nardi of Cantiere Navale dell’Argentario

Centurion 32 A Kim Holman design that instils trust right from the start, with harmonious lines and excellent upwind performance

f there’s a boat that instils trust right from the start, that’s the Centurion 32. The polyester laminate hull is 24mm thick below the water, 15mm at the waterline and 11mm above the water. The overall strength of the hull is augmented by two internal stringers running lengthwise coupled with gunwales incorporated into the deck mould, through-bolted every 30cm and sealed internally. The teak toe-rail completes the hull-to-deck joint. Designed by Kim Holman, 380 boats were built by the Henri Wauquiez yard in Mouvaux, France, between 1968 and 1977. Customers’ faith in the project was such that the first eight boats were commissioned from the design only. The Centurion 32, closely aligned to the latest RORC dictates, was very competitive in her class. A 50% ballast to displacement ratio, deep draft and modern hull shape give her excellent upwind performance, even when it blows. Rigging and hardware are a blend of the best available at the time. The deck-stepped single spreader mast was made in England by Proctor in riveted anodized aluminium. Harmonious and elegant lines are the Centurion’s dominant feature, and her considerable beam was a recent development of the time. Sheer and overhangs are quite pronounced. As for her appendages, the skeg mounted rudder has a 30mm stainless-steel shaft, while the lead ballast is secured to the hull by six 32mm bolts. The boats produced before 1970 also had a trim-tab.

The interiors follow the well proven and widely adapted classic scheme: a bow cabin with limited headroom, the head to starboard, the main cabin with a U-shaped dinette that doubles as a queen size berth and faces a comfortable sea-going berth, and flanking the companionway a small galley and chart table to port with a pilot berth stretching below the cockpit and galley to starboard. There are numerous storage lockers for cruising gear, the wood trim is in oiled teak.

CENTURION 32 LOA: 32ft 9in (9.75m) LWL: 24ft 0in (7.3m) Beam: 9ft 9in (3m) Draught: 5ft 10in (1.8m) Displacement: 4,355kg.

TRANSLATION BY JAMES ROBINSON TAYLOR

The interior has a U-shaped dinette that doubles as a queen-size berth and faces a comfortable sea-going berth

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EXCLUSIVE by Guy Venables

With 712,000 visitors, 9,000 sailors in over 1,000 boats, 3,000 volunteers, 1,500 musicians and our own village demonstrating traditional skills, including making cocktails, Brest is the biggest - and greatest - maritime event in the world.

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MELANIE DENNIEL

e were a rum crew. Dan, our beloved editor (as he insists on being called); Mike Smylie the Kipperman; Jim Corr the Irish cowboy banjo player and block and tackle man; Nigel Gray the Geordie rigger and wire splicer; John Greenaway demonstrating caulking, and me, Classic Sailor’s cartoonist, just a tiny part of the three-quarters of a million people who walked the quays at Brest Festival. Mike had set up his long army-green bivouac shelter held up with sticks where we sat and drank in the evening, casting long shadows. With the addition of Jim’s banjo playing, we struck a striking resemblance to Oddball’s gang in Kelly’s Heroes. Along with Jim, Jimmy and Tiger – the triumvirate boatbuilding team from the International Boatbuilding Training College Portsmouth, who spent their days making wood shavings and twisting rope, and The Old Gaffers Association singing their endless sea shanties, we were the English village. As we were the only group of people actually displaying traditional maritime skills we were given a lot of attention. And this attention seemed to peak in the evening when I started shaking cocktails, the ice for which came from the quayside fishmongers who charged me a cocktail each time we filled up. He would greet me with firm handshakes and moustachioed smiles every evening and grab a snow shovel to fill a cool box. Then

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Gaffer fleet goes for Brest

ne thing you should know when you attempt to organise a fleet of Gaffers for a cruise ‘down Channel’ is that gaffer skippers have their own ways of doing things! The OGA is not a club; it’s more a loose association of beautiful boats and eccentric sailors who don’t take too keenly to being organised! Full credit then for getting their act

together, linking up with the Dutch and French OGAs (the Association des Vieux Gréements in France) and setting sail for the biggest sea festival of them all. OGA skippers do, it has be said have a penchant for a good party, and there were quite a a few free ones along the way. It doesn’t take much for a French mayor and quayside café owners to see the

commercial benefits of filling the village harbour with some old sea salts and their lovely boats. All that is needed to lure them in is free berthing, free wine and a cheery reception. Charge a small entry fee to the local populace to access the pontoons and you have a lucrative instant festival! Everyone wins! But in 2016 getting the boats down Channel proved a challenge; the weather had been contrary for weeks. And the term OGA ‘fleet’ is perhaps a misnomer. Gaffer boats come in all shapes, sizes and

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Main photo: Number 2 basin with (mainly) British boats next to the British Village; Keewaydin in morning light; rowing a Norse double-ender; Exmouth Shanty Men in full voice; Portuguese lateen rigged heritage ﬁshing boat.

ages. A fleet of gaffers starting out together will take little time to scatter. The older hulls need TLC on the high sees and skippers will adopt a more traditional approach, waiting for the wind and tide to be fair, seeking out a course with long tacks, overnighting in shelter when the waves are up. Others with limited holiday and new-cut sails can push the clock a bit, sheet in tight, spray over the bowsprit, and be first to the Moule Frites at the harbour restaurant. And then there’s a third group with their sleek white hulls,

he’d wait patiently in a shady seat for me to arrive with the day’s concoction and an explanation of what it was. (Negronis were his favourite.) There were Italian, Irish, Polynesian, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian villages all plying their own trades and showing a range of their smaller boats on the quayside. Our quay boat was a beautiful flax canoe that weighed no more than a French breakfast. There were no Americans there this year after they heard that the Russians were coming – seriously. Someone senior told us that “off zee record,” the Russians had their own troubles with their The crews soon fantastically huge four-masted relaxed as they got steel barque Sedov not making used to being it. She’d been impounded a few years ago but the official line for ogled and her absence was “mechanical photographed problems”. from above as if Mostly the views of the boats, excepting the very large they were zoo ones, were from above as the exhibits... floating pontoons within the four large basins and the marina couldn’t stand the sheer weight of such a number of people… on any day there would be more than 100,000 visitors. So we had to make do with being rather voyeuristic spectators peering down into the ordinary working lives of cutters and sloops, lateens and ketches. The crews soon relaxed as they got used to being ogled and photographed as if they were zoo exhibits. Some with closer resemblances to that than others. Around the several stages for music – folk, shanty and contemporary – crowds would build making moving on the site slow. It was quicker to scull by water, if you had a boat. Eschewing our hosts’ kind offer of accommodation “back in the city” we ended up sleeping in the only empty exhibition tent which, once we’d spread our sleeping bags on cardboard all over the floor, we renamed Sangatte. The reason for this became clearer to all as the week went on and a Frenchman’s habit of relieving himself behind such tents became increasingly olfactorily obvious. We all snored heavily but although Steve snored the worst, he was still the man to sleep next to because as Nigel discovered, he wore an electric sleep apnea machine that sounded like surf caressing a shingle beach. In the evening Nigel told us all about Mangrove Cutch. In a Geordie accent those are two of the most satisfying words in the English language. Then Mike and I went over to the Italian village where the produce was all from a tiny area along the Po river in the north. They syphoned their dry red wine from a huge wicker clad bottle and served some of their wonderful cheese. It was their hard cow’s cheese with cracking salt crystals called Grana Padano which came in a huge wheel and was reminiscent of fresh parmesan, but at 25 years old I thought it was even better. They played music and the old and the young danced, just like Italians tend to and made it hard not to smile at the entire world.

sparkling varnish and pristine white sails. Gentleman’s yachts that seem to slip effortlessly and graciously, a cool trace line over the horizon ahead. But at first none of us could get going at all for contrary winds and steep waves from the west. Brest looked increasingly remote. For the Solent boats that had made it to Yarmouth the Bugle seemed the best option. Over our beer we watched the weather forecast and felt for those who, coming from Holland and the East Coast, holed up in Ostend, Eastbourne,

Brighton and the like. Inevitably we fretted. Both winds and the Brexit vote. Were the gods telling us not to go to France in 2016? Had decades of Anglo-French ‘entente cordiale’ come to an end? Would we be met by newly diligent French customs officers demanding paperwork and searching our holds for tariff evading goods?. We held our nerve. The winds dropped and the sun came out. A lumpy channel presented itself but the fleet made hay. Some set sail for Cherbourg, >> CLASSIC SAILOR

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As for the rest of the place, the stalls were mostly food with the exception of Armor Lux, which had the stripy top clothing sales business sewn up so tight that occasionally you could look into a crowd of Frenchmen and your eyes would be confused like when lions watch a herd of fleeing zebras. As Mike Smylie had a smoking shed we started experimenting with smoking oysters from the fish market for breakfast which, because we were smoking them above the herring, had an interesting kippery tang. And once, ah, was enough. Mike nearly Mike nearly had a courted absolute disaster when disaster one night the super efficient cleaners on when the cleaners site cleared up his bin liner full of vitally important oak wood cleared up his bin sawdust and threw it all away. liner of vitally Fortunately Mike has an important oak international network of smokers and he was soon sawdust and threw visited by a mysterious it all away... Frenchman with more sawdust for him. Also, lured in by the chance to muck in, Mike had no end of volunteers, mostly pretty young girls, learning how to fillet herring properly which they would happily do for several hours above the intense heat rising from the tarmac. Old friends and new enthusiasts appeared all the time, giving advice and encouragement. At one point a chap approached me as I was sitting drawing and said: “I see you lot have copied the old Classic Boat habit of doing witty reviews in your kit pages.” Somewhat peeved at being accused of plagiarizing my own work I replied slightly tersely that I used to write that magazine’s kit reviews and I now write the Classic Sailor kit reviews. So. Some people! After lunch in a huge hangar reserved for the staff (of which there was a volunteer force of 3,000!) I headed down the docks to see The Celebration of Sail or “everybody out” as someone put it. It was an impressive sight and the wide channel of Brest took on a thousand white and red bottom teeth as more and more boats headed out to sail on the light winds. However it was what was going on behind me that was even more fascinating. An old man who looked in his 70s was slowly donning traditional deep sea diving gear including brass helmet with porthole and lead boots. He then stepped into the water and disappeared only to be tracked around the marina by a lengthening hose and a stream of bubbles made by two young men on a two wheeled pump who seemed to be arguing with each other. If any of you are familiar with Tintin then you’ll know how much extra delight this scene gives a cartoonist. The one thing we noticed in this plethora of traditional boats was that there was nowhere for them to buy even the most rudimentary of repair gear. We were asked for so much kit that in four years time I’m going to bring a lorry load of boat jumble and set it out on a huge blanket along the quayside. Do come with me. We’d be paid in euros and make our fortune! >> others motor-sailed for Alderney. Our Carlotta thinking herself clever held the port tack westward to Weymouth to get a better slant for the following day. But then the weather went fuggy and the wind went SSW. We chugged out past the Bill and crossed the shipping lanes to a blast of ghostly ship horns. At day’s end, Alderney emerged grey and rocky in the mist. A welcome refuge, but not a single fellow gaffer in sight. A stiff westerly greeted us next day and reefed down, staysail furled, we went through the Swinge on

Clockwise from top: Boats leave past the Pile of Peas rock; tiki carving; mending sails on Keewaydin; La Recouvrance; Folk band Aartwork aboard their boat Marie; the main stage ; French replica frigate L’Hermione; Gwenili, Thalia and Eve of St Mawes in a quiet moment before the crowds arrived

the slack of high water. Good sailing as we raced down to Guernsey, but where were the others? Molly Oxford at last arrived astern from Chichester having sailed through the night. Next morning our luck again seemed thin. The wind had dropped as we coaxed Carlotta southward under topsail and gennaker. The Cote Rose appeared lit up in the setting sun, a mirage in the haze ahead. We motored into Perros Guirec. Onward to Roscoff for our rendezvous with the scattered fleet. The French OGA, our hosts, had their

little fleet flying the Tricolore. Some joshing over Brexit and offers to hide away all our whiskey from the Securité . A warm smile from the lady in the Capitainerie. It was good to be among friends! The weather seemed to be settling but not without a couple of blows. More British, Dutch and French boats poured into harbour as the rolling Brest fleet or ‘boule de neige’ gathered it boats. Aber-Wrach the next stop. A hearty reception awaited the growing armada, a bagipe serenade

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BREST 2016 EXCLUSIVE

played on the quay as we tied up. The party’s begun! By now the OGA fleet has grown to over twenty and counting. Gwenilli came in from Falmouth, Windbreker and Eva Christana from Holland, Witch and Victoria from the Essex Coast (the latter by truck!). The Recouvrance, Brest’s proud two-masted goélette tied up alongside to greet us the start of a steady stream of new arrivals. The final leg to Brest had its sting. The strong SW winds returned and ahead the infamous Chenal du

Four was in turmoil. The word from our French lookouts along the coast ahead was a clear “stay put”. All aboard to catch the ebb next morning. Down the Chenal to meet the flood as it turns into the Rade de Brest in the late afternoon. The armada was on the move. A jungle of masts and rigging pushing off the quay. As the rocky coast bent south the sails came out for an impromptu race on this final passage. All around us set between the cliffs and rocky coves, are a myriad of sails, square and gaffed, white and tanned,

tall and short. All billowing to the wind astern that funnelled us through the narrows, towering square riggers imposing their presence as crews hung from yardarms furling their Royals and Top-Gallants. Herding cats? The OGA fleet had made it! At least most of us had. And there was a bonus too… It seems we had picked up a few strays on the way. The OGA welcomes all! Where there’s a challenging sail and a good party at the end, expect us to be there! Brest did us proud! Ben Collins CLASSIC SAILOR

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NOTRE STUDIO POUR VISITEURS Á BREST Our little row of tents at the British Village was put up by our kind hosts, the festival organisers, who covered the inside walls in a matt black felt. We soon realised that the white tent roof was providing a kind of David Bailey standard of lighting where we could ask visitors to sit for an impromptu portrait. So these are our festival faces, mostly of the British at Brest, with some of the back stories that go to make up the most awesome maritime event on the planet. Our thanks to everyone who agreed!

David Stickland brought his 9-ton Hillyard Tashana from Portsmouth via the Falmouth CLassics. “We pitch up in places and they say: ‘My grandad had one of these!’”

Sir Robin KnoxJohnston was on good form when he visited Brest on the Monday before embarking on the French rakish schooner La Recouvrance - a replica 1800s vessel, to sail to Douarnenez in the big flotilla from Brest. When we asked him: “Are you the original classic sailor?” he replied: “I think I am the only one left!”

Sue Lewis does tireless work for the Old Gaffers Association and is well know to regular readers of CS for her absorbing cruising tales of sailing to Holland and back last summer. She and husband Howard were sailing their 1897 ex Colchester police cutter Victoria (which they had trailered to Britanny).

Neal Hill had brought Naiad – his 26ft 6in 1936 Harrison Butler Englyn class down from Scotland. “Last time she was in France she dragged her anchor,” he said. “That was in Cherbourg in 1952.”

PHOTOS BY DAN HOUSTON

David charte brothe “We’re organ

Emily Caruso (“no, not related to the singer or to Robinson”) is the charter skipper of Gipsy Moth IV – it was the first time the famous 50-year-old British yacht has attended the festival.

Ben Collins coordinated the Old Gaffers sail in company, which then met with their French counterparts in Roscoff before continuing to Brest. His prize? A froggy model cutter, natch!

James Wharram and Hanneke Boon It turns out that among James Wharram’s many accomplishments is his title as president of the French multihull association. The pioneer of catamaran sailing was at Brest on his and Hanneke’s latest design – the Mana 24. This will be available for a home build shortly and the couple were testing some of the new ideas incorporated in the new boat. For instance Mana is cat boat rigged with a main and mizzen but no headsail. Each ama has room for a person sleeping and sailing kit but in summer the central deck can be used for camping, either with a tent or with a tarpaulin rigged between the masts; the mainsail is boomless. It was great to spend a lazy hour in the shade of such a tent talking to James about his 61-year career and life as a pioneer of home-built affordable sailing boats. We’ll get a full report on the Mana 24 quite soon, she’s still in trials right now.

Mike 38ft g Manx no win failure

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David Sutton sails a Memory 19 but charters large cutters with his four brothers and was on Leader this year. “We’re in awe of how the French can organise these festivals.”

Ira MacDonell sailed across from Falmouth on Shane Carr’s Clio Marie, based on an 1890 Grimsby smack... but with a Victorian style bathroom taking up most of the fo’c’s’le.

Dr Warren Scott and wife Jill have sailed more than 150,000 sea miles in their converted 1935 Watson lifeboat Swn Y Mor

Manon Muret is our ﬁrst cover girl, appearing in a photo study by Nigel Pert on the front cover of our January issue (CS004). At the time she was a volunteer sailor aboard the amazing replica 18th century French sailing frigate L’Hermione and our article with captain Yann Cariou gave readers a fascinating insight into how a sailing ship like that behaves at sea. Manon came to say hello in Brest and told us she is now the second mate on the recently revamped charter Tall Ship Kaskelot, based in Bristol, and in Brest taking visitors on day trips. Kaskelot, incidentally, takes on her own volunteers, a great start for would-be classic sailors!

ilor?” nk I eft!”

Without doubt IBTC’s Jimmy Green, Jim Brooke-Jones and Tiger Jordan (left, left to right) had the most energetic display with rope and oar-making wood work with hand tools and other skills needed to keep the workboat and ﬂeet of old boats going. The lads drove down from Portsmouth (Boathouse 4) and stole the show.

o the rter the

tival.

Mike Sullivan owns and sails his 38ft gaffer Harbinger based on a Manx nobby. “We had headwinds or no winds all the way, and an engine failure but we got here OK.”

Tino Rawnsley arrived in Brest aboard his Wharram catamaran Brillig, a 1985 Tiki 31 design, inspired by the Polynesian double canoes. He has just refurbished her and says she is a rare example of her type, by not being modiﬁed and retaining her original loose-fotted gaff rig. He had around seven people aboard.

Paolo Maccione is an Italian editor of the online magazine Barche d’Epoca e Classiche; the Italian village had some delicious food stuffs, including a special hard cheese – but only by day (p98).

Peter ‘Nezzie’ Bell ﬁrst mate on the 1895 Brixham Trawler Pilgrim. “There’s so much to see here, it’s hard to take it all in. Ideally you need the whole week! But regrettably we are leaving early because our charter ends on Monday and we have to be back across the Channel by then.”

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-in THE UNITED COLOURS OF BREST

Barbara Runnalls sailed her Yarmouth 23 Moon River to Brest from Shoreham in Sussex. “It’s great to get here. It had never occurred to me that I could do anything like this.”

Chloe Amber sailing in on the 1913 Lowestoft sailing smack Keewaydin, made herself the maiden of the meeting with an unstinting party attitude that could see her helping out at Kipperland as a Herring lass all day, to playing music and singing at four in the morning with a band of waifs and strays who’d attached themselves to her, while the old men in the British Village dreamed on, with one ear open, nearby... Sharon Brokenshire and Chris Bentley “This week celebrates the true ethos and traditional skills of sailing that are so important to maintain. You see kids here sculling a dinghy across the harbour – it’s such a rare thing to see now. In France yachts are not seen as an elite thing – sailing is for all, and that is brilliant; the welcome has been fantastic.”

Philippe Delorme is the president of the French Old Gaffers Association who sailed to Brest from St Malo and co-organised the the OGA tent in the British Village.

Martin Goodrich is the skipper owner of the gorgeous 1910 yawl yacht Gwenili built in Bordeaux. “My mission is to find a French person who might want to take her on,” he told us.

Spider skipper of Lizzie May is also a member of the popular but crazy Falmouth Marine Band. So which night is practice night? “Oh we don’t really practice, that tends to make it worse...”

Breandán Mac Conamhna is an expert on the Irish curragh and had brought one along to show alongside a typical Irish homestead – complete with peat fire. We caught him in his “civvies”, normal dress each day was a grandfather shirt, full sleeved waistcoat and a bowler hat. He’s a former director of County Sligo’s Institute of Technology

Fabian Bush, with Elspeth and Alastair MacKenzie and Mary Gibbs were sailing Alastair’s Faith, a Mersea Winkle Brig (a West Mersea open fisherman’s boat) recently built by Fabian and trailed to Brest and Douarnenez. “Brest is great but you don’t get much sleep!”

Fiona Molloy was sailing on the 1989 Chichester based gaff cutter Molly Oxford (based on a Heard 28 hull). “I am going on to Douarnenez but then going home by ferry.”

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Dominic and Barbara Bridgman have run Mashfords boatyard in Cremyll opposite Plymouth in Devon for many years, restoring a number of well known craft including the 44ft 7in Huff of Arklow, probably the only Uffa Fox Flying 30 still in use.

l “My n who ld us.

ea es”, owler

e r 28 nez

Jim Corr had brought a display of wooden blocks he makes (and repairs) for the British Village. Jim also played banjo during the week with a slightly nervousmaking rendition of the banjo tune from the film Deliverance. An ex-cowboy, horse whisperer and schooner captain (for disaffected youths) he has some fascinating insights on life; more on that next issue.

Colin Evans is a Pembrokeshirebased boatbuilder who brought his own 28ft Atlantic Beachboat to show. The four-oared lug rigged ketch is designed for expeditions.

Dan Houston Classic Sailor’s editor was asked at the Southampton Boat Show last year if the magazine could help organise a British village. It took him about 30 seconds to say yes.

Mike Smylie the Kipperman (and our coordinator) brought Kipperland, his display of the herring fishery including a smoke house for those delicious cold-smoked kippers he does.

Luke Powell the pioneer of new pilot cutter building is taking a year or two away from his adze to charter his beautiful Scillonian pilot boat Agnes, and after Brest they sailed on to Galicia, northern Spain. But Luke revealed there are plans to build another boat soon, a 68 ft cutter for Brian Payne (of Standard Quay in Faversham). “I’ll build the hull back in Cornwall, and take it to Faversham to finish,” Luke said.

John John is a local French artist who was running the French Steamboat Association tent. Known as vaporistes they had two historical boats taking people out. “For Suzanne we found the original 1882 engine and rebuilt the boat to plans of her makers, the Schindler brothers. The other is Vigie, of 1900, refitted with an English White & Sons (Cowes) engine.”

Nigel Gray was kept very busy as people crowded around his stand where he demonstrated aspects of wire rigging. Please don’t try this tongue test for a smooth splice!

Guy Venables is Classic Sailor’s cartoonist and cocktail maker to the British Village. “I used to like sea shanties but after four days of them non-stop I have started to hate them...”

John Greenaway, at the age of 78, was supposed to have retired, but brought his personality and deep knowledge of boatbuilding to Brest with a caulking demo; brilliant!

Steve Philp Our art editor Steve had been wanting to go to a Brest festival since the early 1990s. “It’s lived up to all my expectations and more; I love the atmosphere and the French cafés.” CLASSIC SAILOR

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Drawn to Brest Classic Sailorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s artist Guy Venables took his box of inks and lawn paper to Britanny to capture some of the spirit of the occasion of both the French and the Brits, at Brest

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BOATS FOR SALE

PHOTO: EILEAN RAMSAY / PPL

Is this the best ti m

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TIME TO LOOK FOR YOUR DREAM?

i me to buy a boat? Time was when a well-found wooden yacht was the way to get aﬂoat, on a budget if not cheaply. But with older glassﬁbre yachts selling under £10k it’s a great time to buy your dream boat

ith the future of the economy balancing cold and barefoot on the wet seaweed-covered rock of Brexit you’d be forgiven for hiding your money in an old sock under the mattress until it all blows over. However there is opportunity in every crisis and the boat-buying market, right now, is full of bargains. The great glassfibre boats of the 1960s, 70s and 80s are tumbling in price and you can find these, often in a tidy state for under £10,000. This newish market has in turn pushed down the older wooden boat market so that bargains like a South Coast One Design (looking tired but with a sound Back in the 1960s these South Coast One Designs were highly aspirational and treasured yachts. With our story of one being bought for £1,500 (p86) are they now unwanted? By Guy Venables and Dan Houston

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BOATS FOR SALE

Just £64 (£1 a share!) would buy this sleek classic 25ft 7in wooden Folkboat but she’s described as in need of a lot of attention. Built almost 60 years ago, by a well known Dorset boat builder with a low coachhouse, she has three berths. Maybe a syndicate will take her. Details from owner Chris: cjhoare7@gmail.com / 07779 257608

Kaymer is a Contessa 26 which spent 20 years in a barn. She’s at the Downs Road Boatyard in Maldon and is described as a project although you could sail her away after making an offer on her asking price of £5,950. Being barely used her problems are cosmetic and she has some features from 1969. At present she is engineless which is a plus to some sailors.

Prelude, is a 1979 GRP Nordic Folkboat we found for sale at folkboats.co.uk for £12.5k. One like her just sold for around £10k. Great boats for racing or cruising.

Marie Louise is an exceptional 16ft half deck Oysterman cutter, 1978 Paul Gartside design, Nanni 10hp diesel 2009, Dyneema standing rig, lots of extras at £14,000.

Twisters are around £15K but a few are coming down and Shandie (on Apollo Duck) is a very clean looking example of these well-loved yachts with a 2012 survey at £8,000.

Delphine is number 6 of the ten GU Laws designed ﬂeet of East Coast One Designs. Dating from 1913 the class is still intact! Ready to go she is £6k at MJ Lewis in Maldon.

hull) can be found under £5,000 and in the case of our story on p86, for just £1,500. Wooden boats of course need to be painted, and painted regularly; leave them for three years or so and they start to look extremely tatty and unwanted. But go round with a light hammer and listen to the ping of the live wood (compared to a thud of dead timber) and you can get an idea of how sound they are within ten minutes – before ringing a surveyor for a fuller report on what you might be taking on. Some 30 to 40 years ago, the classic boat movement started, based on a secondhand market where you could buy an old wooden boat for cash. Secondhand 30ft (9m) glassfibre boats then were all well over £20K and in loan territory. The great thing many of us found was that these wooden boats were such excellent sea boats, with their slim hulls and long keels, and while many yachtsmen looked at you as a bit of a crank (in the yard with your paintbrush), when you could be out there sailing.

There were also some great events, which celebrated the lines of the older boats and sailing classics became more mainstream, aspirational even. What has changed, for sailors on a budget, is that the glassfibre boats that were being made around that time are now the ones you can often buy for cash, especially if two or three would-be owners get together. Take a look at the Contessa 26 – 50 years old this year. Modest, rugged strength, limitless range, eminently sailable and inspiring of affection of all who own them (many even have an onboard cold seawater shower cleverly disguised as the saloon windows!). In the 1990s good, sail-away examples were £30,000. Today the same examples can be snapped up for as little as £5,000 if you keep your ears to the ground. And the Contessa is a well-known type. Each month since we started in September last year Classic Sailor has run a page feature on one of these classic yachts of that era, by Federico Nardi who runs the respected wooden boat restoration yard Cantiere Navale, dell’Argentario in Italy (see p21). And

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Windsong is a 1978 clipper bowed Haslars Friendship sloop design gaffer in kaya planks on oak. Restored with a 20hp Volvo engine she is £14,000. See small ads p94.

We found this 1970 Hurley 22 at Yachtworld.co.uk for only £2,950. The Hurley 22 is a well respected, solidly built sailing cruiser and this one looks very tidy.

Any Sadler 32 under £10K is worth a sniff. This one at £9,995 at the boatshed.com has just been reduced. These six-berth ﬁn keelers have been taken all over the world.

Ever since we read Senor Nardi’s comments on the Alberg 35 (CS8 – May 2016) we’ve been clocking them for sale and we found a couple of nice examples at £9,800 on yachtworld.co.uk (in the Paciﬁc), our photo shows Magic in an online article on converting her to tiller steering. Not many of these in Europe but they are worth seeking out.

Daisy 1925, is a 22ft 1925 pitchpine centreboard 2 berth Hillyard 3ton gaffer we found on the MJ Lewis site. After a recent reﬁt, she’s seaworthy and ready to go at £2,750.

Here is a Tamarisk 24ft (7.2m) three berth gaffer we found at boatsandoutboards. She had a major reﬁt in 2013 and is on sale for £12,000. Lying in Dumfries

MATT BOWSER

On Gumtree we found this Sea Sprite 27 in great nick in Penzance. She’s a traditional long-keeler in GRP, looking like a counter-sterned version of a Twister and is £9,750.

it’s already a growing, and fascinating tribute, to some of the lesser known star boats which with their seaworthy lines and stable heavy-scantlinged hulls are as good to take to sea now as they were when they were excitingly new. And the point is these glassfibre boats were often extremely well made. Boatbuilders copied wooden-boat scantlings, so they have very thick hulls which, as the years pass, are proving themselves stable and long-lived. Later, bad decisions were made with GRP such as a thin skin over foam or worse still, over balsa wood. This causes delamination of the hull when layers simply peeled off each other and is an exorbitant cost to fix. And there may be osmosis but it’s rarely a big problem and it won’t sink the boat or ruin you. These skin bubbles can be dealt with with a skin application that’ll last indefinitely. Once you compare that with the yearly upkeep of a wooden boat glassfibre looks attractive in terms of saving time and money. And while marina charges are high nowadays you can still find decent swinging

This GRP Cheoy Lee looks like an absolute wreck, which her £2k asking price no doubt reﬂects and she needs a new interior, but she is a bargain, at Boating World Cornwall.

moorings where you can keep a long range sailing boat for under a grand a year. Club moorings are often good value as well. Clearly the best bargains are going to be the ones that need some work, but the attitude to this is that it should be fun, as Phil Russell relays on p86. As the season ends and owners face the costs of winter lay-up and storage and a spring refurbishment, this autumn is the time to start visiting yards in search of that dream boat. Walk around and chat to people, there’ll be several boats for sale that haven’t got round to being advertised yet. Remember cash is king so be prepared to make a low offer but do it couched in the fact that you will be spending money on this boat to get her back to her best; owners will appreciate this attitude to their pride and joy. And keep your head about you. You can ask for a recent survey but you should always get your own done. And a golden rule is to get sailing as soon as you can – do the cosmetics out of season or as you go. CLASSIC SAILOR

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2/08/16 10:44 PM

CRUISING WITH AN ENTERPRISE

Cruising for En t Colin Gilbert converted his Enterprise to go dinghy cruising... to Beaulieu, Truro and Chichester Harbour

ome sailing friends may have noticed various temporary additions to my Enterprise which do nothing to help it win races. The largest are an over boom tent and bottom boards which can be raised onto the thwarts for a bed. Eager to try these out I made a recce of Bucklers Hard with a view to launching there after visiting the 2013 Beaulieu boat jumble. On the Monday I tacked up the river to Beaulieu on the flood which was quite gusty on some of the bends. I entered the pool at the village suddenly without any idea of where to moor. Luckily I was soon in the wind shadow of the old mill buildings so had plenty of time to select wooden pilings near a slip. I bought food for the evening and following day and then set off for Bucklers Hard with only the jib as I was wary of having to gybe if it was still gusty on the river. It wasn’t and the wind died so up

Above: Colin celebrates on the slip at Buckler’s Hard after his sail out to the Dolphin and back. Left: Moored at the ferry steps at Truro

went the main. Eventually I ghosted onto the pontoon, put the tent up, cooked and spent a rather cold night in a three-season sleeping bag. On Tuesday it was bright with a moderate breeze. I sailed with a friend down the river, we stopped for lunch on Needs Ore Sailing Club pontoon then out to the Dolphin and back to Bucklers Hard. A really good sail – why were all the other boats motoring? In July I spent a couple of weeks with the NW branch of the Dinghy Cruising Association in the Falmouth area based on Trethem Mill camp site and St Just Creek. They took one look at my Enterprise and said we’re not going in that, they capsize. Not with 90kg of sand in the bottom, I said. My goal was to sail up to Truro. The forecast was southerly and not too strong on the chosen day. The boat flew up the Fal gybing easily when required, passed King Harry’s Ferry, Smugglers, various large ships, pontoons, moorings, Malpas, then

I was in unknown territory. The plan was to arrive at approx HW but I was running early; not much water and too much mud. It looked as if the river stopped at each bend until you could see around it, then a huge industrial quay came into view with a cathedral further on. I reached the ferry

Then the waves came… It felt like I was moving through the water at some speed on a bouncy castle quay but had to wait over an hour for the mud to disappear and let me tie up. Returning from Charlotte’s Tea Rooms I had to vacate my quayside steps to allow three ferries to turn round. When the last had left I followed. Not easy due to buildings, width of navigable water and the

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DINGHY WORLD

n terprising types

wind in the wrong direction. Sometimes sailing, sometimes rowing, often aground. Sigh of relief, Malpas in sight and a nice starboard reach. It should be easy now. Then my Bermuda Triangle moment! The river Fal had disappeared behind my back and I was on a mission up the Tresillian River expecting it to get wider and deeper at the next bend… and the next. When I couldn’t sail any further, or row any further I started to pull the boat. I could see large low buildings ahead – must be a yacht club! My phone rang. “Where are you?” “I’ll tell you exactly in a moment.” As I opened my GPS I could see the water flowing over my feet – but it was flowing in the wrong direction! This explained all the other strange phenomena I has noticed and wondered at. On a happier note I spent another night (planned this time) in the boat tent at anchor. After exploring Restronguet Creek, the wind had dropped to nothing so there

Top: Cooking on a solid fuel stove clamped to the aft thwart. Above: Bottom boards raised to make a platform for an air bed. Left: Overboom tent, moored on the ‘wrong side’ of East Head – The Winner which connects with the Solent at HW. Luckily the anchor held.

was no chance of reaching my planned overnight stop. I rowed along the 1m LAT contour of Carrick Roads until I found a large enough space, prepared anchor and warps, rowed into position again, dropped anchor and waited. Was I settling 100m from each of the three large yachts surrounding me? Think so. Tent up, meal cooked, slept like a log. Up at 0600, still hardly any wind, yachts still 100m away. Then back to St Just Creek to join others for a trip to the Helford River. And lastly in August I joined the DCA summer week at Cobnor in Chichester Harbour. In previous years many members had overnighted on the beach at East Head, arriving on the evening flood and sailing away in the morning. Now it was my turn to try this. Unfortunately this year it was springs instead of neaps and things were somewhat reversed which I hadn’t fully appreciated, but I was planning to be at anchor so not really a problem. The spring ebb, however, turned out to be a major problem. The plan was to drop anchor under sail so I wrapped the jib up to free the foredeck and made a dummy run amongst already anchored boats which was OK. On the next run the ebb took me way off course so I had to tack far up stream to stand a chance of crossing the main channel and still be upstream of the anchorage. Three attempts at this failed as the current increased. The ebb tide won and I settled for the wrong side of East Head as the light was fading. I anchored in 1ft of water, put the tent up and took some pictures, Hayling Island Yacht Club in the background, ate and got ready for bed. Soon after it dried but not for long. Then the waves came, and kept coming. I already had a fix on my position and could see most of the lit buoyage at the harbour entrance which fortunately was not moving, even though it felt like I was moving through the water at some speed on a bouncy castle. The tent ties are sewn on to allow for flaps which can be lifted to look out of, even when inside a sleeping bag. I wouldn’t have felt safe without this feature. Just after dawn the boat was on the sand again and I had a good hour’s sleep. Then I dressed for rain and started thinking about how to weigh anchor under sail on a lee shore. The weather improved so I sailed all the way up to Dell Quay for a drink before returning to Cobnor slip. CLASSIC SAILOR

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3/08/16 11:56 AM

BRIXHAM HERITAGE REGATTA

Sailing the Brixham Trawler Vigilance at the town’s heritage regatta was an experience to be savoured discovers Dan Houston while Peter Blanchard relays some of the history of the event

itting in the saloon of Vigilance as we get a briefing from the skipper it’s easy to imagine the fishermen of the 1920s sitting like this on their race day. I wonder how they felt. I hope they felt that a day without hauling (or mending) nets, a day when they got to sail their vessel for the sheer joy of it, and for the competition and chance of winning, with a few beers, at the end was a good holiday. Vigilance was launched in December 1926, at the end of a year that had seen the General Strike and working men were questioning how they were being treated. Whether that much touched the happy harbour of this protected Devon port is conjecture. What is real is to be sailing this amazing vessel, restored, upkept, sailed and chartered by a syndicate some 75 strong. Skipper John Ashworth is telling us about the course. There should be three times to go around, he says, adding, to murmurs of assent, that with the light wind conditions we might be lucky to get twice around. Our start time is going to be 1250, five minutes after Pilgrim, or The Grim, as her people like to call her. Grayhound, the newish, rakish, 1700s-ish lugger will be racing as well although she is not eligible to win the cup – the King’s Cup, which is only for proper trawlers like us. And that’s just as well, because later when Grayhound comes by, she just overtakes us like a smart nanny Vigilance with the new(ish) lugger Grayhound slipping along on the blue waters of Lyme Bay

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RACING WITH VIGILANCE Top row left to right: Marcus PomeroyRowden, builder/owner/ skipper of Grayhound; Barrie Jones who does the concours judging; Penny Jolly; Provident lasses; crew or skipper of May Blossom, Paul Greenwood of 1904 lugger Our Boys, skipper of Vigilance John Ashworth.

Left: Lara Caine captain of the Provident expertly manoeuvres out of harbour. Below left: the men pulleyhaul the bowsprit out into its sailing position.

Vigilance Built Upham’s 1926 LOA 78ft (24m) LOS 114ft (35m) Beam 20ft (6m) Draught 9ft (2.7m) Sail area: 2,600 sq ft (242m2)

walking a pram. Some pram though, captain Marcus likes to shock with his black powder gun. He let this off as the lugger walked through our lee and the shock of the report made the old men of Vigilance all walk a bit straighter for a while afterwards. I’m not saying anyone had to change their trousers, but not far from it. John assigns jobs and we get out in the Bay. We get up the sails. For many of the Vigilances (as I think they should be called) looking after the boat is a way of staying fit. Most are local and some have a monetary share (£2.5k) in the vessel. They describe themselves as a “self-selecting” crew, the vessel is large enough that they can go sailing almost as much as they want. Likewise the maintenance programme is run on the basis of volunteers, and work gets you sailing time. It’s a system that seems to

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BRIXHAM HERITAGE REGATTA

work, though the boat has to make around £30,000 a year to be able to stay afloat and in code – she charters and they have a system that runs by the hour (three hours is £276). They need more volunteers though and some younger people would be useful too! We start our race on our own and we are clearly always going to be behind Pilgrim. It’s a shame that we won’t get much closequarter sailing (other than Marcus’s gun), but there are quite a few other boats on the water, with gaffers and yachts joining in this heritage regatta. It’s an amazing sight and it has a great history as Peter Blanchard, regatta chairman can relate. We have a good, if uneventful race and the sights in the bay recreate some views that go back to the turn of the 20th century. It’s great to see Vigilance in such fine fettle and carrying on her legacy. Seeing and sail-

ing boats like this recreates maritime history in a way that films, books and magazines can never muster. But I have a deadline to hit and so I leave before the prize giving, where Pilgrim gets that famous cup. Peter Blanchard takes up the tale:

Its original and correct title was The Port of Brixham, Torbay, Royal Regatta I have been Chairman of the Heritage Regatta for five years and in that time myself and the Committee have taken the Regatta from a time in the doldrums to the great success it was in 2016, (as the editor Dan can confirm). But first to some history. The Brixham Heritage Sailing Regatta has its

roots in the Sailing Trawler races that have been held in Torbay since the early 1800’s, although the first recorded Regatta was in 1851. In 1883 the Regatta ran out of funding and was not held for nine years until 1892. The racing was always fiercely competitive, with the boats being driven extremely hard. In strong winds in 1927, the winning trawler Valerian, averaged over 12 knots around the course! In 1914, King George V presented the Perpetual Challenge Cup also popularly known as the ‘King George V Cup’ or the ‘King’s Cup’. This was to be raced for by Brixham registered sailing trawlers over 40 tons but due to the First World War it was not presented until 1919. It was then competed for annually from 1919 until 1939 when the war ended racing and sailing trawlers were rapidly being retired. In 1919, Sunny Isle was the first winner of the Cup.

Toni Knights’ Iris is a 1921 44ft (13m) lugger built in Looe and fished for many years until she became a liveaboard. Toni, a well known local artist and fisherman, bought the lugger and completed a very long and arduous restoration just a year or so ago.

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RACING WITH VIGILANCE

This gathering of large working craft in May this year includes from 2nd left: Grayhound, Provident, Vigilance, Pilgrim and Golden Vanity

Lord Churston, presided over the earlier events and in his letter to King George V, he sent the good wishes of the fishermen of Brixham and personal reassurance that, “The gift will ever be held as a link between the Port of Brixham and the Throne”. The original and correct title of the Regatta was the ‘Port of Brixham, Torbay, Royal Regatta’. Valerian (of which there is a model in Brixham Yacht Club), was particularly successful with Vigilance, winner 1933, and Torbay Lass, winner in 1936, also successful in this racing event. During the heydays before and just after World War One, the racing was an incredible spectacle, with not only a large fleet of big ketches, but also a fleet of the great classic yachts, including King George’s yacht Britannia and several of the famous J-Class yachts. Perhaps the most successful of all trawlers was Ibex, the fastest sailing trawler ever built in Brixham with many wins to her name. After the Second World War, racing lapsed and as sailing trawlers became commercially outdated the fleet slowly disappeared. However, through the efforts of local classic boat skipper and maritime artist Toni Knights and with the involvement of the Old Gaffers and several local restoration projects, in particular the Vigilance Preservation Society, Trinity Sailing Foundation and the Pilgrim Trust, the Brixham trawler fleet re-emerged from 1997 to sail once again for the Perpetual Challenge Cup (King George V Cup). The modern event has had racing in five classes, allowing traditional sailing vessels of all types, shapes and sizes to take part. Since 2011 the Re-

gatta now has a sixth class for yachts of any type of construction or rig, which are over 30 years old. Brixham now has a large heritage fleet including the trawlers Vigilance, Pilgrim, Leader and Provident. Other boats include the Luggers Iris and Our Daddy, Golden Vanity, May Blossom, Minx, True Vine to name but a few. Apart from two years, since 1997 the Heritage Regatta has been hosted by the Brixham Yacht Club which has panoramic views across Torbay and Lyme Bay. Ken Harris saved and restored Vigilance in Littlehampton working through the 1970s very often on his own moving huge baulks of timber about. He then sailed and ran the trawler for a few years, very often on his own as well.

The event is now a highlight of the traditional Southwest sailing calendar. I am proud to say that in 2016 we achieved our goal of getting 30 boats to take part and we had 32 entries of which 28 sailed in the Regatta. It was quite a sight! The Heritage Regatta is organised by a team of volunteers, many with nautical experience of both modern and classic boats. The Unknown Cup! In early July of 2016 a couple (Mr and Mrs Whitham), walked into Brixham Yacht Club one lunch time and asked to speak to the

secretary. He was away sailing so I offered to help. They wanted to speak to someone regarding the Heritage Regatta, so as the Chairman I was the right person. Their family were close friends with the Upham family who ran the famous shipyard in Brixham where many of the classic sailing trawlers were built. In 1983 a trophy was given to them by Daisy Upham which they have now very kindly donated to the Heritage Regatta, so another piece of its heritage has very kindly been returned to Brixham. It had been in private hands for 114 years. Dated 1899 the trophy was presented to Ibex in recognition of her outstanding results in the Regatta and the cup is engraved to indicate this. The trawler Ibex was the fastest ever built by Upham’s yard and won the Regatta on 29 out of its 33 entries. Ibex was so successful that the Regatta Committee banned her from taking part unless her rigging was reduced, which they did. She was back the next year and won again! Ibex was only in existence for 22 years, built in 1896 she was sunk by a German U-boat in 1918. This was the days of gentleman sailors so the U-boat signalled Ibex that they should take to the lifeboats as she was about to be sunk. According to records the trophy was called the Challenge Trophy or the Coronation Challenge Trophy, although this is not engraved on the cup. Next year’s Regatta, is on the late May Bank Holiday, Saturday 27 and Sunday 28 May 2017 with the Regatta on the Sunday. For further information please see our website: www.brixhamheritagesailing.org.uk

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MARIETTE

Schooner schooling The schooner Mariette was built 101 years ago and is still being raced competitively enough to win at regattas against younger boats. So what is she like to crew? David Abramczyk finds out; photos by Andrew Wright

lassic schooners: brawny yet elegant multimasted sailboats that conjure up images of thick-skinned fishermen, white-gloved aristocracy and... pirates. They date from a bygone era when oceans were the primary means of transport, and control of them made and broke nations. Most have succumbed to the ebb of fortunes and the implacability of time, but a few of these legendary beauties still ply the waters. A recent renaissance in traditional shipbuilding has significantly increased their numbers too, and several new ‘Spirit of Tradition’ schooners have joined their ranks. I first set foot on Mariette twenty years ago as a day worker with barely two French Francs to rub together. Although I was new to the yachting game, I knew she was special the moment I set eyes on her. Launched in New England in 1915, she was drawn by the hand of Nathanael Herreshoff, the renowned wizard of naval architecture. Gleaming brass, glistening varnish, a thousand antiquated blocks with lines and two massive wooden masts captivate you the moment you step on

board. In her time she was one of the biggest private yachts in the world. Although several new mega yachts have surpassed her in length, she retains a mystique none can touch. A siren luring veteran crew both young and old, Mariette entices us to travel far distances to rekindle the magic. The Superyacht Cup in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, has brought together more of these timeless beauties than have been seen together in the Mediterranean in years. Celebrating its 20th anniversary, the four-day Cup is the longest running regatta of its kind in Europe. The course is set each day according to wind conditions in the Bay of Palma against distant mountains, a striking cathedral and the charming palm-lined old town. On the first day crewmembers file up across the passerelle and greet one another to ready the sails and deck. Stories of past regattas and shenanigans pepper the banter, with a few silent tears for those who will never return. “Ready on the main, ready on the fore!” Tension fills the dry air, but the crew snaps into action as the wind fills in and sails are hoisted. Last minute adjustments and checks are made as

The bowman in harness. Standing at the end of the bowsprit he calls distances and signals of other boats to the helm. A good voice for shouting “Starboard!” and a head for heights is needed as he will invariably be called aloft or out on a spinnaker pole – hence his modern “bosun’s chair”

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MARIETTE

Mariette 1915 Herreshoff, Bristol, RI, USA LOA: 108ft/33.5m LWL: 80ft/ 24.3m Beam: 23ft 7in/7.20m Draught: 13ft 7in/4.2m Sail area: 11119sq ft/ 1033m2

NIGEL PERT

From top left: controlling some of her vast acreage of light weather racing sails; getting the gun ready for a salute; storming along on the wind with just the one topsail.

start time approaches. All crewmembers know their tasks and hold positions, each one instrumental in the well-rehearsed orchestra as play is about to begin. As we near the start line, brisk commands are shouted to ease sails and depower the boat. Crossing the line too early would result in a stiff penalty that could be the difference between first or last. Clipped on to the headstay, the bowman stands precariously on the massive bowsprit, signalling boat lengths and direction to the helmsman. We cross just as the gun fires… a perfect start! “Sheet on, sheet on!” comes the command as we power up into the wind. Standby crewmembers rush to the windward rail and huddle near one another, their feet dangling against the hull, while others keep a vigilant eye on sail trim. “Down on jibtop one, up on jibtop two!” A last minute call to change sails triggers a chaotic burst of energy on the foredeck. Different combinations of her twenty-eight sails can be shuffled and tweaked to maximize speed according to wind angle.

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SCHOONER SCHOOLING

Tacticians and captain constantly mull over options as they warily eye the competition. A few sailors nestle like albatrosses in the masts far above, ready to rig topsails for the next jibe. “Douse the jib, ease the fore and main!” As we round the mark, windward sails drop while spinnakers are raised and other sails sheeted out in a flurry of energy. “Ease the kite sheet, ease kite sheet…you’ve

the other schooners and all seems according to plan. “Tacking in 30 seconds!” shouts the captain. A smooth tack, but a tad early... we gradually lose velocity as wind and sea set us closer and closer to the orange float. If we don’t clear it all may be lost. A quick jibe spins the boat around and back into position. We edge past with only a few metres of clearance and crack off the sails as the wind

A last minute call to change sails triggers a chaotic burst of energy on the foredeck got a kite!” Blocking out the photography chase boats and helicopters incessantly whizzing about, you slip back into time for a moment and imagine these old girls alongside one another running cargo or rushing royalty across ancient seas. Winning the last two days, we are in line to clinch our class if we can maintain our position. Well into the course we surge past

builds. With a freshening wind, the old girl comes into her own, her thick keel slicing through the water as we rapidly rip towards the finish line. “Trim on!” shouts the first mate as winches noisily crank in sheets. The deck goes silent on the final push, all eyes now on sails and the finish. As we cross the line and applaud one another, the conversation quickly turns to time. Was our handicap

enough? What about the staggered starts? Did we win on corrected time? Once the mainsails are flaked and we begin to motor into port the deck bustles with energy, all hands packing sails and clearing the deck. As we approach our berth, a miniature cannon is fired off the bow, followed by a volley from a fellow schooner. Our crew flocks to the bow to give three cheers to the competition, and they return the goodwill. After a quick wash down, crewmembers lightheartedly jibe one another over gaffs as beers are handed up from the galley and music begins to throb from the nearby committee tent. Finally, the word comes from the aft deck that we’ve won! In all the excitement an unfortunate birthday boy is tossed overboard into the drink. Toasts and handshakes all around as beaming sunburnt faces congratulate one another. Much has changed in the century since Mariette’s steel-riveted hull first splashed, but the age-old tradition of regatta racing is still preserved through her and a handful of these other living works of art that have weathered the test of time. ★

A gaff schooner’s rig can seem complicated at first; eyes are aloft here as a light weather sail is got ready to be hoisted.

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2/08/16 11:16 PM

ARTHUR RANSOME ON FILM

Swallows and amazement The new Swallows and Amazons film has already raised eyebrows with alterations and additions to the classic story – but will it also raise a cheer? Peter Willis meets the people behind it

o what was his ‘pirate past’ that Captain Flint (aka Uncle Jim) was so busy writing about in his memoirs? In Arthur Ransome’s book we never find out. But in the new film adaptation of Swallows and Amazons it turns out to be espionage, and not in the past either. Russian spies are on his tail. It seemed a shocking departure from the much-loved book at first, but the more you think about it, the more logical it becomes. Everyone recognises that Arthur Ransome put himself into the character of Captain Flint. And before he became a writer of books about sailing for children, he’d been in Russia during the revolution, getting mixed up with the Bolsheviks and MI6. Was he a spy? Maybe, maybe not, but MI6 got as far as issuing him with a codename, S76 (also used by Captain Flint in the film). Ever since the publication of Roland Chambers’ The Last Englishman in 2010 the fascination with Ransome’s life, and particularly the Russian part of it, has grown and almost begun to overshadow his books. So when producer Nick Barton began to think about making the film this seemed to be the logical development. “We wanted to be faithful to the spirit of the book,” he explained to me, “but we also felt we needed to make sure the film would be able to stand up in cinemas. A lot of British films feel quite small, and we wanted it to stand up against the ‘big films’ that modern-day young audiences are used to.” For Nick Barton, tall, balding and not all that unlike Ransome’s own depiction of himself-as-Captain-Flint, this has been a project of passion. He has loved the Swallows and Amazons books since he read

them all at the age of 12, though he didn’t get into sailing dinghies himself until his forties, when “I went to the Boat Show, saw a Norfolk Oyster and fell in love with it.” The 17ft gunter-rigged simulated-clinker GRP Oyster, based on a design by John Leather, was being built in North Norfolk by Charlie Ward. “I went up there, ordered it, test sailed it in Blakeney Harbour, and decided we had to find somewhere up there to live. I was taught to sail by Andrew Athill, known as ‘the Major’ – he lived on Moreston marshes, taught all sorts of people to sail, including the Royal Family. “It took me a long time to learn to sail properly, and longer to sail singlehanded, but it was then – 1992 – that I started to

think about Swallows and Amazons as a film – everybody up there leads a Swallows and Amazons sort of life.” He was working in TV, but formed a film company, Harbour Pictures, whose first feature film was Calendar Girls (about the nude Women’s Institute calendar) in 2003, followed up by Kinky Boots, 2005. This Swallows and Amazons film has been a long time gestating. Significant milestones were 2007 when Nick met and teamed up with Andrea Gibb, who has written the screenplay, and 2011 when amid much fanfare the BBC came onboard as co-producer. Even then it took until 2015 to get the rest of the finance in place and for shooting to begin.

Swallows forever! From left: Susan (Orla Hill), Roger (Bobby McCulloch), Tatty (Teddie-Rose Malleson-Allen), John (Dane Hughes) and ex-RNSA dinghy as Swallow

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“...when children were more free than they are now to go off on their own to explore and have adventures...”

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ARTHUR RANSOME ON FILM Nick and I were originally going to meet up for this interview on the water, aboard his boat in Norfolk. But time pressures, combined with the opportunity to see a preview screening of the film meant that we eventually sat down together in the rather incongruous setting of the Groucho Club in London’s Soho. Another advantage though was that it enabled Andrea to be present too. “She’s been in it from the beginning,” explained Nick. “She started writing in 2009

The challenge was to find a way of expanding the story that remained truthful to the tone that Ransome sets up and delivered the first script in 2010. The essence of what we have now was in that first draft, but it grew and evolved.” For Andrea, “If you are coming to something so loved, with its central message of the joy of childhood, imagination, learning responsibility and teamwork… Arthur Ransome’s evocation of childhood is just brilliant… the challenge was to find a way of expanding the story that remained truthful to the tone that Ransome sets up.” She was also conscious of “the sense of time” – the prewar period setting when children were a great deal more free than they are now to go off on their own to explore and have adventures without their parents hovering over them. (There’s a nice little scene between Mother and Mrs Jackson where they discuss exactly this issue.) Andrea likes to quote something she once heard from Michael Morpurgo. “It was to the effect that the key element in the success of children’s literature is that the children must own their own universe,” she says. And when you hear the impassioned cry of “But Mother, it’s our destiny,” from the younger of the two female Walker children, as they try to persuade her to let them sail to the island, who can doubt that they will. But she certainly makes her Swallows earn it. “The jeopardy must be real and they must fight their own way out of it.” And they do. Quite aside from the Russian agents, they face cold, hunger, two man-overboard incidents (only one of which is dealt with successfully). They learn survival skills, including making a fire – and they are stretched to breaking-point, quarrelling and snapping at each other. But they also enjoy themselves enormously, camping out in the (beautifully photographed) Lake District, exploring and, of course, sailing. Finding the boats though proved quite a challenge, and Nick Barton freely admits they are not the Swallow and Amazon of the book. “Old boats like those are really hard 52 CLASSIC SAILOR

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SWALLOWS AND AMAZONS Left: Filming on the Houseboat as Captain Flint (Rafe Spall) prepares to walk the plank Right: The Amazons – Seren Hawkes as Nancy Blackett and Hannah Jayne Thorp as Peggy

to find – and the cost and time involved in building them would have been prohibitive. It was Steve Beresford of Good Wood Boats who suggested RNSA dinghies.” These classic mahogany-on-oak clinker 14-footers were built in numbers for the Royal Naval Sailing Association between about 1935 and 1960; even so, it took the Harbour Pictures team a good three years to track down two of them – then the insurers insisted they acquire a third, as a spare. “They looked the part, but we needed to re-rig them for lugsails,” says Nick. “We went to Peter Lawson of Sailblades in Kendal. The masts are stayed, which isn’t traditional, but both Peter and I took the view that given the size of the sails and mast, for safety’s sake they should be. We were filming on two of the most dangerous

We were filming on two of the most dangerous lakes in Britain – with children and without lifejackets lakes in Britain – Coniston and Derwentwater – with children and without lifejackets.” The child actors recruited to play John, Susan, Tatty and Roger do sail their own Swallow, as do Nancy and Peggy the Amazon. They were given lessons, both individually beforehand, and then on location, and the sailing sequences have a real zest and exuberance about them. The houseboat was hardest to find. Of the two possible originals, the Gondola has now been restored by the National Trust and steams up and down Coniston full of tourists, while Esperance is at the Windermere Steamboat Museum, and far too fragile to move, let alone be used for filming boisterous plank-walking escapades. There was a further limitation – it had to be no bigger than 40ft to negotiate the little bridge into Coniston. Eventually they found an old CLASSIC SAILOR 53

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ARTHUR RANSOME ON FILM

From left: Orla Hill as Susan, Dane Hughes as John, a strange (glassfibre?) rock outside the Secret Harbour, and Bobby McCulloch as Roger

motor-cruiser, built around 1904 and mercifully unrestored to any great degree. It suited the role perfectly, though the interior had to be recreated in a studio for filming. It certainly looks more the part than the boat used in the 1974 film. The spirit of the 1974 version has hovered around the new film like an elderly greataunt tutting and muttering “That’s not how I did it.” Now much loved by older Ransome fans, it’s often forgotten that it came in for its share of criticism when first launched. In particular, Ronald Fraser wasn’t right for Captain Flint. Over the decades though we’ve got used to him, and it is revered as a near-perfect screen adaptation. It is very faithful to the book, taking it as a blueprint, with almost all the right bits in the right order. This new version treats the book more as a Meccano model, to be taken to pieces and put back together in a different way, with some bits left out and others added in. According to Andrea, “The book exists and will do for all time. Likewise the 1974 film” – which she hadn’t seen before starting on her screenplay, and wasn’t allowed to view while writing it. “Our film adds to the canon, and brings different things to it.” It reminded me of a story Arthur Ransome told of a child who told him she loved

Swallows and Amazons and would he please write another book. When he asked her what she would like it to be about, she replied, “Exactly the same children doing exactly the same things.” He was also a great connoisseur of folk tales and a believer in storytellers retelling them anew down the generations. The new film more than lives up to this challenge. It seems pacier that the earlier one; the children’s

The adults have a more active role, though as Andrea says, “the children must drive the story” – and they do language successfully bridges the gap between the modern ear and the speech of yesteryear. A strong cast has been assembled for the grown-ups – Rafe Spall as Captain Flint, Kelly Macdonald as Mother, Jessica Hynes and Harry Enfield as Mrs and Mr Jackson, and Andrew ‘Moriarty’ Scott as the lead Russian. The adults have a more active role in this adaptation, though – as Andrea put it – “the children must drive the story”. And they do. All four Swallows deliver the strong individual characterisations demanded by

the script, though I was disappointed that the Amazons get a bit sidelined. In the run-up to its release, the film has been dogged by publicity – notably from Barbara Alounyan, daughter of the original Roger, who, sounding rather like a greataunt herself, complained about the changing of her aunt Titty’s name to Tatty “without consultiing the family”, and managed to get the story into both the Daily Telegraph and again into the Sunday Times. The “family” is that of the children for whom Ransome wrote the original book, whose names he adopted for his Swallows – except for one, which Barbara Altounyan hasn’t complained about. Her eldest aunt Taqui had her entire name, as well as her gender, changed to create John in the book. It was just the tip of an iceberg of anxiety among Ransome devotees, who can be very touchy if their sacred texts are mucked about with (check tarboard.net). However at a couple of pre-release screenings for members of the Arthur Ransome Society, the overwhelming response was enjoyment and approval. Their one lingering fear was that children who, having seen the film, decided to read the book, would be disappointed to find there weren’t any spies in it. The film opens in cinemas on 19 August.

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VENICE LAGOON RAID

Raiding the other V Its Lagoon is the secret Venice keeps from its cruise-ship crowds. John Cadd discovered it this summer thanks to the Vela or sailing raid, with a mixture of local and visiting boats

he prevailing image of Venice is of spectacular St Mark’s Square, the Doge’s Palace and the Rialto districts overrun by dense hordes of tourists from all over the world. Central Venice has become a ‘tourist museum’ with up to fourteen million visitors a year. But it is well known that a visitor only has to walk a short distance from the crowded areas to find peace and quiet and Venice at is most desirable. This story of the Vela or Sailing Raid on the Venice Lagoon around the city takes this to a totally unworldly level of beauty and tranquillity.

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r Venice under sail What is not widely appreciated is that Venice hosts a unique fleet of Vela al Terazo sailing vessels. The most distinctive thing about the Vela al Terazo is the colourful painted designs on their sails. These were added so that boats could be recognised from a distance. Now the sails have evolved to have imaginative and creative designs that would be a credit to Banksy. This, as a marine photographer, was the first thing that attracted me to them. Google translates Vela al Terazo as ‘lugger’ but that is inaccurate. The boats are a cross between European luggers with trapezoidal shaped sails

and partly Mediterranean lateen rigged boats. The word Terazo mean roughly ‘three parts’, two parts of the sail aft of the mast and one third ahead of the mast. They are completely adapted to the shallow waters in which they were used to fish or carry goods or passengers. More than a thousand years ago the Venetian Islands were home to fishermen and their sail and oar boats evolved over that time. The boats are mostly flat bottomed without any keel, centreplate or leeboards. Their sails are set from an ‘ariel’ spar, like a lateen rigged boat but have a boom on the foot of the sail, unlike most luggers or lateen rigged boats which are loose-footed. I

JOHN CADD © WEXFORD FILMS LTD.2016

VENICE LAGOON RAID

The very varied Venice Lagoon Raid ﬂeet with, on the right Vela al Terzo classics with their colourful sails

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VENICE LAGOON RAID

Left, from top: The entrance to the Venice Arsenal – after the famous Carivagio painting; St Marks Square flooding when the tide comes in; Traditional bragozzo boats at the Venice Maritime Museum in the Venice Arsenal Main photo: Sail & oar on the back waters of the Venice Lagoon

Day 5: JC on Christina, Mazzorbetto-Lazzaretto-Casanova SC Day 4: JC on Emily, Lio Maggiore – Mazzorbetto Day 3: JC on Santa Lucia, Giudecca - Lio Maggiore Day 2: JC on Emily, Chioggia - Giudecca Island Day 1: JC on Christina, Casanova SC – Chioggia

I join the Raid

My chance to sail Vela al Terazo boats came with the Venice Lagoon Raid. This is open to all comers from Venice, Italy and the world and is for sailing boats that have a shallow draught and preferably can be rowed when the wind fails. Yes, mostly boats had outboard motors too. This May 2016 about 55 boats assembled at the Cassanova Sailing Club - Circolo Velico Casanova in Italian (CVC) – and formed two fleets. Four boats were trailed from Britain and Ireland. Three of them were Swallow BayRaiders of 17 or 20ft length, ideally suited to this sail and oar raid, with crews of two to five people. There was one major addition, the gaff-rigged whaler Molly, famous for her participation in many raids, including Venetian ones, and skippered by her owner Geoff Probert with a crew of up to a dozen. Set against these ‘modern’ boats were the Venetian style Vela al Terazo and it was interesting to compare the performance of these two types of boat. The rest of the fleet in the raid were a varied collection of some handsome varnished wooden boats, particularly from Scandinavia and Germany, and a very assorted fleet of modern small cruisers, often incapable of being rowed. Few were the same type or class as far as I could see. One new boat owned and built by Lorenzo, an Italian, was launched and christened Astrid, just the day before the Raid started. The boat is a 5.25 metre Pathfinder built from plans by John Welsford from New Zealand. This attractive vessel was sailed in the raid for her maiden cruise by Lorenzo, his

wife and two small children on the first day of the raid and after that singlehanded. This responsibility did not prevent the skipper from playing his alto saxophone while helming Astrid in the very light wind.

Sail and Oar

As a ‘deep sea’ salty sailor, I would not normally participate in a raid. I, very rudely, considered sail and oar events to be ‘ditch crawling’ (that’s me disqualified from further participation). It was only the chance to sail Vela al Terazo on the Venice Raid in the lagoon that attracted me to it. I was the only person present not to be attached to one particular boat and was a ‘sailor at large’, sailing on the British boat Emily, the Santa Lucia (in the rain) – as well as giving me two days sailing on the traditional Cristina with Marco D’Alba, who is the organiser of the Venice Lagoon Raid and incidentally also the President of the Casanova Sailing Club.

Marco – Raider in Chief

Marco had overall responsibility – with a willing team of helpers – for organising the 55 boats, selecting destinations and routes around the lagoon, arranging accommodation for those entrants who could not live on board and food and victuals for all. He also attempted to keep everyone happy and happy was what most people stayed. In addition, he also had to sail Cristina and host this sailing photographer with my 10kg worth of camera kit. No

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pressure then, he succeeded with a smile throughout. Just about two years of Racing and Cruising Raids are usually cut-throat competitive affairs with dedicated tacking duels pre-planning must have helped. Marco sailed Cristina owned by the Casanova Club. Cristina is a 7.3m and long stretches of hard racing rowing. Not so the Venice Lagoon Raid and long double-ended dory-shaped ‘topa’, originally used for carrying cargo as regards the rowing I say thank goodness. There were some races started but and goods. Marco thinks Cristina is about 30 years old and was probably they usually fizzled out when the wind dropped and after some rowing when built on the island of Burano, about ten kilometres east of the main city. the tide turned against the boats. No racing prizes were awarded. This was a The 600kg boat has a 21m2 mainsail and cause for disappointment from the hardened with either a 7m2 jib or 7m2 ‘trinchetta’ raiders mainly from Northern Europe who There were two fleets in the Raid trapezoidal fore sail, the latter being had done more competitive Venice Raids in reserved for racing. the past. There were two fleets in the Raid and and it seems that one could be for When racing Marco as helmsman has a it seems that one could be for those who like those who like serious racing and regular crew of two others, one a jib hand and serious racing and the other for just cruising. one a ‘borina’s man’ who sets the all-imporAs for myself, a virgin raider, I was dethe other for just cruising tant, correct ‘twist’ on the mainsail. With only lighted just to explore the beautiful unspoilt two to change sails on mark rounding, Marco Venice Lagoon under sail away from millions says it is ‘tough’. They really need three. “Let’s say that we as Cristina’s crew are of tourist who arrived on their cruise liners. I sailed with Marco for two beautough,” he says. I bet. tiful sunny days on his traditional boat and two equally beautiful days on the The other Vela al Terzo boats in the raid were smaller ‘sanpierota’, fishing 17ft long Emily. boats named after the neighbourhood of San Piero on the lagoon ‘barrier’ Swallows and Amazons? island of Pellestrina. These sanpierota were sailed downwind with one mast Emily is a Swallow BayRaider gunter-rigged yawl (or debatably a ketch). She was and usually rowed upwind, with of course the rowers standing and facing built from a kit by her owner Anthony who sails her with his wife Myfanwy. The forward the Venetian way. CLASSIC SAILOR

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most novel aspect of the Swallow BayRaider is its ability to flood a 220-litre four-course Venetian style dinners with wine every evening. These includunderfloor tank for sailing stability, without any risk of sinking. This water ed a complimentary welcome dinner and a departure dinner in the equally could either be removed, say, for ease of rowing with self-bailers when under civilised Fort Marghera. sail at speed or pumped out with a neat built-in hand pump. Every aspect of What was special about the raid was sailing round the city and through the boat had been thought out to aid sail and oar competition or cruising. The the islands that form part of it. By which I do not mean through the crowdsuitability of this design for the Venice Lagoon is shown by the fact that there ed canals with the Vaporetto water buses, the smart water taxis, the cargo were also two other Swallow boats that had delivery boats, police, fire and ambulance been trailered out from England and Ireland water hearses and not to forget the Sailing through marine wildernesses vessels, to take part in the Raid. gondolas, where, quite rightly, sailing is forbidden. When not near habitation we of beauty my camera can only Home from Home were sailing through marine wildernesses roughly capture.The Norfolk Broads of beauty that my camera can only roughly Another aspect of the Venice Raid which I am told is unusual is that we stayed at a capture. The Norfolk Broads on steroids on steroids comes to mind different part of the Lagoon every night and springs to mind. in very different accommodation. The most Then there were the lunch breaks often basic was mixed dormitories of bunk beds in a Scout camp based in an old rafted up with all the boats from both fleets together anchored in some remote gun emplacement fortress on the island of Mazzorbetto. I called it Alcatraz, spot reserved for people on boats that drew just a few inches (ditch crawling the difference being that we were not actually locked in or guarded. be blowed). If not luxurious it was rustically attractive. The other Raid fleet stayed Perhaps the most memorable of these was on the lagoon side of the there on the only rainy day and I am told it was not such fun. At the other southern end of the Venice Lido Island. The Venetians, Bepi, Giambruno and extreme was a very comfortable trekker, cyclist and boating hotel at Lio Roberto caught the fish and cooked it on their colourful, traditional â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;bragozzoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Maggiore in the East of the lagoon. What was uniformly good was the boat Paradiso for the enjoyment of all one hundred and eighty sailors on the 60 CLASSIC SAILOR

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Opposite page: The fleet near the Cassanova Sailing Club - with the whaler Molly in the centre. This page, top left: A typical evening meal; below, fresh fish for lunch Top right: Marco’s crew on the Vela al Terazo Cristina; middle:crew on one of the classics; bottom: Mifanwy on the helm and Anthony pumping on Emily

raid. This memorable meal was held near the middle of three entrances to the lagoon from the Adriatic where the flood barrage is nearing completion.

The Arsenal and the defence of Venice

Amazingly in 1927 the Venice Lagoon froze and I wonder did Venetians rig Vela al Terazo as ice yachts? In November 1966 Venice had its worst floods, up to the first floor of many buildings. Notoriously Venice floods every winter and the ‘museum city’ was and still is at risk of sinking. For many years in England I enjoyed pizza at a certain restaurant chain that sent ten pence from every Venetiana pizza I ate towards the Save-Venicefrom-Sinking fund. The money has gone, I hope, towards the multibillion euro cost of building flood barriers at the three entrances to the lagoon. These have taken about fifteen years from conception and it’s hoped they will be completed in 2018 – inevitably over budget and late. At the height of the Venetian Republican Empire around the fifteenth century the famous Venice Arsenal had the world’s largest industrial enterprise at the time. The 16,000 Venetians who worked there finished one naval lateenrigged galley or galleass every day on a production line basis that would have been a credit to Henry Ford. The keels were laid at one end of the Arsenal and were worked on by teams of specialists until they departed through the naval gate at the other end. There they would have just been equipped with their oars and perhaps the slaves to use them as they left the Arsenal. The Arsenal

was the only area of central Venice to be fortified, mainly for secrecy to stop foreigners and spies seeing how they made their ships so efficiently. Otherwise the shallow unmarked lagoon protected Venice from attack, combined with chains strung across the main channels. Now many of the buildings of the Arsenal have been restored. Apart from the fascinating Maritime Museum housing historic vessels, the Arsenal is still a navy base and is used as the base for the preparation of the flood defence barrages. When construction is complete the barrage will be controlled from the Arsenal to stop the worst of the winter tidal surges drowning the city, just as the Thames barrier on a smaller scale is designed to protect London. I wish the barrage could be used to keep out some of the cruise liners, up to twelve at a time, that flood Venice with too many tourists. I know for certain that many Venetians would support that.

How was it for you?

Not everything goes perfectly on a Raid. Goodness it rained one day on the Lagoon – the other days were scorching hot, which is what we wanted. We could have used a little more wind, but a couple of days after the Raid Venice had a tornado so we mustn’t grumble. Boats don’t run on railway lines, as my old captain used to say, and some things did not run on time. Did anyone care much? I don’t think so. If you are interested, Marco is planning the next Venice Raid in 2018. CLASSIC SAILOR

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TRAFALGARS OTHER SURVIVOUR

Sailing in the spi The replica HMS Pickle – herself now a survivor of Trafalgar – has been rescued and restored by Mal Nicholson and is back in service. Peter Willis reports

MS Pickle earned her place in history as the fast schooner which sped back to Britain from Trafalgar in October 1805 to deliver the glad/sad tidings of victory in the battle and the death of Nelson. In 2005, at the bicentenary of Trafalgar, a replica Pickle became a sort of proxy for HMS Victory at various waterborne ceremonials and events. The original Pickle

was wrecked less than three years after her moment of triumph, and, by 2014, the replica was facing a similar fate. She was lying in Gibraltar, with 4ft of water in her fo’c’sle, nose down and “about to slip under” according to Mal Nicholson, who had discovered her for sale on eBay, at a price of £79,000. “She was in a dreadful state. She had no insurance, her coding had expired and she was filling with water. The only sensible option, to avoid all the consequences of her sinking, was to tow her round to Rosia Bay – where Victory

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HMS PICKLE

pirit of Trafalgar was taken for repairs after Trafalgar – run her aground and set fire to her.” But he didn’t do that. “I’d bought her. It wasn’t a matter of finding out how bad she was – I knew how bloody bad she was. I wanted to save her.” For Mal, Pickle came into his life at a point where his existing design, engineering and restoration business of 30 years growth, with a personal collection of historic sports and racing cars, had been all but destroyed in the December 2013 tidal surge. “I had the

choice of rebuilding all that, which would take five years at least – or doing something else in the meantime.” He bought Pickle in July 2014, took three months or so to get her into a fit condition to put to sea with the aim of nursing her back under engine to the UK, and set out from Gibraltar with a naval escort. Almost immediately the alternator caught fire – another €1,000 bill for a replacement. It was at Cape Trafalgar, ironically enough, that Pickle was dismasted. “Even

on a relatively calm day it’s rough round Trafalgar with choppy, short seas but it wasn’t excessively bad,” Mal recalls. “We were doing five knots under engine – I’d have expected masts that were properly supported not to come down. They’d been painted and varnished up to look good, but they were just rotten inside. The main mast went first, then the triatic stay brought the foremast down.” They proceeded to Puerto Sherry, in the Bay of Cadiz, where the harbourmaster Paco was “fantastic”, with his team working

Above left: Pickle next to HMS Victory at the 2005 Festival of the Sea: Trafalgar 200 Above: At the Battle of Trafalgar, Pickle, circled in red, was kept well clear of the action(top)

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SPIRIT OF TRAFALGAR

Above: The replica Pickle under sail in 2005

through siesta time to repair the vessel, and thence to Mazagon – where the propeller fell off. “Luckily it caught on the skeg, otherwise it would have been lost in 15ft of sloppy mud. By this time,” added Mal, whose laconic sense of humour has clearly seen him through many a challenging situation, “I’m starting to wonder what the bloody hell I’d bought.” But his luck was about to turn, though admittedly not in a way that would immediately staunch the haemorrhaging

of his bank balance. “While we were in Vilamoura, we met a brilliant shipbuilder from Quartiera [about 3km further along the coast] whose family have built ships for over 300 years.” This was Rui Pinto. He brought a three-man team to the project and together with Mal’s own team, they set to work, in 40-degree heat in Portimao. “We became very good friends,” says Mal. “If it wasn’t for Rui I believe it would have been a very difficult or doomed project. We proceeded to rip her to bits, got

all the rotten wood out. I’d say we replaced about two-thirds of the ship – up to 22 tons of wood has gone into her.” By late August 2015 she was ready and set sail for the UK. The Portuguese gave her a good send-off and a wonderful present from Rui in the form of a re-creation, built by Rui himself, of a 300-year-old Portuguese fast launch as built by his great-grandfather. In Sines a wild night ripped the Lewmar anchor winch out of the foredeck, leaving it at an angle of 45º. A massive electrical

Right: The 2015 restoration in Portugal: 22 tons of new wood went into her. Notice the very different treatment of the stern

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HMS PICKLE

storm off A Coruña managed to break the winch which needed emergency repairs after paying out all the anchor chain – “but we reached Lorient in Southern France to a great welcome, then round by Ushant on the route taken over 200 years earlier, to Roscoff and Guernsey and on to the Solent, where our Royal Navy sent out an escort. “At Dover, conditions were very rough, but Pickle was great – she was a perfect lady!” The Mayor came aboard and they launched The Dover Boat, a re-creation of

a bronze-age boat, in welcome. Neil Batey from The Sailors Childrens Society – of which Mal is an ambassador – presented him with a painting of HMS Pickle. At Harwich, “the homecoming welcome was enough to bring a tear to a glass eye.” The Royal Hospital School, just up the River Stour, took the crew’s clothes and bedding to get them laundered and dried out, fed them and laid on a guided tour of the Nelson rooms and museum, finishing with a sail up the Stour for a photo session.

And so, via Great Yarmouth, with a TV interview at the Nelson Museum, home into the Humber, where a Royal Navy escort joined by the RNLI and the Police launch along with Humber Rescue, escorted her into Hull, her new home port, her new berth, and her new life. She moored up next to Mal’s earlier restoration, the Humber Super Sloop Spider T, at Keadby and plans are afoot for an adjacent shoreside exhibition of classic racing cars and motorcycles at Hull Marina where

Marine artist Geoff Hunt RSMA’s painting of the Pickle heading north in a heavy sea

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SPIRIT OF TRAFALGAR

Above: Builder’s drawings for the Russian schooner Alventina & Tui that eventually became Pickle

she now lies. Pickle is already running charter weekends and sail-training voyages. Perhaps the most surprising thing about this Pickle is the closeness of her lines to those of the original ‘fast, clever schooner’ that served at Trafalgar. The modern Pickle – Mal prefers to call her a reconstruction rather than a replica – was created for the

Right: HMS Pickle in Portsmouth Harbour this summer, on her way home from Portugal

bicentenary celebrations of Trafalgar in 2005, built onto the hull of a vessel Rodger Barton had found in Finland. “But,” says Mal “she’s not a Baltic trader, as people sometimes think – have you seen how slim she is?” In fact she was one of a small fleet of schooners built for sail training in the mid1990s in the Askold Shipyard, Petrazavodsk,

Russia, by Andrey Akhmeton. The plans he used were described at the time as those of a Baltic armed packet schooner of the 1790s. In fact they were probably based on the lines taken off Pickle in 1802 by two naval architects from the British Royal Navy. Pickle herself had been built in Bermuda, as a privateer named Sting. She came into the Royal Navy via Vice-Admiral Lord Hugh Seymour, who bought her in 1800 for £2,500. These lines appear to have become the basis of the 1995 Alventina & Tui, named after the owner and his wife, which eventually became the replica Pickle. Another of the five boats was named Elena Maria Barbara, after their three daughters. Both vessels were eventually owned by Robin James, who kept Pickle but sold Elena to Andrew Thornhill’s World of Boats, where she remains under restoration. Mal, who now has in his possession a copy of the original plans of Pickle, is still mulling over her future, as HM Schooner Pickle is now the central thrust of his new venture HMS (Historic Motor And Sail) a non-profit organisation for historic ships, cars and motorcycles. To an extent she will have to earn her keep. “I took it on the chin to save her – if I’d decided to apply for grants she’d have sunk before they came through.” Options include Tall Ships races and coastal work such as cruises or visits to maritime events. Invitations already received include Hartlepool, home of HMS Trincomalee, Whitby and Harwich Sea Festival.

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MARINE MOTORING

Sea Lion to the Baltic Helen Lewis and The Skipper discover the delights (and difficulties) of continental canals, and at last pass through the ultimate – the mighty Kiel

t was April Fool’s Day of course when Sea Lion set off for the cruise of a lifetime. Being a modest little boat and designed for estuary work I doubt it had ever crossed his maker’s mind that some foolhardy owners 35 years later would take him foreign. I guess if I’m honest it hadn’t occurred to me either until I found myself being swept along by the Skipper’s enthusiasm. Thus it was that we found ourselves wandering up to the harbour office in Bradwell in thickish fog wearing our wellies, thermals, thick jumpers and the Skipper resplendent in his prototype naval duffel coat. We were met by the lugubrious Harbour Master who turned to his colleague saying “Ey ey, this looks serious!” I can never see the Skipper wearing his duffel without feeling the same. For those of you who sail mighty sailing boats, without dogs, this will seem a strange ritual but the Skipper and I make it our practice to creep around to Ramsgate or Dover before dashing across the Channel. In those days we were too timid to ignore the stern strictures of Ramsgate

Harbour Commissioners who refused to admit Beasts upon their territory and we were making for Dover. We were also sufficiently cautious to go into the mouth of the Thames Estuary, dodging from buoy to buoy and loving the romance of the ancient channels and sands (the Wallet Spitway, the Warp, the Cant, the Horse and Pudding Pan). We often spent a night on the small landing stage at Queenborough on the Isle of Sheppey, wondering at the toilet arrangements which involved a metal revolving gate, a token and a public loo. If you decide to go BEWARE – once out you cannot return without a token and to get one you must find the local shop, or pub or sailing club open and manned. That first crossing of the Channel should always be a tense one otherwise you truly ought not to be doing it. If you know enough you will worry, particularly in a small, slow, single-engined vessel. We blessed our radar and our AIS, as we still do now on a boat twice the size and with two engines. We moored up in Calais dazed, jubilant and just a little bit ruffled.

Rough and tumble in Terneuzen Lock

Our journey now lay in the canals of Europe. For this we felt ourselves to be well equipped, arguably better than most sailors, as we had spent 25 years going through locks on a regular basis and were well used to manoeuvring at close quarters. Think again, oh ye cocky ones. There is such a variety of locks and lock keepers spanning the four countries we were to travel through – France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany – that nothing but another chunk of experience would suffice. To start with, many locks ‘sur le continent’ are designed for huge barges and you may find you have no choice but to cling to one mooring bollard trying desperately to hold your bobbing vessel in to the side. Sea Lion was light so this was mostly not too difficult but we were to re-learn the implications of this when, a few years later, we did the same with a much heavier boat. Then there are the lock keepers themselves, mostly friendly enough but some, like caricatures from the war movies of our childhood, seeming to regard us as ‘the old enemy’.

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THE CRUISING LIFE: PART 5 Left: Sea Lion in Hoorn. Right, from top: Helen and Lola on Marken; Dutch clogs; Zuiderzee Museum, Enkhuizen

These surly characters had a battery of weapons they could throw at one. A long long lunch or a public holiday no one had ever heard of were the mildest. The ability to smash your boat up with a cunningly opened single sluice at full tilt taking your boat’s nose across the écluse in the blink of an eye was another matter. Skipper would mutter under his breath “don’t they know who liberated them,” all the while smiling charmingly and speaking calmly to them in their native tongue while I took to wearing gloves for rope work. Then of course there are the automated locks: mysterious ‘Beauty and the Beast’ affairs where levers, buttons and sensors aid your ingress seemingly without command.

The first crossing of the Channel should always be a tense one, otherwise you ought not to be doing it

Now what I need to tell you, if you haven’t already discovered it for yourselves, is what fun the inland waterways can be. They take you to places you would never have dreamed of going. In Belgium and the Netherlands in particular there are many medieval towns unspoilt, un-bombed. Some are well known like Middelburg, Veere and Bruges and there are others that you may come across by chance. Let me not tell you, but make them your own. These charming watery towns and cities almost all have a museum and often an art gallery. One of the hidden delights of travelling by water is that not every day is ‘a go’. Whether it is a broken mainstay or a leaky water-pump or simply the weather the museum may be the answer. Whatever your interests – cultural, social, political or nautical – believe me the museums of Europe, including our own UK ones, have a richness that will leave your brain buzzing to match your cheeks. Of course there is also the belly to be considered. The little towns dotted across

the canal and river system of Europe have markets to die for. You can buy sublime yoghurt and cheese, herbs and breads, olives and strings of garlic. In Bruges we fell not for the waffles or the chips with mayonnaise, wonderful as they are, but for ‘bolus’: flaky pastry affairs with seams of cinnamon. Later we discovered that this was a 17th-century Jewish delicacy and we wondered, as you will, at an odd phrase or a custom or indeed a bun that had made its way across old Europe and survived. When we found ourselves more remotely moored the Skipper’s baking skills (see next page) rose to the fore and the smell of freshly baked bread wafted from our portholes to tempt any passing yachtsman. If you get stuck for a day or two, the local cinema is likely to be showing at least one film in English, subtitled for the locals, and there are concerts, concerts everywhere. Added to this they take their old boats very seriously so their harbours nearly always have a fine collection to gaze at when taking an evening stroll. CLASSIC SAILOR

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MARINE MOTORING The Skipper’s word

Heading into the fastrunning, tidal Elbe from Otterndorf

If you are travelling in spring dally a while at Lisse to visit the tulips at the Keukenhof Gardens. Nothing can prepare you for those banks of solid colour in fields when the tulips are in full bloom nor the wooded parkland planted out with beds of hot orange or shocking pink. If you are into your flowers then try Leiden for its botanical gardens or in the summer stop at Giverny and visit Monet’s garden and house. If you are heading for the Med then tie up at Sancerre and walk slowly up the hill. At the top ensure you have enough time to have lunch and do some wine tasting. When you have chosen the cru and vintage simply load your booty into a taxi and deliver it to your vessel. Weeks later reach into the bilges for a bottle or two when you lie at anchor off Ischia and savour icy France in Italy’s heat – if you can wait that long! But I digress, that was a different journey and for now we are heading in

already taken a tiny one from Amsterdam through to the former island of Marken (make sure you try the fried fish followed by poffertjes). Our arrival caused some puzzlement as high winds had made the open water route from Amsterdam dangerous for small craft and the harbour master had no idea the Trekvaart Het Schouw was still navigable. Now as we left Bremerhaven we were making for another diminutive canal, the Geeste. It took us a while to work out how to enter it: there was a fixed railway bridge with such low air height that even we could not slip beneath it. Eventually we asked some passing oarsmen and felt the hot flush of foolishness when they advised us to wait for low tide! Once under we entered a magical waterway. Here we meandered along a narrow rural ribbon of water for two days until at the far end we reached the ancient junction of locks, sluices and tunnel at Otterndorf. We had come to the Elbe: but a monkey’s fist Our modest dimensions let us go throw away from the entrance to the Kiel Canal. However down some of the prettiest canals that throw must be carefully that were denied to grander vessels calculated for the Elbe runs fast with a lively tidal range. little Sea Lion to the Baltic. Added to this we could only get through When you get to the ancient port of the lock when the water was low enough Bremen you could visit the Ratskeller. Here for us to clear the tunnel mouth. Huffing you sit amongst enormous wine barrels and puffing there was, while calculation and eat herrings of almost any variety. I after calculation was made, and finally a love herrings and never tire of them and decision to go through and wait. On the far I am also rather partial to fried potatoes side we met one of our most memorable and a glass of cold Dunkel beer. This is Harbour Masters, partly because he probably one of the reasons I am always a celebrated our achievement rather than our sucker for a voyage back North. foolhardiness. He literally fell to his knees There were times when I sincerely when it dawned on him that we had come doubted the wisdom of a trip of 3,330 from England, though I still wonder if he nautical miles in a flattish bottomed 26ft thought we had come via the North Sea. elderly boat with a large hairy dog and my We had got our sums right and a day later lovely Skipper but there were other times we entered the Kaiser Wilhelm Kanal with when I basked in the absolute certainty the Big Boys and proudly progressed through that we were lucky beyond anything. The that majestic waterway to Kiel. We were in the next bit of our journey contained both Baltic and my first impressions have remained the former and the latter. Because of Sea with me over the years - the clearest, cleanest, Lion’s modest dimensions we could go loveliest water but would I ever be able to down some of the prettiest canals that swim with all those jelly fish? Next month: Oslo and back were denied to grander vessels. We had

You probably thought a skipper just has to get the ship roughly where promised with no scuffs or grazed knees, make as little hash as possible of getting into a berth, and then produce a fine, bilge-chilled Gavi di Gavi. Would it were that simple! No, the skipper must aspire to the Renaissance ideal: poet, scientist, musician, artist, linguist, dancer, philosopher. As well as plotting a course to steer and repacking the stern glands we must be able to cut a caper, dash off a ballad and bake a loaf of bread. I’ll keep the first to myself, give an example of the second when the Editor’s away sailing, and treat the third here and now. Pleasantly often it is the task of the ship’s dog and her morning walker to find the bakery. In the Med this can be a surprisingly uneven experience. Swathes of Italy and Greece provide dull, samey loaves and even France has its bald patches. The Baltic is a different matter. There fine bakeries safely outnumber the mediocre. The choice is daunting between five-corn breads, intense dark breads, rye breads, breads with chia, buckwheat or sourdough. The artisanal baker near the harbour in Roskilde, Denmark has huge seeded brown loaves with wondrous taste and texture. The best focaccia I have eaten north of Genoa came from the baker almost on the quay in Varberg on Sweden’s west coast: plump, blackened, luscious. An unassuming shop in Flensburg is quietly turning out the definitive five-corn brot of Schleswig-Holstein. Sooner or later, however, you find yourself stuck crust-less on an anchorage with breakfast ticking ever closer. The Renaissance Skipper takes such calamities in his stride. Moving silently to wake no one, he lights the oven, quickly mixes his ingredients only as much as he needs to amalgamate everything into a firm but just moist dough, shapes it into a round mound slashed with a cross, dusts it with flour and slips it onto the middle shelf as the temperature reaches 200˚C. He then walks the ship’s dog for precisely forty minutes before returning to remove loaf from oven, tap the base to hear that resonant hollow sound and place it nonchalantly on the cooling rack where it will be found – still warm – by the crew when they rise from their slumbers, wistful at the thought the bread has run out. How wrong they are! The Skipper’s Soda Bread 1lb flour (8oz seeded/malted/wholemeal, and 8oz strong plain white) A handful of oats or bran 1 tsp salt 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda 1 tsp honey 15 fl oz buttermilk, or a mix of plain yoghurt and milk with a tablespoon of lemon juice Make sure, though, you are busy with spanner or barometer when the crew stumbles forrard, drawn by that magical smell. You don’t want it to look as though you are only capable of one thing. Jonathan Lewis

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info@drascombe.co.uk

OWW H S O

AT SH O T B

N OA O T KB P M AAR47 A 5TH LE4P U A O EA D S N A HE E TB T S H T SA TT

73 CLASSIC SAILOR Model shown is a Drascombe Longboat p73_CS0816_Drscmb_soton.indd p84_CS0616_drascomb.indd 1 73

E UUS A E S

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TRAILER SAILING PART 2

Parked ’n’ dried: Taking g This month David Parker focuses on making sure it stays attached, well-

ith your enthusiasm fired up from part one (last month) you have probably already hitched up the Cortina and are heading for the seaside. But to avoid any roadside indignities (or worse) we should next look at trailer maintenance and keeping it legal. Maintenance is such a priority with boat trailers because when it comes to salt water and mechanical objects you can’t get away with anything. It’s easy to lavish lots of time on the boat and neglect the trailer which can sometimes be left standing for months. The mindset creeps in that because you haven’t used it, it won’t need a service, but it is often through lack of use that parts can corrode and seize up. There is also sometimes a tendency to just concentrate on the wheels. These are of course vital and we’ll be looking at servicing them later but don’t neglect the chassis and acces-

sories either. It will ensure that your trailer rig stays in good condition and within the law. There are as yet no laws about trailer MOT’s in this country, however if your trailer isn’t roadworthy then it is just as illegal and dangerous as if you drive a car without an MOT. You may risk points on your licence and a fine. But if you start out by keeping your trailer in good condition, serviced at least once a season, it’s much easier to keep it that way. Regular maintenance prevents minor jobs becoming major expensive ones and helps eliminate problems before they happen. It will make your towing a lot safer and easier – and give you peace of mind when on the road. Because this is a beginner’s guide it’s important to point out that if you do plan to undertake your own maintenance you shouldn’t start taking any assemblies apart unless you know exactly what you’re doing and have the right tools for the job. If in any doubt get the bearings and brakes in particular checked by a professional because it’s obviously dangerous to tamper with the wheel and

brake systems on a trailer in the hope that you get it right. If you’ve reassembled a brake drum and are scratching your head because there’s a spring left over then maybe it’s time to get help. But we all have to start somewhere so the aim here is to explain basically what’s involved when it comes to trailer maintenance, help with fault finding and understanding parts and components. It will also hopefully help you decide which routine jobs you can safely carry out yourself and allow you to be more informed when having work done at a service centre. One point I’d like to make early on is that if ever you need to jack up the wheels make sure the trailer is on the flat and always properly chocked. Make doubly sure the chassis is properly supported if you have to get underneath a larger trailer to inspect brake linkages etc.

The initial inspection

Trailers should be given the once-over each time you take them on the road and a visual inspection will tell you about the overall bodywork and the condition of the chassis such as welds, galvanising and

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TRAILER MAINTENANCE

g good care of the trailer maintained, fit for its boat, compliant with the law and above all safe 1. Opposite page: This dual piggy back design has been specially designed so that the Cornish Shrimper has its own launching trailer to prevent the road wheels being immersed in salt water

2. Here’s an expensive 4-wheel trailer which has clearly seen better days and the repeated soakings from the tide aren’t going to help 3. Only with the coupling removed could the extent of this corrosion be properly seen

4. Just as well I checked – this was all that was left of the bolts actually holding the coupling in place! 5. When replacing fittings badly corroded bolts can be drilled out

mudguards etc. You will also get to see where corrosion builds up. Hidden corrosion or salt deposits can sometimes make a nut appear tight, then the vibration of towing on the road will make it work loose. I’ve had this happen with hull supports which appeared firm but worked loose when under way. Nuts and bolts are particularly vulnerable to corrosion because they are often just zinc-plated mild steel so get rapidly attacked by salt water. Similarly if road wheels have been immersed in salt water and you’re doing a lot of mileage then thorough lubrication checks should be carried out at least twice or three times a season, maybe more. There’s no hard and fast rule, a lot of it’s down to common sense and it’s certainly better to make maintenance a regular habit. Work systematically as you make your checks. When you see professional trailer engineers undertake a thorough inspection of a trailer for servicing they start at the front and work their way back looking at every detail. This is a really good habit to get into when you start trailer sailing and carry out your own maintenance schedule.

Essential accessories

To keep legal and safe it is also important to pay attention to some vital accessories which have to be fit for purpose when towing. For a start you must display the same number plate on your trailer as on your towing car. Any number plate on the trailer must be a mandatory design and

Work systematically as you make your checks. Professionals start at the front and work their way back, looking at every detail the same specifications as the plate on the towing vehicle. The days of trying to get away with a piece of cardboard and a marker pen are over – unless you want to get pulled over. In Europe a trailer will have its own number plate in the same way as a car does. Therefore you could tow someone else’s trailer with your car but it would

be registered to them. When abroad you can still use your normal GB plate but all trailers have to be EU type approved now. Typically the number plate will be on the trailer lighting board and although the lighting board itself isn’t technically part of the trailer it should always be on the check list as an essential part of your trailer sailing. Sometimes they can be awkward to fit and get easily damaged so I’ve made up a rigid plywood mounting board for mine which slots over the boat’s transom and can be fitted or released quickly and easily. It also holds the lights/lens secure and protects them from excessive vibration when towing. Before each use check the trailer board and cable for any signs of wear. Test that the 7-pin plug is working properly so that all lights are functioning correctly. Electrical problems are something we’ll be looking at in greater detail in a later article but trailer lights should also be checked periodically when you’re on the road. After ensuring your trailer lighting board is operational and legal the next job is on the car itself CLASSIC SAILOR

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TRAILER SAILING PART 2 6a and 6b: Part of regular maintenance is dealing with all areas of corrosion. Here is a pair of mudguards before and after an effective rust treatment 7. It was necessary to use an angle grinder on this seriously seized bearing

8. A small DIY welder is a very handy bit of kit for work on the trailer chassis

9. Improvements can also be made as part of a maintenance programme. Here welding on new plates for the suspension units also offered the opportunity to fabricate and fit new tie down bars

and this is the 50mm tow ball. This should be well greased and when not in use have a cover to keep it from picking up dirt and grit and getting grease all over your trousers each time you open the boot. You should also check that the tow ball bracket bolts are secure and that the ball itself is not worn so that there’s no movement when the primary coupling is fitted. When doing this make sure that the locking trigger on the primary coupling works properly and that the spring underneath is not corroded or damaged. Tow bars must be ‘type approved’. This means it meets EU regulations and is designed for your car. This doesn’t apply to cars first used before 1 August 1998 but the towbar does now fall within the remit of the MOT. A well fitted and maintained towbar is vital for safety so you should inspect the tow bracket regularly, checking for cracking or serious rusting and that the bolts are correctly tightened. If in doubt get it checked out by a towbar specialist.

Putting the brakes on

Any trailer weighing over 750kg, including its load, must have a working brake system. Also, an unbraked trailer must also not be used if its laden weight exceeds half the towing vehicle’s kerbside weight. The laden weight of a trailer fitted with brakes which automatically come into operation must not exceed 3500kg and trailers in excess of this weight must have brakes operated by the braking system of the towing vehicle. You should regularly inspect cables and fittings and the parking brake must be capable of holding the laden trailer on an 18% gradient. Also any trailer

weighing over 750kg, including its load, should be fitted with a braking device to stop the trailer automatically if the main coupling is detached from the towing vehicle. With a braked trailer designed to carry an allup weight of over 750kg you will need to check that the damped coupling is working efficiently and the rubber bellows are in good condition to prevent damage to the drawbar inside it. There shouldn’t be any excessive movement in the head of the coupling and when the wheels are chocked you should be able to push the damped coupling

Check the handbrake and don’t wait until you’re on a steep slipway to discover it needs adjustment in slowly. Alternatively you can hitch the trailer to the car and gently rock the trailer back and forth. If you are unable to move the damped coupling or if there’s too little resistance it will need looking at or replacing. For maintenance purposes use a grease gun on the grease nipples on the coupling. With the chocks removed also check the handbrake and don’t wait until you’re on a steep slipway to discover it needs adjustment. When you have checked the primary coupling is operating properly then inspect the secondary coupling or ‘breakaway cable.’ If it’s damaged or broken it needs to be changed because it means four points on your licence if you’re not using it,

it’s malfunctioning or is in a condition which is not fit for use. The secondary coupling is there for a reason and that is to stop you from losing the trailer if the primary coupling comes off. A new one is easy to fit and they are not expensive.

Nicely wound up

If your trailer has a winch make sure a proper webbing strap is fitted and it is in good condition. Polyester webbing has a much greater breaking strain than rope and is easier to handle than wire. Wire can also be lethal if it suddenly snaps under tension. If you have to fit new webbing or rope on to a winch it should be offset with a bar above the spindle and winches have pre-drilled offset holes for this purpose. Beware not to over tighten the high tensile nut and bolt which acts as the offset bar because you could crush the drum. Use a Nylock nut to keep it secure. Any webbing strap should be approximately 1.5m longer than the trailer chassis just in case you get into difficulties. Check that the ratchet on the winch is working – the spring in the locking clasp can wear out. On any incline without the ratchet working the winch won’t hold and the boat will slip back off the trailer. If ever this does happen and the handle does start to spin round uncontrollably never try and stop it with your fingers, or let anyone else near it, because it could cause serious injury. Always make sure no one is ever behind a boat when retrieving it with a winch. It is often easier to replace a winch rather than try and repair it. Jockey wheels come in for a lot of use and abuse as you manoeuvre trailers around bumpy yards so check it isn’t badly worn and winds in

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TRAILER MAINTENANCE 10 Don’t ignore fittings hidden by the hull. The U-bolt on this roller is due for replacement 11Jockey wheel shaft needs to be cleaned and greased

12 Check the breakaway cable is in good condition and firmly secured

13 Thick winch webbing has a greater breaking strain than rope and is easier to handle than wire 14 Don’t forget to keep the tow ball greased and protected by a dust cover when not in use

and out easily. Keep the inner shaft on a jockey wheel smeared with grease and check that the clamp pad is secure. If a jockey wheel doesn’t wind in or out smoothly the central screwed rod may be damaged or corroded so you’ll need to chock the front of the trailer to remove the inner shaft and inspect it. With the jockey wheel removed you just unwind it completely to get it apart so you can lubricate it.

Look behind you

Ensure your wing mirrors give an adequate view of the road behind you and along both sides of the load. If your boat or trailer is wider than the rear of the towing vehicle you’ll need to fit additional suitable towing mirrors. You can get three points on your licence and be fined up to £1,000 for towing without them. These should not project more than 200mm beyond your load’s widest points or 250mm if your towing mirrors are E-marked to the latest standard. The Department for Transport now states that towing mirrors used on any car registered on or after 26 January 2010 must carry an E marking. E marking means the mirrors meet the EEC/EC standard and have passed impact tests. Basically this means you do not want to fit a cheap mirror which could send razor sharp shards of glass everywhere if it was hit – particularly if you are driving along with the window open. Fitting decent towing mirrors is also common sense for as well as checking the road behind, you will find you will instinctively often be giving them a quick glance to check your load and the straps etc. They are also a big advantage when it comes to manoeuvring the boat and trailer. Make

15 Use the grease nipple on the wheel hub to keep bearings regularly greased

sure the mirrors are adjusted correctly and any extension mirrors are removed when not towing.

The chassis

For most of us launch and retrieval can always be a bit frenetic. We probably feel we’ve got enough to think about without checking over the trailer when we want to focus on getting afloat or getting home. But actually the best time to check the trailer thoroughly is when the boat isn’t on it. This is when you can inspect the overall condition of the chassis, frame welds and the rollers.

There’s nothing to stop you building your own trailer – but the law surrounding this is something of a grey area Rollers are vulnerable to sunlight and salt water and may show some cracks but as long as they all rotate freely and are intact they should be OK. A multipurpose lubricant like WD40 can be used to make sure rollers turn freely. Also ensure the U-bolts which secure them to the trailer spine aren’t corroded. If any rollers or pads on support bars are damaged or have lost their cushioning ability get them changed – otherwise you will create pressure points that may damage the hull. When you have identified any areas of the chassis that need tidying up then for local areas of corrosion an aerosol galvanising spray can be used. First degrease the area, clean it with a wire

brush and spray it over. You can use paint such as Hammerite (or CooVar) but bear in mind that it doesn’t adhere particularly well to galvanising and tends to flake off after a while unless the surface has been well abraded. Typically the frame itself will be a standard box section steel which offers an excellent weight to strength ratio. However if it is not galvanised the internal parts of the frames should also be checked for rust to ensure the wall thickness of the steel hasn’t degraded too much. If parts of the chassis are broken or missing then you may well need professional help to fix it. A missing mudguard will mean points on your licence if you get caught trailing without it. Good service agents will also be able to make new sections up if required and weld them in place to the old chassis if it’s sound. If you’re attempting more major repairs yourself and need to remove old sections or fittings then with very corroded nuts it might be a case of cutting them off with a hacksaw, drilling them out or using a grinder. Before you weld anything the surfaces you weld to must be spotlessly clean. Everything has to be clamped securely for this type of work and appropriate eye protection is essential when grinding as when welding. If you want to build your own trailer from scratch there is nothing to stop you doing this but I’m told by Indespension that the law surrounding this is something of a grey area. You can build your own trailer if it is for your own use and it still has to be safe and roadworthy but if you sell it on then it has to be type approved. This means you must take it to a proper DOT test centre with evidence to show that the trailer has been built to CLASSIC SAILOR

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TRAILER SAILING PART 2 17. Unbraked trailers are used for lighter craft and require less maintenance 18. For an all-up weight of over 750kg a braked trailer must be used. Check that the damped coupling is working efficiently

Right: If all’s well the trip to the slipway will have gone smoothly and so will the launch – in this case a Swallow Boats’ Bay Cruiser

the proper specification in regard to things like the wall thickness of the steel etc. Trailer manufacturers will put a Vehicle Identification Number (VIN), similar to a car’s, on the chassis. This plate shows the gross weight and the carriage capacity and that it is EU type approved.

Don’t get overloaded

If you already have the boat and are looking to buy a new or second hand trailer the boat length and boat weight will determine what trailer you need. But the weight is often the main determining factor. Whatever you are towing, the boat, trailer, accessories and straps have to be in a safe condition. If their condition is such that could cause a danger to another person or other road users you could be fined, If someone is injured they could make a civil claim against you. The trailing of large loads is beyond the scope of this article and won’t be relevant to the average trailer sailer but there are some key points to know about. You should pay special consideration to any projecting loads such as masts or outboard motors; in fact people have been prosecuted for not protecting the exposed blades of an outboard engine. Special marker boards must be attached in specific positions if a load projects to the front or rear by two metres or more. Similarly if a rearward projection sticks out more than one metre that too must be marked using a red rag or other bright object. Also if the mast or similar projects more than one metre over the lighting board an additional red light and reflector must be fitted. A load projecting more than a metre from the front of the vehicle must have a white light and

reflector. Rearward projections between 2m and 3.05m must have end marked boards and beyond that side marked boards must be added and you have to inform the police. The width and length are the same for any vehicle. The maximum trailer width for any towing vehicle is 2.55 metres. The load may project up to 305mm either side of the vehicle or trailer provided the overall width does not exceed 2.9m. The maximum length is 7m (excluding the hitching device coupling) for a trailer towed by

Watch out for projecting loads. People have been prosecuted for not protecting the exposed blades of an outboard engine a vehicle weighing up to 3,500 kilograms. There is no legal maximum height but again you could be prosecuted for an unsafe load. Safe practice is generally accepted to be a maximum height of 3m or 1.7 times the wheel track of the trailer.

Check the car and your licence too

The maximum weight your car can tow is usually listed in the vehicle handbook. Alternatively the vehicle’s ‘gross train weight’ may be listed on the vehicle identification number (VIN) plate on the car. This is normally under the bonnet or inside the driver’s door. The gross train weight is the weight of the fully-loaded car plus fully-loaded trailer and must not be exceeded.

Your driving licence shows the categories of vehicle you may drive including the size of trailer that you’re allowed to tow. Older drivers are at an advantage here because if you passed your driving test before 1 January 1997 you’re generally allowed to drive a vehicle and trailer combination up to 8.25 tonnes Maximum Authorised Mass (MAM). That is more than even the largest craft designed to be trailed and sailed in normal circumstances. However rules changed in 1997 and 2013. From 19 January 2013 drivers passing a category B (car and small vehicle) test can tow small trailers weighing up to 750kg or a trailer over 750kg as long as the combined weight of the trailer and towing vehicle is no more than 3,500kg (MAM). To tow a trailer weighing more than 750kg and when the combined weight of the towing vehicle and trailer is more than 3,500kg, you will need to get B+E entitlement on your licence. However if you passed your driving test after 1 January 1997 and have an ordinary category B (car) licence, you can drive a vehicle up to 3.5 tonnes or 3,500kg MAM towing a trailer of up to 750kg MAM. You can also tow a trailer over 750kg MAM as long as the combined weight of the trailer and towing vehicle is no more than 3,500kg. But you need to take a category B+E driving test for anything heavier. Admittedly all the legal stuff can seem a bit over the top but it’s important to be aware of it from the start; a lot of it is basic common sense about being roadworthy. Anyway now most of it is out of the way we can start getting our hands properly dirty because in the next article we look at servicing hubs and bearings.

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N R U E IO O VIN IPT I R D CR FE BS OF

It’s what you would rather be reading… Classic Sailor is the magazine about traditional seamanship and seaworthy boats. But how did the vicar get his copy so quickly? He’s a canny subscriber, realising that by subscribing he pays less than the cost of a glass of his favourite red wine! He gets his issue delivered direct to the vicarage door saving some 25% on the newsstand cover price. Join our flock and take advantage of our special rates. 12 editions – £35 6 editions – £22 Please quote our code 816CS

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RACING PILOT CUTTERS TO SEA WITH SAILING TO BRI L PLATES TTANY SWALLOWS & AMAZONS FILM

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SUFFOLK CLA SSICS ART OF PILOTAG E

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On watch: kit for ship and crew Compiled by Guy Venables

Saint James Sirocco Jacket

Slick

Here’s a step up from the smock, as you can open it from the front giving you heat control. There’s plenty of pocket space and the button version sports anchor buttons. It’s “French fit” so size up if you’re on the large size, including shoulders! Smart yet tough and rugged. £95 www.arthurbeale.co.uk

Designed to be used buffered up to the crook of the arm a slick is a tool that, in the right hands, can be invaluable to the boatbuilder. It’s used in spar and mast making, for cutting plank scarfs and trimming overhanging garboard planks. It can also be used as an oversized chisel and is one of the oldest of boatbuilding tools. The carbon steel blade is sharpened ready to use and has a natural finish except for the fully machined sides and face. The 14in long white ash handle fits comfortably against a shoulder or crook of arm. £175 www. traditionalboatsupplies. com

Hold-Ons!

These clever Swedish clips will grip any flexible material such as canvas or sailcloth and provide a strong hanging point without the need for conventional eyelets. The more you pull, the more they grip. Perfect for boat covers, dodgers and sun shades where fixing points can be selected exactly where they are needed. £1.36ea www.arthurbeale.co.uk

Klein tool bags

To save you the time and bother of rummaging around in the bottom of a tin box here’s a way of storing your tools colour-coded so that you know what to grab when you’re off to do a specific job. £11.00 each. £39.00 for a set of 4 different colours. www.arthurbeale.co.uk

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Boatie’s baking pan

After the global hit of The Fry pan here’s the only other thing you’ll need in the galley. Designed for one-handed use this heavy gauge aluminium baking pan can be used on the hob then transferred to the oven to roast, braise or bake using a detachable handle. As always the square corners make more sense of the galley hob and oven. www.boatiesfrypan.com £24.50

Hoopy Bike

Brava varnish

Woodenwidget presents The Hoopy, a lightweight ‘one size fits all’ wooden bicycle that you can build yourself. It is fun to ride and very comfortable. Highly detailed plans walk the builder through the entire process and cost just £30. Maker Benjy, for Woodenwidget tells us they will plant five trees for every set of plans sold. www.woodenwidget.com

Hand carved propellers

Carved by hand and, amazingly, measured by eye these beautifully sculptural layered wooden varnished propellers are supremely decorative. It’s best to display them within hand’s reach because, as I watched people go past the stall nobody could resist picking them up and feeling them. £299 for the stripy, others are less. www.dadsboats.com

We had a word with a few people who’d been using Brava and they couldn’t recommend it higher. Then we saw their boats and we saw what all the fuss was about. The gloss is toffee apple smooth and this is due to its ability to fill grain “better than all the others” one delighted owner said whilst lovingly smoothing his varnished hull. It’s imported from Italy and made from tung and linseed oil. There’s also a comprehensive range of preparation applications. Shown is the VG 66 premium. 750ml tin is £29.02 www.marineindustrial.co.uk

Sea strobe

The new C-Strobe is one of a series of personal LED safety lights from ACR Electronics. Made to attach to the inside of your inflatable lifejacket (right) it can provide a 45 lumen (bright) strobe light for 120 hours. A water activated version can be set for strobe, continuous on or SOS. At 14cm these lights use two AA batteries. £25.95 at Force Four chandlers www.acrartex.com

Crocs

The compromise you make with crocs is comfort v style. But the people at crocs are now making more and more “visually acceptable” footwear. These Swiftwater mesh crocs fall into that category and are designed specifically for use in water: quick drying breathable mesh upper and a foam footbed. Our tester found them the most comfortable shoes he’d ever worn. (Tip: They smell better with socks in mid summer.) £54.99 www.crocs.co.uk CLASSIC SAILOR 79

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Over the Yardarm

Guy Venables Two more gins. One is by Beefeaters, but designed to be drunk neat. The other is by me, with ancient herbs grown by my wife We’ve all been there, late night, sitting on the internet trying to gauge how much to bid on a brand new foreign spouse. The trouble is you simply can’t tell how much you want to pay until you’ve been properly acquainted. The same is true nowadays when trying to choose between the hundreds of gins available. I’m going to tell you about two of them. The first is a refined affair from Beefeaters. Because gin, in them olden days was often stored in barrels, it would have taken on a very different flavours from the ones we are used to. This has been recreated by distilling and resting their gin in Jean de Lillet Bordeaux barrels. Beefeaters Burrough’s Reserve Edition 2 is designed to be drunk neat with ice and in that it’s a lovely and surprising straw coloured appetizer. The wood notes may utterly delight some but confuse others as it denies the gin it’s usual crisp clarity and I was advised it shouldn’t be mixed. That I took as a glove-swiped challenge and “took it straight home” by mixing it with some Lillet blanc which made perfect sense out of it as a woody martini. I can’t claim any great success however in mixing it with anything else (tonic drowns it, sugar and lemon fight with it, after that my notes got a little hazy). At around £65 a bottle, sipping a chilled neat one with an appetizer is much more sensible and reminded me of the way the Greeks drink freezing Tsipouro with octopus and sour bread. My second gin is, well, my first gin. Renowned cocktail barman Joseph John and I have concocted a gin using only herbs from the long long ago with the help of my wife, Clea, an historical gardener in the Weald and Downland Museum in Singleton. Steeping Orris root, chervil, cardamom, red peppercorn, wormwood and, of course, juniper in base spirit (vodka) we spent a fun afternoon blending it and now it’s for sale in the Dean pub, unfiltered, so a deep amber colour and it’s going fast. (Possibly because it’s quite a bit cheaper than all the other gins but I’m going with the discerning palette of our locals rather than diminishing local wages.) It’s called Trundle, It took a week or so to make (see last issue on “how to”) and, inspired by Beefeaters, we might barrel age some just to slow demand.

Off watch Books:drawing, sailing, drifting, exploring

Keeping a Sketchbook Diary By Claudia Myatt Claudia’s watercolour artwork is wellknown to readers of this and other marine titles, and (even though self-taught herself) she also teaches drawing. This attractive little book is stronger on inspiration than technique. “Sketching helps you slow down and connect with your surroundings.” But it is full of ideas, and examples. PW £9.99 claudiamyatt.co.uk

Hand Reef and Steer By Tom Cunliffe An update of the standard text for gaff rig sailors of cat boats, cutters, sloops, yawls, ketches and schooners – now with updated sections on modern gaffers, replicas and the big class. This is principally a book on rigging, sail trim, and handling and surely answers most of the questions you might have about your gaffer. £25 (paperback) Adlard Coles

Swinging the Lamp By Nick Ardley Meandering about the Essex and Suffolk tidal creeks of the Thames Estuary in his Finesse 24, Nick Ardley has picked up all sorts of tales and snippets over the years, and relates them here in an appropriately leisurely and discursive manner. Reading it is a bit like drifting on a slack tide of a warm windless evening with a beer in your hand. PW £18.99 Fonthill Media

The Naked Shore By Tom Blass We sailors see the sea as connecting, rather than separating us, and so does Tom Blass who travelled around and across the North Sea to discover its people and ways of life. Coastal communities, both British and continental, come under his benign and intrigued scrutiny. PW £20.00 Bloomsbury

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Shoreside Places we love

In the past it was a smuggler’s haunt. More recently, the pub became a fashionable watering hole for a creative set

Rent: River Lark Lodge

A modern property this one, but well designed, albeit in a squeaky-clean, sharpangled way. River Lark Lodge is located in Isleham, Cambridgeshire. Perfect for river rats, it is one of six A-frame properties on a small, woodland-covered marina complex. There is a decked balcony where you can while away the time watching the ducks with a glass of something whilst dangling a worm on a hook. Mooring is free for those bringing vessels, or you can make use of the lodge’s rowing boat. Boats can travel to Judes Ferry House Inn, and then on to Mildenhall, a town in Suffolk famous for its timbered, 16th-century, hexagonal market cross and pump. £480 per week or £90 per day. Sleeps four. www.riverlarklodge.co.uk

Sale: Marshmoor, Weir Quay, Yelverton, Devon.

Being sold by Mariquita’s race navigator Chris Tibbs and nestling neatly on the banks of the River Tamar, Marshmoor commands views across the river to Cornwall. The Bere Peninsula offers lovely countryside between the Rivers Tamar and Tavy, an ‘Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty’. Down the road are Tavistock and Plymouth, with all the amenities of a large modern city, including excellent opportunities for sailing with marina facilities providing access to some of the finest uncrowded sailing in the country. A short stroll away is the all-tide public slipway and a well-regarded sailing club. There is also a boatyard offering moorings for deep draught yachts. (Will Sterling built Integrity just round the corner.) Four bedrooms, open plan dining/kitchen, sitting room, garage, study and over an acre of mature gardens. £695,000 Stags.co.uk

Run ashore Send us your favourite pubs! Address p15 > The Square and Compass, Worth Matravers

If you ever moor up in Swanage, Dorset, take a bike or taxi up the hill along the south coast and you’ll find the ancient low beamed pub the Square and Compass. Beer is served through a hatch. There are rooms dotted about and a fossil museum at the west end. They make their own cider and there’s often music. In the past it was a famed smuggler’s haunt, more recently in the interwar years the pub became a fashionable watering hole for a creative set, the artist Augustus John, cartoonist Low, pianist Harriet Cohen and actor Leslie Banks. The gardens look down to the sea and it is a thoroughly delightful place to sit and drink. Food is all pies. www.squareandcompasspub.co.uk CLASSIC SAILOR 81

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Your

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Rescuing a SCOD in distress

In a graveyard of neglected yachts Phil Russell spotted a South Coast One Design that looked worth restoring – if the engine worked

have painted and drawn boats of all sorts for my own pleasure and even sold a few. I have also owned a couple of boats. As a profession I photograph yachts and I have photographed war ships from end to end under contract, so I have more than a passing interest in the marine industry, but by far my love for boats lies in the classic wooden yacht. I have been fortunate enough to have photographed the Pendennis Cup on a few occasions which is an event organized by the Pendennis shipyard in Falmouth for yachts that have either been restored or built by them and in 2001 I was invited to crew on Marigold, a Victorian gentleman’s gaff cutter, during the America’s Cup Jubilee. Marigold had been found in mud on the Isle of Wight and was salvaged by Greg Powlesland, rebuilt to her original spec and later passed on to be sold at Sotheby’s to be taken on by a new owner. Over a period of time I came to realise that to pre-

serve the marine heritage of the UK is vital. In Marigold’s case the preservation in all parts of the vessel is as close to the original as it could be. I recently visited Boating World on the River Lynher which is a tributary off the River Tamar in Cornwall. This yard has been known locally as something of a graveyard for unwanted projects and there I found a number of yachts in need of TLC. Some need rather more work than others and a few need a minor miracle to recover and return to the sea, but sure enough among the glassfibre I found a real classic in need of some attention. The unmistakable lines of a South One Coast Design sat in the middle of the yard, painted a delicate shade of muddy blue with her varnish work doing nothing to lift her appearance. On first inspection she didn’t look too bad and I thought she deserved a further look. As it happened, a boatbuilder friend was coming to stay so I roped him in to give her the once over. At this point I hadn’t told

Top left: Aurigny as we found her in the yard – just in time; she was about to be taken away and burned. Right: The interior – needs work, but usable as is for a season. Middle, from left: Slab reefing and roller reefing needed attention; the recalcitrant engine – we got it going in the end. Bottom: Floors and straps showing some signs of rust but quite sound on inspection; advisable to draw the fastenings the next time she is out the water. Left: Phil and Sue

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“You bought this then? I hope you didn’t pay much for it, you could have bought a load of trouble.”

my wife anything, why give myself a problem? I thought this would be the best way forward although I had sort of mentioned it to her in passing at which point her reply had been: “In your dreams!” John, my boatbuilder friend and I, spent the afternoon going through Aurigny, my intended purchase. The engine was seized and the keel bolts needed drawing sooner rather than later but the rest of her appeared to be sound, so with this information I felt able to make an offer on the proviso that the deal would be off if I could not get the engine running. So, the yard owner and I came to an agreement, I would buy her for the storage fee that she owed the yard, with the owner’s permission of course, and I now knew that it was time to break the news to my wife. We had just returned from a life-changing trip to Australia and whilst there had both realized and agreed that we were drifting too easily into old age, a change of some sort was needed on our return home, but what sort of change had yet to be decided. I felt that I had now found the answer. John and I discussed the boat openly over dinner and he said what a good buy she would be. As planned it stimulated my wife Sue’s interest and John’s reassurance about Aurigny’s state made the journey of getting her to the boatyard for a look a piece of cake. The next morning, after John had left, we drove to the

yard and Sue was up Aurigny’s ladder before I could say: “The engine won’t turn over.” “WHAT?” was Sue’s reply. That was a bit of a stumbling block! I had to get it going or she would go off the idea like a bucket of prawns in the sun! To justify the purchase and in anticipation of the problem I had had the batteries put on charge and they were fine so with a bit of gentle persuasion I eventually got the engine to turn over and soon I had her thumping away, she was pumping water and sounded sweet so I reported to the yard owner that the deal was on. When I returned, Sue was already getting busy with the scrubbing brush, cooing like a dove and making all the right noises. Done deal then, there was nothing more to be said so best get on with it. It was shortly after this I became aware of a chap who was working on a wooden restoration across the yard from where we were standing looking at Aurigny. “You bought this then? I hope you didn’t pay much for it, you could have bought a load of trouble, the previous owner was not a boatbuilder and did a lot of work on her.” This of course was true, but it was also true John and I had been right through her and were aware of some minor problems. I looked at him and asked if the previous owner had replaced any timbers in her and that she was sound as far as we could tell. He made a sort of grunting noise and padded off back to his project. CLASSIC SAILOR 87

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Rescuing a SCOD in distress

Over the next month we grafted on Aurigny at every moment we had spare. Gradually she shook off her dowdy coat of muddy blue and like the ugly duckling began to show us her true worth. I must say that Mr Nicholson was a master of his craft if you’ll excuse the pun; the shape of her is a piece of art, the lines of her curves above and below the water are sheer inspiration, it’s no wonder SCODs had such a reputation during the fifties and sixties. These are the sort of boats I used to look at in yachting magazines when I was a child and dream of one day owning one. Well it’s been a long time but the day has arrived, so yes, you could say I am pleased. On a break from sanding and painting I looked around the yard and was saddened to see a number of neglected yachts whose owners had lost interest or possibly through misfortune had abandoned their assets to the breaker and I have to ask why there are so many? A Hurley 18 fin keel, a lovely little boat in fair condition for around £700, a Hurley 22 for £1750 in need of some cosmetic attention but otherwise sound, but to my mind, the saddest case is a Rustler 30 that is not for sale and has been just left to the weather. Everything aboard is neat and tidy but covered in green mould and decay. As I understand it, this fabulous

yacht has suffered the loss of her owner and his widow can’t bear the thought of parting with her, such a shame as her fees are paid and she just sits there year in year out. There are several choices to be had here and for very little money you could get you and your family sailing and enjoying the delights of owning your own boat. Our three children grew up on all three of the boats we have owned in the past, my wife learned to sail and navigate, how to splice rope and the rules of the road. The experiences we have had with the children are remembered in later life and we hope that some time in the future they will take up sailing again, but for now it is just my wife and I who are looking to the future and new horizons with Aurigny. As it happens she is a similar age to us, I just hope she is not so grumpy! Hoping to have her in the water in early August we need a 5.5m tide to get her away from the yard. The narrow channel proves something of a challenge and although I have done it once before in Finesse, our Ecume de Mer, it was two decades ago and I hope I can remember the way over the mud. Of course Aurigny is timber and being out of the water for so long has not been healthy for her, so the sooner she is back in the better. The weather could be better too but I am not really sorry about that because it will keep her damp.

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People began to notice that things had taken an upturn and the odd smile was cast in our direction. Whether it was in admiration or sympathy I wasn’t sure

From top left: work in progress: topsides, undersides, the varnishwork; might just get rid of that anode – and, top right, Aurigny in her new livery on July 31

As we started to make progress on Aurigny it began to emerge that we might be doing something right, the odd few people who were busy on their own projects had begun to notice that things had taken an upturn for Aurigny and the occasional smile began to be cast in our direction. Whether it was in admiration or sympathy I was not yet sure. We have recently had a few days of fine weather and made some real progress painting the topsides. She had been flattened and filled with a surface filler, four coats of undercoat rubbed down between each coat and the first topcoat applied which caused some emotional issues between my wife and me. She wanted cream, I preferred an offwhite so eventually we chose a colour in between the two from a colour chart. When we opened the tin and started to apply it to the pure white undercoat we couldn’t see any difference in the colour and it was at this stage that the toys came out of the pram! “That’s not the colour we chose, I don’t like it, I’m not having that, you’ll have to take it back,” said my wife. Having spent fifty-odd quid on the now opened tin of paint I was not about to cave in on this one, but somehow I had to avoid the ensuing mutiny. We scoured the shelves and eventually found a small tin of yellow and after gradually adding small amounts ended up with the exact colour Sue wanted in the first place – mutiny was averted and, as usual, my wife

was right all along, it’s the perfect colour, though I can never admit that to her! All the undercoats were applied with a roller but I like to use a paint pad when applying the topcoat and it was at this point that people began stopping and making comments. Of course, like all paint jobs it’s all in the preparation, the base has to be flat otherwise every mark and pimple will be exaggerated in the final coat. She has now had three topcoats and with the green boot top applied we are now stopping traffic! The varnished coach roof makes her glow in the sunlight and it is now difficult to get on with the jobs we still have to do as everyone wants to know how we have achieved such an amazing finish. She does look fantastic even though I say so myself. When the yard critic who had warned me that I may have taken on a load of trouble appeared, quizzing me on how I managed to get such a good finish, I explained and said, with tongue in cheek, that of course, it takes years of experience. With nodding approval and a smile, he returned to his project, and I took that as a huge compliment. So here we are finally, almost where we had planned to be before we launch. There is still the interior to get to grips with but we will use her as she is for the season in order to know what has to be done to suit our needs and of course, whatever we do will have to be in traditional style. CLASSIC SAILOR 89

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Joints: Mitred Through Dovetail The technique for making a through dovetail joint as demonstrated by IBTC’s Ian Cook. Words and photos by Richard Johnstone-Bryden

aking a tight fitting dovetail joint provides a real test of any woodworker’s skill. This family of joints owes its name to the angled male component which resembles the profile of a dove’s tail. They fit into a female socket of the same shape to create an interlocking joint with a high degree of mechanical strength. Dovetails can be used for several purposes including the making of boxes, cabinets, drawers and securing deck beams. If you are trying to achieve a high quality of finish you should always try to avoid leaving end grain on show. Therefore, the mitred through dovetail joint is an effective means of concealing the end grain especially if you have had to cut either a rebate or channel into the side of a drawer or box. Fig 1 Begin by marking out the dovetails and the 45º mitre on the half width dovetails at each end. Figs 2a, b Cut the sloping sides of the dovetails with a very fine toothed dovetail saw before switching to a coping saw to cut along the bottom edge of the waste wood. Do not cut the mitres at this stage because you will not be able to accurately mark up the sockets. Fig 3 Ian uses a chisel to trim the sloping sides of the dovetails. Fig 4 Ian uses his home-made miniature bevel to check that the sloping sides of the dovetails are true.

Figs 5a-c Ian clamps the other piece of wood, known as the pin member, on top of the one with the dovetails, known as the dovetail member, to use as a straight edge along the shoulder line. He removes the remaining waste wood between the tails with a bevel edge chisel. The difference between the initial result that was achieved with the coping saw and the required shoulder line can be clearly seen in Fig 5c. This method is ideally suited on those occasions when you are making several dovetails within a single piece of wood rather than one or two dovetails.

Fig 6 Trimming the sloping sides of the dovetails with a bevel edge chisel. Fig 7 The required profiles for the sockets have been scribed on to the second piece of wood using a sharp knife. The scribed lines can be clearly seen against the white chalk. Fig 8 Once the sockets have been cut out the remaining vertical pieces of wood are referred to as pins. Thus, Ian repeats the steps he took during the cutting of the dovetails starting with the use of a dovetail saw to cut vertically down the sides of the pins. As he cuts, Ian ensures that he remains slightly to the waste side of the marked lines. Fig 9 As he nears the lower edge of the pin’s side he switches to a coping saw to cut round the corner and along the socket’s bottom edge.

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12b

12c

12d

Great care must be taken not to force the dovetails â&#x20AC;&#x201C; if they are too big for the sockets they will simply split the wood Fig 10 The bulk of the waste wood has been removed to create the sockets. The initial cuts at either end of the wood highlight the extent of the section that will be turned into the mitre. Fig 11 The pin member is placed vertically in a vice for the cutting of the mitre in the two end pins. Ian uses a dovetail saw at a tilted angle. He keeps sawing until he nearly reaches the two scribed lines. However, it is important that the saw does not cross either line. Figs 12a-d The pin member is then placed horizontally in the vice for the second cut to release the waste wood from the two end pins.

12a

13a

13b

Figs 13a, b When it comes to cutting the mitre in the two end dovetails there is no need for a vertical cut so the tail member is simply placed horizontally in the vice for Ian to cut slightly to the waste side of the indicated lines. Fig 14 The time has now come for Ian to gently lower the dovetails into the sockets. Great care must be taken at this point not to force the dovetails because if they are too big for the sockets they will simply split the wood and you will have to start again with a new piece. Fig 15 The initial fit seems promising so Ian uses a wooden mallet to apply some extra force to bring the two halves together. He also uses a block of wood

to protect the joint itself while using the mallet. Fig 16 As Ian brings the two halves together he can see that some minor adjustments are still required to achieve the perfect fit so he stops to avoid the risk of splitting the wood. Figs 17a, b He uses a chisel to remove a little more wood from the sloping side of the dovetail and checks that the bottom edges of the sockets are true, again using his home-made miniature bevel. Fig 18 On completion of the adjustments to the dovetails and sockets, Ian is able to bring the two halves of the joint together to assess what adjustments need to be carried out on the mitre itself. Fig 19 To ensure that the two pieces of wood remain at an angle of 90Âş while he fine tunes the mitre, Ian puts the two pieces of wood up flush against a squared off block to eliminate any movement. Fig 20 Ian holds the two pieces against the wooden block and uses a chisel to trim the extremity of the mitre on the dovetail member to give him the exact point beyond which you must not cut when fine tuning the mitre. Fig 21 Ian uses a dovetail saw to saw along the line of the mitre to trim the leading edges to the desired shape thereby CLASSIC SAILOR 91

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Joints: Mitred Through Dovetail

tightening up the joint as a whole by enabling the dovetails to fit firmly within the sockets. Fig 22 Ian gently inserts the saw blade between the dovetail and the socketâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s bottom edge to reveal that there is still a saw bladeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s width in the joint which confirms that just one more saw cut is required to achieve a perfect fit.

17a

17b

Fig 23 Ian uses the dovetail saw for one last cut to remove the last surplus wood from the leading edges of the mitre to create a tight-fitting joint. Fig 24 The adjustments to the mitre have worked and created a tight-fitting joint. Fig 25 It is now time to trim off the protruding ends of the dovetails and pins. The bulk of the waste wood is removed with a dovetail saw. Fig 26 Ian then uses a smoothing plane to trim the remaining excess so that the ends of the pins and dovetails are flush with the surrounding wood to create a smart finish. Fig 27 The finished result: a neat, strong tight-fitting joint.

Description and practical demonstration of the techniques by Ian Cook, joinery instructor at the Lowestoft, Suffolk, based International Boatbuilding Training College (IBTC). Further Information: International Boatbuilding Training College. Tel: 01502 569663 Email: info@ibtc.co.uk Website: www.ibtc.co.uk 92 CLASSIC SAILOR

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Boats for sale M J Lewis & Sons (Boat Sales) Ltd Tel:01621 859373 -

Email: info@mjlewisboatsales.com

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19m Luxemotor motor barge, 2003 Essex. OIRO £175,000

52ft Fleur du Lys by Dagless 1961 Essex £69,500

86ft Thames Sailing Barge,1926 Steel, Essex POA.

41ft Silverleaf by John Bain 1935 Suffolk. OIRO £50,000

32ft Gaff Ketch 1903 Kent £19,950

35ft Berthons W.Solent Edwardian Yacht Essex OIRO £40,000

Heard 28, 1984 Gaffers & Luggers Essex £29,500

South Coast One Design 1961. Sussex £11,500

1959 17m Dutch Mussel Cutter Essex £45,000

Dunkirk Little Ship, Osborne 35 1937 Essex POA

19’ Golant Gaffer 2007, Essex £6,950

As new 25ft Gostelows Gaffer 1935 Essex £19,950

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SHARES FOR SALE IN A CLASSIC YACHT Due to changing circumstances amongst the syndicate, there are a number of shares for sale in the International 12M, Sceptre. “I’m Tom Smith, a Yachtmaster and very keen sailor, and thought I couldn’t aﬀord a 70ft sailing boat… BUT I COULD! I bought a share in Sceptre, the classic wooden International 12M, 1958 America’s Cup challenger. Twenty years later, I still enjoy her good looks and love sailing this iconic yacht!” You can too, for £12,000 for a 19th share, plus an average annual subscription of £2,500 – have a look at www. sceptre1958.co.uk for more details, photographs, and videos of this beautiful boat. You may not have considered a boat share, but there are many advantages to this approach to going sailing: No trouble ﬁnding people to sail with, lower costs, share the responsibilities of owning a yacht.

On Sceptre, you will also enjoy the following: Superb sailing in a thoroughbred boat that eats up the miles - Eighteen friends to go sailing with - Working together to maintain and improve a historic yacht - It’s not a time share, so sail when you can (depending on qualiﬁcations, schedule etc) Recent upgrades include a new main sail, jib roller reeﬁng, new navigation instruments and many other improvements Interested? Visit www.sceptre1958.co.uk and then ring me to book a trial sail, Tom Smith on 07576 909141 for a chat. 93 CLASSIC SAILOR

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Calendar

Send us your events! editor@classicsailor.com

This month Svendborg Classics Regatta 11-13 August, Svendborg, Denmark Races for all boats build before 1970, allowing GRP boats to compete alongside wooden classics. classicregatta.dk River Dart Rally 12-14 August, Dittisham, Upper Dart, Devon Small boats to large gaffers, now in its third year dittishamsc.org.uk Swale Smack and Sailing Barge Match 13 August kentishsail.org Bridlington Sailing Coble Festival 13-14 August, Bridlington, Yorkshire A new festival to celebrate and sail this local design Blyth Tall Ships International Regatta & Maritime Community Festival 20-30 August, Blyth, Northumberland tallshipsblyth2016.com Whitstable Smack and Barge Match 20 August sailingbargeassociation.co.uk Southend Barge Match 28 August sailingbargeassociation.co.uk Holyhead Traditional Boat Festival 2-4 September, Holyhead (OGA) Sue Farrer sue@psfarrer.co.uk Great River Race 3 September, Thames: Milwall, Docklands – Ham

Maldon Regatta House, Richmond ‘London Marathon on water’ – 300-plus rowing craft. Start c 12 noon greatriverrace.co.uk Contessa 26 50th Anniversary Championships 3-4 September, Lymington, www.contessa26.net Cannes Yachting Festival 6-11 September cannesyachitingfestival.com Harwich International Shanty Festival 7-9 September Harwich, Essex harwichshantyfestival.co.uk Brixham Heritage Sailing Rally 10 September, Brixham, Devon brixhamheritagesailing.org. uk Colne Smack and Barge Match 10 September sailingbargeassociation.co.uk

Thames Trafalgar Race 10-11 September, Tidal Thames littleshipclub.co.uk/events Dorestad Raid 14-18 September Rakken Marina, Woudsend, Holland natuurlijkvaren.nl Tom Cunliffe at Arthur Beale 15 September, 6.45pm, 194 Shaftesbury Avenue, London WC2H 8JP Tom will be introducing the new edition of Hand Reef and Steer, his legendary ‘how-to’ book on traditional sailing arthurbeale.co.uk Southampton Boat Show 16-25 September, Southampton southamptonboatshow.com Countercurrent: nautical jewellery at Arthur Beale 17 September-8 October An exhibition by staff at Central

Saint Martins School of Art, inspired by the historic shop and its stock, 194 Shaftesbury Avenue, London WC2H 8JP arthurbeale.co.uk Maldon Regatta 17 September, Maldon, Essex maldonregatta.co.uk North Clyde Regatta 17-18 September www.clyde.org Hamble Classics Regatta 24-25 September inaugural regatta for all classics royal-southern.co.uk Portsmouth Regatta 24 September, Portsmouth, Hants portsmouthregatta.org Skiffies and Classic Boats at the Tall Ship, Glasgow 24-25 September, Riverside Museum Pier, Glasgow “Classic boat owners are invited to sail, row, motor, steam or paddle on the River Clyde at this inaugural event.

It gives a rare opportunity to access the river at the West End of Glasgow, and explore the Clyde right up to the city centre. The newly formed Glasgow Coastal Rowing Club will host St Ayles Skiff racing on the Saturday and informal rowing on the Sunday. The scope of boats invited is very broad. If you think your boat is a classic, it’s most likely welcome. On the water, there will be rowing, sailing, and steam boats. Shore based actives will include boat building demonstrations, and newly built wooden boats on show. Spectators can watch from the quayside, or aboard Glasgow’s Tall Ship “Glenlee”. As with all Glasgow’s museums, entry is free.” For more details on bringing your boat contact jmacmillan@talktalk.net rowglasgow.org.uk thetallship.com Yare Navigation Race 24 September, Norfolk Broads Coldham Hall SC-Breydon Water and back; ‘River Cruiser’ class yachts and similar coldhamhallsailingclub. co.uk/ynr

Coming up London Boat Show 6-15 January 2017 Excel, London londonboatshow.com Australian Wooden Boat Festival 10-13 February 2017, Hobart , Tasmania australian woodenboatfestival.com.au See classicsailor.com for more events and details and upload your own!

In Classic Sailor next issue There’s the way you should anchor... and the way most of us do it! We used the idea of an aide memoire on anchoring (which is a good thing to be clued up on by the way) to go for a sail with broker Barney Sandeman on his gorgeous S&S yawl Laughing Gull.

We are also up at Happisburgh (pronounced hazeburrer) where the RNLI launch their boat by charging down the beach with tractor and trailor and literally shunting it into the waves. And we really should run our Couta boat article, which has been promised a couple of times. Ahem CLASSIC SAILOR

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Last word: Fromage de Brest Mike Smylie, Kipperman by day, has a surreal cheese-related dream involving an underworld accessed via his own smokehouse

GUY VENABLES

t is very early Sunday morning – about 2am – and the biggest maritime festival on the planet has just about shut down for the night. Three figures stand out, leaning against the quayside railings. Below, the boats gently tug on limp mooring ropes, and above decks all is gaining quietness. Then a lazy shout of: “We want cheese!” echoes across the water, punching the silence like a thump on the chest. The slight tap of a stone as it lands on a deck, forces figures to emerge from darkened cockpits. Lights shine bright from behind darkened portholes, blinding these poor hungry cheese people. “What for?” the boats reply. “We’re hungry,” comes the echo. “No cheese,” they shout in unison. “Go to bed!” Simultaneously, there’s a rustling that, to me the casual observer, sounded like cheese being hurriedly wrapped up and stowed beneath sole boards and into dark lockers or even into crisp-packet consistency sail-bags. There must be a conspiracy afoot. Eventually the three fade into obscurity and one can only wonder whether they were actually ever there. Meanwhile, just along the quayside, puffs of smoke can be seen to gently waft across the stars from the top of the Kipperhouse and a wonderful aroma secretes from its weather-beaten wooden structure. Standing like a Tardis, those without the know can only wonder what happens inside and whether the presence of the mysterious night-time visitors has anything to do with the process within. Cheese,

of course, is far removed from the noble kipper, except that both have the capability to excite tastebuds and nostrils alike. And there within this Kipperhouse doth the secret lay.

Beneath the smouldering oak sawdust, underneath a heavy cast of iron, sits what would ordinarily be regarded as an insignificant access cover to a land drain although, on closer inspection, the age-encrusted

symbol of Mano Cornuto is just visible stamped into the metal. It’s the symbol of the ancient world acting as a horned hand, a pointer down to the underworld. Lift up the cover and a shaft leads down into darkness. Fourteen storeys down another tired metal door is the entrance to a whole new world. Zig-zagging beneath the modern world, deep down in the earth’s crust, like some giant teredo worm, they are part of a network of ancient tramways, a bit like ley lines, only bigger. And those faint new scratchings on the Kipperhouse door could allude to recent comings and goings. Then I awake from my slumber. and my tummy rumbles. Was it that shout of ‘cheese’ that broke my reverie maybe? Or the creak of the Kipperhouse door? I look around at the darkened restaurants and temporary marquees and see that all is as silent as the boats below. Away to the right a lone figure stumbles along perhaps hopelessly searching for the last bus home. This is the port of Brest, in northwest Brittany, and the Kipperhouse has been busy making kippers. Kippers are kippers by any English description though these ones are in fact known as hareng fumé. It sounds like the connoisseur’s kipper; the best the smokehouse has to offer. Alas though, they are still smoking, and not yet ready for consumption. They need a few more hours but I need a snack right now. In the depths of the night I fumble for some of yesterday’s baguette. But it’s not going to do. “Oi, you lot, have you got any cheese down there?”

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7873AD_UK_Antifoul in the Autumn_Classic Sailor_UK_225 x 295 29/07/2016 08:39 Page 1

Do you remember the Spring of 2016? Why wait until next year to antifoul your boat? Paint in autumn and relax, safe in the knowledge that whatever the elements throw at you in Spring, your boat will be ready to go. With at least 6 months before immersion, you can antifoul in the autumn with Micron® Optima, Micron® Extra 2, VC® Offshore EU, VC® 17m Extra and for professional application, Micron® WA.

Save yourself the stress next year, antifoul in the autumn, relax and be ready to sail in the spring! www.yachtpaint.com

All trademarks mentioned are owned by, or licensed to, the AkzoNobel group of companies. © AkzoNobel 2016. Use antifoulings safely. Always read the product label before use.