Trikeri, Pelion, Greece – 2004
For the origin of this series – here
Folksong
Helpful clips
I posted a short clip of Blue Mistress some months ago (the same clip I keep on my desktop at work!), but hadn’t thought much more about the medium – I have always preferred still images.
I went for a solo sail out of Plymouth one cloudy and suspiciously dark afternoon – (it blew up and rained after I came ashore).
There was a light breeze while I was out and the idea was to work with the autohelm, trying various sail trims, wind directions and so on. It was fun and I got several simple jobs done at the same time.
I though I’d try out the movie mode on the camera again. And became irritated by the set of the foresail with its flapping foot – we sometimed accept things for ourselves that we wouldn’t accept if we thought other people were going to see them. Sad but true.
It’s the sheet position of course, but getting the balance on an older sail is difficult when there has been some stretching. This is the foresail I would normally use in a much stronger wind. The genoa would have come into its own for the wind strength that afternoon, but we were in trials – not trying to break records.
So, a different tack, shifting the sheet one notch, sailing slightly further off the wind and it looks better. But I would like to sail closer to the wind with this sail, so I will need to think it through further.
In the meantime, I have these reminders.
For love of a boat – in Crete
Aghia Galini, Crete 2005
I had intended posting a single image each week with no text. However, there was a comment to my initial post that took me by surprise and has made me reconsider.
Usually when I wander round a harbour looking at boats, especially in the Mediterranean, I am far too late to see the boats going fishing – they would all have been out earlier in the morning.
Therefore, of the many images I have collected over the years, only a few show boats as they should be seen – with crew – working. This image of a gentleman from Aghia Galini, rolling his sleeves up as he sets off, has long been a favourite. There is a promise of more to come – and a fine boat to accomplish it. Look at the wake.
So much for the romance. It was AA’s comment that concentrated my mind. He has kindly given me permission to quote the following:
“The preservation of some of these boats is an issue that is not met positively in Greece as well (which is where i am coming from originally)
Only for the last year or so there has been a society formed for the preservation of these boats but things are moving very slowly.
The boat you are showing is “lucky”. It has not been swept away because of a political decision to scrap it, like this one:
http://www.greektube.org/content/view/21126/2/
The government (prompted by some EU financial analysis) is trying to decrease “Professional Fishing” by giving money to fishermen to give away their older wooden boats. So, what do you do with a wooden boat once you have “bought” it in this way? Well, you scrap it in the most hideous way.
Some people have found ways to convert the bigger old fishing boats to recreation vessels for small tours and things like these but the majority of these boats end up chip wood.
The way i see it, these boats are products of a tradition that goes way back. Looking at them is like looking at a compact form of knowledge and experience…The boat is like a library but it has the fate of the Library of Alexandria.”
The last paragraph says it all. Watch the video carefully.
Now my simple pleasure has gained an extra dimension – and I add ‘Maritime History’ to the category list for this series of posts. There’s more to come.
For love of a boat – on Cap Corse, Corsica
The Cloud Appreciation Society
We were charmed to look up at the mountains across the water from Korcula to see this cloud formation.
I had never seen a cloud like this and wondered if it was a local phenomenon or whether we were just unobservant.
It remained over the peak for a long while and slowly developed.
I don’t think it is related, but that night we had a thunderstorm and a half. The lightning was right overhead and the thunder claps deeply thunderous. At one point, our window blew open.
Anyway, I have looked up the type of cloud (Google) and find it is a Wave cloud. This particular form is called Lenticular:
“Another way that wave clouds can form is where air flows over a mountain or hill. If a cloud forms on this wave, it is called “lenticular” (which means “lens-shaped”) cloud, which has a very smooth, symmetric appearance”
In my search, I came across The Cloud Appreciation Society. Now, I’m ashamed to say I laughed. What! There are people who watch out for clouds and take pictures of them!!
And then I paused – Oh . . . . . . .
Well, here are two more untouched images – (taken two days later on the ferry from Korcula to the mainland)
– and long live The Cloud Appreciation Society.
The Art of the Charter
We had been looking down on the harbour of Cavtat for some time, before we noticed the obvious – “That mast is very tall.”
We are in super-yacht territory, and this is ‘Only Now’ (and here) – loa: 104.10 ft, lwl: 90.78 ft, beam: 21.82 ft.
Yours to charter – for a fee, complete with crew.
We had been admiring the fleets of charter boats sailing between the islands, especially the 40 – 50 ft boats.
Yachts like ‘Only Now’ raise the game to a different plane altogether.
We didn’t see her leave harbour, but we did watch her out at sea, tacking among the islands – stunning.
(Oh – and she’s four times the length of Blue Mistress!)
For love of a boat – on the Dalmation Coast, Croatia
The problem is this: here is a fine-looking, well-built, working boat sitting on a beach.
“
It’s not in its original condition. The hot sun shines on it every day, the seams have opened, a piece of the forefoot has come away. Whether this is repairable or not is irrelevant, this boat is no longer required for its original purpose and it will finish its life as a theatrical prop on a beautiful beach in Croatia.
So, do we care? After all, there are plenty of other boats in the world. What’s special about this one?
Well, somebody had the idea to build it. Perhaps he designed it – or perhaps he took the lines off another boat- (I say ‘he’ because it’s less likely in this country to be ‘she’ – but not impossible). Somebody sawed the timbers and found the rest of the materials required, then they built it. Maybe he sold it or maybe he used it himself to fish from, and certainly he would have put in the time to maintain it.
You see, this boat has gathered a history around it. It is the story of a life lived on the water. We may never know the details of that story, but it deserves some respect and, at the very least, it can be preserved in a picture.
I hope to post pictures of similar boats (most of them in a better state than this one) regularly.
Back from holiday
We have just returned from a holiday in Croatia – not sailing, but walking, busing and ferrying along the Dalmatian coast and through the islands – another opportunity to wander around small harbours, (some very small indeed), looking at boats.
I am fired up with a new enthusiasm. In the face of some of the more elegant and expansive examples of modern yachting (of which more later), I understand why Blue Mistress suits me and have an inkling how to evolve with her over the next few years.
I come from the Robin Knox-Johnson first era – (his first circumnavigation, rather than his second), and, while watching (and enjoying) the more extreme examples of modern sailing, which a younger generation takes for granted, I am able to pause and wonder what are the things that are being lost in the rush for the new that would be worth highlighting.
There are skills and knowledge that grew over time (because they took time to grow) that will be lost in half a generation. Some are obvious, and some we do not need any more, but there are others that we will miss when they have gone. And they are less obvious than you would think.
Blue Mistress’ lines were taken from the Folkboat, (which was designed in the 1940s), but she is not such a classic boat that we can’t put some new materials and innovative ideas into her – and still have a fine boat. We can straddle the generations and see what comes out of it.
Even if we wanted to, we cannot avoid the modern – it constantly hits us in the eye. But we can take the time to look a little further, trawling beneath the surface. And wondering along a coastline, wherever you are, is doing just that. Some of the knowledge and skills I am talking about can still be found in places like the little harbour below.
A qualification for life
This is the qualification I am proudest of – one of the first I ever received.
Not one of the many compartmentalised, categorised, bulletised certificates that I have received in the intervening years has matched this hand-printed document for its underlying humanity.
Three cockpits
Tongue stuck gently in cheek, I offer you three images.
Like thousands of others, I leant on the railings around the Barbican in Plymouth in early May and admired the TRANSAT boats.
Like hundreds of others, I looked very hard at those boats and put myself on board. “What would it be like in a gale of wind – where would I be, what would I be adjusting next?”
I imagined myself picking up lines, juggling with electronics, changing sails, feeling myself lifted high in the air in those wide cockpits – looking down to leeward as the boat heeled precariously in a sudden gust . . . or standing knee deep in water, looking up as the windward side angled above me . . . or just holding on – (when ‘one hand for you, one for the ship’ becomes ‘both hands for you’) . . not to mention the other tasks of working with the team, managing the press, dealing with costs.
Sure, I can see the differences, this is way out of my league, but are there any similarities with what happens on Blue Mistress? . . . Is there a common thread? Or am I just a another dreamer?
This is the cockpit of Gitana Eighty (Loick Peyron) – as I write, lying first in the IMOCA 60s, making 13.8 knots, with 307 nautical miles to go to Boston, (and, yes, we do deal with figures showing that apparent accuracy).
And this is the cockpit of Telecom Italia (Giovanni Soldini) – currently lying first in Class 40, making 7.4 knots in light airs, with 1079 nautical miles to go.
Back on board Blue Mistress – (seen here last month in Fowey, Cornwall),
I look round my own short, narrow cockpit. Like Peyron and Soldini, I know every inch of it. Less to know, of course, and I may not have competed every inch of the way across an ocean, but I too have watched the sea from every angle, felt the wind, and eyed the weather.
And there lies the similarity, it’s not in the technology, it’s in the sea and the weather, elements careless of mankind, carrying their own way day after day, century after century.
And if I dare to compare myself (and you) to those sailors currently hurrying acoss the Atlantic, it’s lies in a certain restlessness – that sparkle in the eye, that beat of the heart, that need to test ourselves in those elements.
There’s no mystery, it’s simply being out there for the love of it.
Beyond Steeple Point 