marine photography

Photography to inform, to record and as pure art

On sailing a Folksong – one nautical mile

/ Bill / 1 Comment

I woke on the boat on Saturday morning to a slowly clearing sky and little wind. By the time I had prepared for a morning’s solo sail, the sun was emerging.

The spring tide had been flooding fast when I had my first cup of tea but was now less fierce.

Leaving a fore and aft trot mooring single-handed can be tricky. The tide makes all the difference.

Blue mistress, like all the others on the trot, is moored looking downstream. She has two stern lines – one to each quarter and  two bow lines over the bow roller.

This morning, the incoming tide allowed me loosen the port quarter line and drop the starboard one. This let the stern drift to starboard away from the trot line but still stay attached to the buoy. Lightly lashing the tiller to port caused the bow to want to turn to starboard, away from the forward buoy. Engaging the throttle very lightly to hold her against the tide, I went forward, dropped the bow line to port, releasing the bow to swing slowly (the long keel helps here) out to starboard. I returned aft, dropped the stern line and pushed the throttle gently forward.

~~~

Now that Blue Mistress is more or less as planned (always more to do, of course), I have time to look around and enjoy the surroundings as well as the boat. The early morning was crisp and clear, so, camera in one hand, tiller in the other, I motored down to the Sound enjoying the ride. There was nobody around. I had the water more or less to myself.

What follows is that early morning trip down the Plym – from the mooring to Plymouth Sound, a little over one nautical mile, highlighting some of what I saw:

The entrance to Hooe Lake

Astern, the sky was still heavy with cloud over Oreston and Plymstock.

Cattedown Wharves. The previous evening, I had watched a ship enter Plymouth Sound via the western entrance. She was busy unloading when I returned to the mooring later. She left silently in the night.

The entrance to Plymouth Yacht Haven. Little movement there.

Further downstream, through the moorings, the buildings on Plymouth Hoe were catching the sun.

The Hangars that were a part of RAF Mount Batten and are now boatyards. The Mount Batten Centre is this side of them.

Victoria Wharves.

Queen Anne’s Battery with the Royal Western Yacht Club, the home of OSTAR, on the far right. The National Marine Aquarium is in the centre.

The austere ramparts of the Royal Citadel

The entrance to Sutton Harbour and the Barbican.

Smeaton’s Tower and the Hoe with Tinside Pool beneath and the Royal Plymouth Corinthian Yacht Club on the right

And, round the end of Mount Batten Pier, the Sound itself, with the Royal Navy much in evidence.

A lone fishing boat scuttled past, in a hurry to get to sea, her wake underlining Drake’s Island with the Mount Edgcumbe Estate in the background.

~~~

The mainsail set without the battens snagging the lazy jacks. I’d had a hard time of it the previous afternoon, but there was less wind today. Then the genoa – and we made a starboard tack in under Jennycliff where the wind was stronger as it hugged the short Fort Bovisand to Ramscliff Point stretch of coast

Tacking onto a close reach, it took an hour and a half  to cross the 3 nm of the Sound from Jennycliff to Cawsand –  a patient and gentle 2 knots.

Close to the top of the tide, the Breakwater was washed by the slight swell, the western end bathed in the morning light.

There was even less swell in the Sound and Blue Mistress sailed upright and silent.

In towards Cawsand, the wind increased from around Penlee Point, and we made 4 knots right up to the trees that come down to the water here.

A nod and a wave to a man on his boat anchored close in, and then the second tack of the day to look along the outside of the Breakwater.

But by then the wind was dropping away further and my 1.5 knots (and falling) would not get me back to the mooring in time.

Stowing the genoa, I motored back across the Sound and up the Plym again.

This was not sailing as sport – but sailing as therapy, the cares of the week blown away.

~~~

An hour later and barely three miles away, I was stationary in the car, caught in two impatient lanes of holiday traffic waiting for an accident to be cleared. Hey, ho . . .

For love of a boat – one year on.

/ Bill

A year ago, I started the Love of a Boat series following a holiday in Croatia.

I had seen an old boat arranged ‘tastefully’ on the sand as a piece of beach furniture for tourists. I was saddened that something as complex and special as a wooden boat should be left as a casual prop for those who probably wouldn’t care whether it was there or not.

This was slightly naive of me but, as it turns out, a good basis for learning.

Since then I have shared some of my collection of boat images on a weekly basis. These are images that I take, firstly, for the pleasure of looking at boats and, secondly, because I have always been interested in how the design of working boats varies according to their location – (form following function).

In sharing them, I have found that:

  • There are many people all over the world who share my enthusiasm and care very deeply about wooden boats – (and not just wooden boats).
  • Some confine their interests to particular types of craft, interests which they pursue intensely and exclusively.
  • Thanks to blogging, it is possible to follow what they are doing and thinking, and watch new ideas emerging

Above all, I note in this group a genuine desire to learn from the past and to build the best of the past into new projects.

This may sound self-evident to you – of course we learn from the past, don’t we?  The older I get, the less sure I am.

I have banged on about this before. The way modern technology advances in leaps and bounds seems to have created a rather blinkered environment, one in which we look intently forward hoping for solutions to our problems, often ignoring the fact that man has been facing many of the same problems for generations and the core solutions are already there. Yes, technology gives us new ways to deal with them, and, yes, technology is a source of new creativity – (excitingly so!), allowing us to enter areas we have never entered before.

But for some solutions we don’t need technology . . .  just a way of dealing with them at a more human level.

to be continued . . .

On Steeple Point – a shared world

/ Bill

I was climbing the path to Steeple Point.

Towards the top, the land falls steeply away, rapidly becoming a cliff face that drops vertically to the rocks below.

With the tide in, these rocks are covered by sea – Atlantic rollers reaching their nemesis on the Cornish coast.

From up here, you watch those big swells roll in.

They build, curl and crash forward in a welter of foam, sparkling in the sunshine. Piling over the back-tow of their predecessors, they waste themselves on the pebble ridge.

There are intricate patterns of foam, constantly changing, highlighting myriad currents and cross-currents.

That morning, there was nobody in sight.

I was enjoying the aloneness. . . the warmth of the sun . . . the smell of salt in the air. . .  the sound of waves on rocks.

The sea was still heavy from an earlier gale

There was a slight breeze, I remember.

And then this guy appears below me on a surf board.

The waves were sweeping in from around the Point. He had been hidden out there as I climbed.

So, it wasn’t my sole world after all. There were two of us – the one holding a camera and idly watching, the other intently doing.

It was so totally unexpected. I felt a little shocked – a bit put-out.

Then I felt admiration – what a great ride in such a beautiful place.

And then a change of mood –  sudden concern because of what I could see from my vantage point.

A moment of doubt burst into this memorable day.

The concern was all mine, of course.

Whatever I saw, whatever I thought might happen, was way beyond my control.

He didn’t care. He knew what he was doing. He was having a ball.

I could only watch, my concern pointless.

Let him get on with it.

He paddled out to catch another wave. I continued my walk.

Two separate lives enjoying  the same space, viewing it through different eyes.

On sailing a Folksong – update

/ Bill

Blue Mistress has twenty lockers with removable lids, twelve of them in the bunks. Laid out across a worktop and painted white, the lids looked surreal – bright islands in a dark sea.

There is a new folding lid across the stove as well as one above the portable loo. (Before, both these lids were a little tight to remove. There was a trick to it –  meaning that I could manage them fine because I knew how to do it, but the occasional crew didn’t. Therefore, they found the loo difficult to use . . . and said so.)

The varnished trim around the bunks has been matched along both sides, but is yet to be fitted.

The chart table has been revamped.  The old one was slightly too big to keep shipped all the time, although it was a very good dining table. Unfortunately, it also had a split in it. So it has been shortened, reworked with fiddles and, although still removable, will be fitted securely across-ships.

There is a concern that giving. the main cabin an eggshell white finish makes it look clinical. Well, not with all the gear I put in it it won’t! At the moment it looks stark but the cushions and trim will soften it. It’s a boat with a parlour in it, not a parlour with a boat around it.

But it is a boat of just under 26 foot with less than five foot headroom in the main cabin. We are not talking ‘large yacht’ we are talking ‘making a small space as comfortable as possible in circumstances that can be quite uncomfortable’.

Therefore, the art of stowage is magnified here. I have only a hazy idea how the long distance voyagers manage their stowage in boats of this size. A lot of gear must be piled on spare bunks, every nook and cranny filled. Single-handed, it must be tight; two of you must be very tight.

Stowage is not a static art – hiding things away in the bowels of the boat. It’s a dynamic art. Everything has to be accessible, able to be reached when needed and moved to wherever it’s used – sometimes in a hurry.  It’s about lockers that open easily (but not too easily in a sea). It’s about knowing where everything is, and having an instinctive ability to move around the boat to reach it.

It’s about establishing regular habits to be able to give measured responses to irregular events.

It’s about seamanship – handling yourself, handling the boat, handling the gear.

~~~

This week, I have noticed a sea-change in my thinking.

For the past four years, I have been concerned about the fabric of the boat – “should we do this or that, change this or that, keep this or that the same, or what?”  Each year, I have concentrated on one part of it. Each year I have taken countless images and studied them for this or that reason. I have sometimes followed outside advice, and sometimes followed my own intuition  and, with the help of Richard Banks at DickyB Marine, we have progressed.

There’s plenty still to do – it’s a boat, there’s always plenty to do . . . and even more to learn.

But the major work is over. From now on, “it is what it is – get on with it”.

I am looking to get Blue Mistress  back in the water and go sailing.

On learning to row

/ Bill / 1 Comment

“Watch carefully, Bill.”

Aged about 12. We were leaning against the rail  looking down at the water.

A small,  elderly man was descending the wooden steps from the quay next door. He was dressed in a blue fisherman’s jersey, baggy grey trousers and canvas shoes.

Half way down, he nodded a good morning to us, untied the end of the frape and gently hauled his dinghy to the tiny landing stage beneath him.

It must have been about half-tide to have exposed this platform. Along this side of the harbour, dinghies were moored on frapes to allow the boat to ride the considerable tides and also to prevent them going aground at low water –  (in all but the lowest of low spring tides), so that they were always ready for use.

He untied the boat from the frape, remoored it to the ladder and stepped neatly into the middle of the boat. It barely moved.

The thwarts were wet from the previous night’s rain. He found a cloth and dried them.

Then he raised a bottom board and bailed the small amount of water collected there. He sponged it dry.

Facing aft, he sat down on the middle thwart, shipped both rowlocks and then the outside oar.

Twisting round, he untied the painter, coiled it into the bow and gave the boat a gentle push. Now he had room to ship the other oar.

As the boat drifted further away from the ladder, he was able to pull on the port oar turning the boat towards its destination.

With barely a glance over his shoulder, he took the weight on both oars and glided effortlessly away to the quay across the water.

The oars dipped with barely a splash – an economy of movement that gave the sense of a single unit – man and boat.

Even I could see the natural focus, the self-possession and the strength of someone doing what they have been doing for decades – a master in his element.

This was Randolph Johns. He was probably in his late sixties. That seemed ancient then – I no longer think so.

Over the next two or three summers, there would be the occasional lesson in our pram dinghy or a few words on shore.

From watching and listening to him, I learnt how to row and how to handle a small dinghy.

There was never any formality in his teaching – just the passing on of knowledge and the acquiring of some skill by doing.

I will never forget Randolph Johns. I learnt from him what it meant to master an activity – to have reached a point where the movement itself ceases to be an aspiration and becomes part of your being. He wasn’t a man who went out for a row – rowing was part of how he lived. He didn’t think about it much.

Had I rowed every day since, I doubt if I would ever have been as capable of doing this deceptively simple task as well as him. Even in those days, outboard engines had taken the necessity out of rowing and were turning it into a leisure activity. There was now choice – the attitude behind it had changed. Most of the masters of rowing nowadays will have mastered a sport, not a means of transport.

At 12, of course I didn’t understand this. But I did begin to look at how other people did those things I wanted to do – and I did learn a little from doing this . . .  and then a little more  . . .

“Watch carefully, Bill.”

Fowey, circa 1959. I took the picture. See the number of moorings compared with today. The tug on the right is St Canute which later went to the Exeter Maritime Museum.

On sailing a Folksong – for fellow Folksong owners

/ Bill

Blue Mistress was lifted out of the water last Wednesday. While waiting for the lift, she was stripped of everything aboard (except for the cqr and anchor rode).

The boom was also unshipped.

Although that was not the  intention, it meant I got a picture of her motoring light.

So, we’ve got the much-talked-about ‘heavy’ rudder, two large riggers, and a Yanmar engine placed fairly far towards the stern – (the front of it stretches approximately 6 inches into the main cabin).

In the event, she is only slightly down at the stern. Normally, there is heavy gear (inc. spare water containers) in the fore cabin lockers to counteract this.

They removed the mast and rigging – the boom and spinnaker pole are lashed on deck.

The deck has grown green patches over the past few months thanks to the weather. The lines of the halyards over the cabin top are clearly visible. I will remember to clean here more often.

The bottom was fairly clean. Weed is on the anode, propeller (not enough use his winter), and the edges of the keel and rudder.

The Raymarine log has not been working this winter. There was a small colony of barnacles around the ‘propeller’ housing in the bow which was stopping it turning.

The strop is only just on the keel, showing how difficult it is to judge the rake of the stern from above.

A last look at the cheeks on the rudder and the hull shape from the stern.

There is more growth on the starboard waterline. Moored fore and aft, this is the part of the hull that faces away from the sun for most of the time. Earlier in the year, I spent some time in the water trying to clean this off – with little success.

For love of a boat – Carrick Roads, Cornwall

/ Bill / 1 Comment

Carrick Roads, Cornwall 2009

We have spent the weekend in and around Falmouth.

Falmouth is one of the great natural harbours of the world, with its vast deepwater expanse of Carrick Roads protected from the sea.

From the water’s edge north of Mylor, we watched Falmouth Working Boats dredging for oysters on the opposite shore. These boats are one of the few in the western world still working solely under sail

Three workboats under reduced sail, a sloop passing up the roads and a working boat moored on the foreground.

I suspect the latter is one of the racing fleet of Falmouth Working Boats, like the one below . . .

Falmouth Working Boat, 2009