MESSING ABOUT ON THE RIVER

As is so often the case, it all seemed like a good idea at the time. There was this little matter of a small endowment, a little windfall no less. So what do you do with a little windfall,  that’s different ?  Something impossible – well, not too impossible, but certainly something you would not otherwise have done. If you’ve had a dream – go for it !!

I did some sailing in my youth, management had never sailed at all. We both enjoy being by or on the water – not so much in it, but more of that later. “Let’s build a boat”, I ventured. Management was not very impressed; there were vague mentionings of curtains, back doors, upvc windows……..”Let’s go to the Caravan and Boat Show at the NEC”, she said – so we did.

We looked at Long Boats, Narrow Boats, Speed Boats and Kit Boats. We looked at large boats, small boats, flat-bottomed boats and an awful lot of caravans. We saw nothing that was really ‘us’,  but the idea of being a boat owner was beginning to take root.

The next port of call (we’re into the jargon already) was the local paper shop. Several magazines and letters later, we were knee deep in boat plan catalogues. Boats come in all shapes and sizes, and made of all sorts of materials. There are DIY plans published for all of them. Did you know, for instance, that boats can be constructed from concrete ?  Neither did we, but they can be, and indeed are. However, eventually plans were ordered, plans arrived, plans were studied, plans were costed ;  now was the time for our first major decision.

We were confronted, at this stage, with two possible scenarios. The first option would be to build from a kit. This method does have some advantages – everything required, other than the paint, comes in a parcel, there are very full, detailed and comprehensive instructions, some of the more complex cutting and shaping is done for you and, finally, there is invariably a help line available. As is usually the case, however, where there are pros there are also cons. The disadvantages include a very limited choice; designs that are tailored to suit the kit format and method; very limited scope for any design variation or personalisation and, looking at it from a personal point of view, not as much satisfaction with a finished product that has been assembled rather than built. I am not knocking kits, they are good, and have brought a lot of pleasure and satisfaction to a lot of people, but they do have their limitations.

The second option involves building completely from scratch. Working drawings, and basic instructions, are used to build a tried and tested design from a competent designer.  Here, there is the advantage of choice from a very wide range of designs, and the opportunity to stamp one’s own individuality on the finished product. However, it must be accepted and understood that in all respects, with this approach, the ‘buck’ stops with the builder !!  Being young, foolish, full of enthusiasm and very naïve we, of course, plumped for the second option. I should perhaps mention that it became apparent quite early on that cost would not be an important factor in our choice. Building from scratch is cheaper – but not by any significant margin.

Technically, what we decided to build is a 12 feet long, half-decked, sloop-rigged dinghy with provision to take a small outboard motor when required.  In principle, the actual construction is quite straightforward. A mahogany framework is constructed upside-down on disposable formers. This framework is then covered with panels of marine plywood cut to size and glued and screwed into place. When this assembly is removed from the formers, turned over and the thwarts and decking added, the result is a rigid construction that retains its shape. With the addition of a centreboard, rudder, mast, boom and sails, not to mention a few coats of paint, there is a finished boat. Easy, wasn’t it ?

Along the way, however, there are some very interesting discoveries to be made. The required timber is always the one which is unavailable. “ Phew – sorry sir, there isn’t much call for that these days”.  All of the timber sizes are metric, excepting, usually, for some strange reason, the length, which is still in imperial measure. There is also that odd hybrid – imperial converted into metric – which produces strange lengths like 1.63 metres !  Planing timber to size, by machine, can lead to a loss of as much as 25% by volume – that you have paid for!!  Having your timber cut to size, by machine, can increase its cost by a factor of four. A quantity of mahogany board costing £135 costed out at £565 when cut to size !!  I could have bought a saw-bench for that sort of difference – all ready for the next boat !

It is in circumstances such as this that another modern innovation comes into its own. Let me give you a ‘for instance’. The panels that form the skin of the boat are fitted a pair at a time. This is done to balance the stress on, and thereby avoid any distortion to, the frame. There are 8 panels in all. Each panel is held by approximately 85 screws. For each screw a clearance hole is drilled in the panel (and each is countersunk) and a pilot hole is drilled in the frame – around 340 holes 170 countersunks and 170 screws per session. Not only do you use an electric drill for the holes, you also, with great enthusiasm, use an electric screwdriver for the screws !

When in real difficulty with suppliers – get them interested. The biggest problem we had from all points of view, including the literal one, was the mast; it is, after all, 18 feet long. And just to cap that, it’s hollow !. It has to be made from specialist timber that no one, but no one, even wants to hear you mention, let alone supply. After several abortive approaches to various timber merchants, and during my second trip around them, the problem was solved. We were supplied, at last, with a beautiful piece of Douglas Fir, grade 1, guaranteed clear of knots, enough for a mast, a boom and a pair of oars.  It was all accurately cut to size “on the house” and only because a salesman became interested in what is, in these modern times, a rather unusual project.

After the construction – the painting. All of you DIY painters (and dare I say professionals too) will be well used, of course, to all of these quick drying modern paints. Touch dry in minutes (well, perhaps not quite) but dry enough for a second coat within the day. Boat paint isn’t like that !!!  Drying times are very ambient temperature dependant, and overcoating times are critical. I will illustrate. The area to be painted may very well take, say, 2 hours to paint. In the prevailing temperatures at the time this work was being done the drying time could then be about 48 hours before a second coat could be applied. At that point, there is then a ‘window’ of 16 hours during which a second coat may be applied. If this ‘window’ is missed then the whole surface must be rubbed down and flattened off before another coat is applied. With a minimum of five coats of paint to go on, in three different colours, you will appreciate that things tended to drag on a bit. Painting, in fact, took three weeks – and it’s only a little boat !!

By this time we were very seriously thinking boat trailers – it took our minds off of the painting !!  Building a boat trailer really was, for a pleasant change, a most straight forward operation. It is very much a case of design-it-yourself to suit the boat in question. But, having done this, then all of the parts being commercially available the actual building is rather like playing with a full-size Meccano set.

At last all was done. The day of the launching arrived.  The boat fitted the trailer, the trailer towed well behind the car, the mast rode nicely over the car boot. We were off to Rother Valley Country Park where an invited audience awaited us !

Putting the new craft on the water for the first time turned out to be a doddle. She sat on the water level and true; and that, in itself, was a relief because you never quite know how good the balance is until you actually try it. But our first mistake of the day had already been made – putting her into the water at all !  We had launched from the only slip-way and the moderately strong, and gusting, wind was blowing us straight back up it. We hauled her off the slip and alongside the pontoons. We stepped the mast, fitted the rigging and hoisted the sails;  but each time we cast off – yes, you’ve got it – straight back up the slipway we went. After the umpteenth time our invited audience pleaded a prior engagement and upped and departed.

Apart from the wind, we had another problem. Whilst we had been quietly minding our own business doing what the British have happily been doing for centuries – messing about in our boat – the ‘driver’ of the rescue tender had very thoughtfully parked his craft between us and the only direct outlet to open water. Our only possible course out into the lake now, was through the mooring area; on a zig-zag course, dodging all of the moored craft, their lines and their bouys, and all of this more or less drectly into the wind. Oh, happy days !!

The seeds of disaster had, of course, already been sown. With the repeated shunting backwards and forwards on, and getting away from, the slipway and the resultant wet legs and feet,  the bottom boards of or craft were now very wet – not to say very slippery. However, immediate help was at hand in the shape of two knowledgeable volunteers;  one of whom asked very pertinently, and ever so politely, if we really knew what we were doing !  Those weren’t the exact words he used, he was much too polite for that, but that was undoubtedly what he meant. If only he’d known …….. However, to continue, these two volunteers now held on to the boat whilst we finished rigging the sails, cast off and generally got totally disorganised; finally giving us a good shove into the teeth of the gale (I’m exaggerating slightly, but who cares) and dead straight into the moorings.

For those of you who do not mess about in boats there will now follow a short course of instuction in the gentle art of sailing. You will, upon reflection, readily appreciate that if you wish to propel your boat directly into the wind you will need a great big engine – not a sail.  If , however, a sail is all you’ve got then you have to be a bit crafty. The general idea is to proceed in a series of zig-zags. Each zig takes you forward at an angle to the wind, and when you run out of space you turn through 90 degrees and zag until you run out of space again, and so on. This is known as ‘tacking’. Each time you ‘come –about’ (technical term – means turn)  from one tack to the next, the sail whips across the boat from one side to the other and the boat leans over the other way. If you fail to duck, the boom, that’s the piece of wood on the bottom of the sail, gives you a severe head-ache !  If you fail to get your body across to the other side of the boat, to counter-balance it as it leans over the other way, the boat falls over and you get very wet!  End of lesson.

Let us now review the situation. We have a brand new boat – never been sailed. We have a Captain who hasn’t sailed for 40 years and a crew that has never sailed at all. We are sailing into the teeth of a very brisk and gusting wind, and heading straight for the moorings. These are infested with bouys, lines and numerous small craft at anchor. Through this shambles we have to steer a course!  Just to turn the whole mess into a complete farce the bottom boards have become so wet and slippery that your Captain cannot keep his footing, and every time we ‘go about’ he falls over!!

If we now get back into real time, you will remember that our two ever so polite and intrepid volunteers had just shoved us off into the teeth of the gale (well, that’s my story anyway). Amazingly enough, even though I fell over three times, we got through the moorings and into clear water. At this point we had to ‘come-about’ and make a heading that avoided the narrowing of the lake. Unfortunately we ‘came-about’ a little too violently;  I missed the boom but failed to get my body across the boat before collapsing into an ignominious heap in the bottom. This left me on the lee, or downward, side of the boat, which immediately, and quite gracefully, laid itself flat on the water and tipped us both into the lake!  My glasses remained momentarily on the surface, instantaneously headless and gazing vacantly into space, only to be picked up a moment later as my head came back out of the water.

In an instant I realised what had happened  -  we’d capsized! There is a drill for these occasions, of course, and I invited management to swim out to the far end of the mast and lift it off of the water, so ensuring that when I stood on the centre-board and heaved on the rigging the boat would return upright. The problem was that my lady wife was laughing so much that she would probably have drowned if she had let go. In the midst of all this hilarity the rescue boat arrived and, cutting short our heroic efforts in self sufficiency, towed us back to the bank.

It had been quite warm in the water but once out on the bank and back in the wind it was very ,very cold. Having beached our craft, and got her back upright, she now had to be baled out. Unfortunately a baler had not been amongst the items on any of my shopping lists  -  so we had to use the dog’s bowl. It worked, but it was very, very slow. The dog had had a drink and really couldn’t have cared less.

The last instruction given to the crew, in the middle of the lake, had been to hang on to the ‘painter’ (technical term – mooring line). This was so that the boat woud not drift away from us whilst we were frantically trying to retrieve oars, and other miscellaneous bric-a-brac, tipped from the boat and in great danger of escaping from us in the wind. Upon reaching the bank a forgetful captain omitted to ‘belay’ (cancel) this order. So there was the crew, on dry land, with the boat, also on dry land, still hanging on to the painter as if her life depended on it with hands which were getting progressively bluer and bluer with cold and encircled by the hem of her jumper which, struggling with the weight of the water trying to drain out of it, was by now down to her knees. The camera wasn’t handy!

An hour’s baling later we once again had a boat capable of floating. We and the boat were half way down the lake; the car and the trailer were up at the slipway. “Let’s row back” I said, eager to try out the new oars. That was my last mistake of the day. I pulled on the oars and the boat went one yard forwards, but whilst the oars were out of the water on the swing back the boat went two yards backwards straight up the bank. It really wasn’t our day. Instead of taking the boat to the trailer I had to go on foot, bring the trailer to the boat and fetch her out of the water where she stood.

With the boat back on the trailer, and the trailer hooked back on the car; wet, cold, bedraggled, bowed but not beaten, we set off for home to prepare for another day.The boat had been well and truly launched.

This is a totally true story. I know - I was the Captain !

© 1988