Adrian Morgan
CRAFTSMANSHIP
CLASSIC BOAT AUGUST 2016 37‘W
e are such stuff as dreams...”, well it is
Shakespeare’s birthday, or is it death-day
this year? Forsooth, something topical,
perchance? Will, it has been lately discovered, owned
a smartly painted punt in which he would pole Miss
Hathaway gently up the Avon, and reference to it has
been found in a codicil to Will’s will (the one in which
he gave his wife the second best bed).
Alack, no. For all the research into the great man’s
life, no one has unearthed a suggestion that he took to
the water for any other reason than to be ferried across
the Thames to The Globe, in which case it would have
been a shalop, not a punt, manned by a surly thug in a
floppy red woollen cap who would likely pause mid-
Thames, pull a knife, double the fare, or throw you
overboard. And could Shakespeare swim, you ask?
I digress (again). The other day, seeking refuge from
the cares of dry land, I escaped to Sally at her mooring
in the little bay opposite Ullapool they call “Logy” and
spell as Loggie. And I remembered afresh one of the
many reasons we go sailing, or in this case swing about
attached to 40ft of Seasteel and a shot of ferry chain,
with a fish farm anchor at each end.
After the customary fight – Sally often plays rough if I
have neglected her for a while by stubbing my foot,
bumping my head or just being plainly obstructive – I
finally, lost my patience (she swallowed my screw driver)
and screamed “Sally, for Pete’s sake I am trying to help
you” as indeed I was by renewing the sound proofingaround the engine and re-routing the
VHF cable, along with a raft of other,
small improvements that make owning
a septuagenarian wooden boat so
satisfying, and at times, frustrating.
From then on, all was harmony
between us, and she allowed me to get
on with things. And it was therapeutic.
At last, after 20 years, to find a stowage
place for the mugs that she was happy
with; cut out the rot in the tiller;
varnish the toe rail (for once it only
drizzled a little, rather than rained frogs
the moment I finished) etc. All the little
chores that take up time and keep you
from thinking about the mortgage.
And as I relaxed (later that day I fell
asleep to Radio 3 and decided to spend
the night aboard), it was about then I
remembered one of the many reasons,
as I said earlier, we sail little old boats.
Here we have a world of our own,
circumscribed not by a sleep but by the
sea. We can be in control, well almost,
of our environment in a way that is
difficult ashore. Only so many things
can go wrong on a simple boat, and all
can be fixed with recourse to the tools
and materials we keep aboard. We are forced to be
ingenious (unless there’s a branch of Aladdin’s Cave
chandlery just beyond the pontoon).
Simple and small is, of course, the key. No sooner do
you ship aboard a hot water system, smart battery
charger, a set of wind instruments, interfaced with GPS,
AIS, chart plotter (linked to cockpit repeaters), and all
the other accoutrements of the cruising life, then that life
starts to take on much of the frustration of life ashore.
The little world becomes more of a nightmare.
I wonder how many different kind of light bulbs the
owner of one of those big yachts has as spares, let alone
winch handles, injectors, carpet cleaner, washing
machine belts, varnish, water maker filters and loo rolls?
That must be really stressful. Like my old Land Rover;
constantly wondering “what’s going to go bang next?”
But then, most owners of big yachts have crew, and
agents to sort out matters such as changing LED lights
in the sauna, or replacing the oil filters in the (second)
generator. So where’s the fun in that? To own a boat
and have all its little issues sorted for you, so all you
have to do is front up on the quayside, hand over the
keys to the Porsche and step aboard to a welcome of
flowers and Champagne? Compare that to a night on a
Highland mooring, reading to the light of an oil lamp
whose wick you have trimmed yourself that very day?
What would Shakespeare have written, I wonder?
“Small boats are such stuff as dreams are made on and
our little world is rounded by the sea.”Keep it simple, son
Or how to find onboard harmony in a small boat
“We can be
in control,
well almost,
of ourenvironment
in a way that
is difficult
ashore”CHARLOTTE WATTERS