New Day, New Photo

This is one of my favourite boats, and the smallest I have built to date. Built on spec, she's now owned by the young lead guitarist of one of the world's best-known singer's backing band. I have it on good authority that he's often to be seen out in the bay, on his own, presumably as far from the mad world of gigs and tours and venues and screaming fans as it is possible to be.

The design is by Karsten Ausland, in effect a small version of his Jan sjekte, of which I have built two 18ft versions and a couple of 16-footers, tweaked as to midship section but essentially as they came off his drawing board in the 1930s.

But it's this little son of sjekte that I like most. She's a bit unstable on her own, alighting on the water like thistledown, and stiffens up beautifully with a little body weight. Just like a fast rowing boat show be. And she just flies along. I can't think of a nicer little rowing boat. After all, what do you want? A boat that's stable and sluggish or light and fast? And she' a delight in a seaway, riding the waves like a bird.

Wish I hadn't sold her sometimes as she's the kind of boat that one day I will build for myself. Why would you want anything else and, just so as you don't think I haven't forgotten my old prejudices, why on earth would you want something made of plywood, when you can have the real thing? There, just so you don't think I've gone soft on the awful stuff.

Lapstrake (but not as we know it)

I suppose it has some similarities to building clinker boats, yet Oh how I wish it were that easy. Some people think the planks on a boat are simply that: planks, parallel sided, and all you do is slap them around a set of formers. Now, we all know this will not a boat make; more like a box, which is what I've been up to these last few days, namely a log cabin.

Have to say that all those straight lines did not come naturally, or the need for absolute squareness. Not that boats are not meticulously trued at every stage, or you'd get one side rising faster than the other. It's just the absence of curves that made me glad I was not engaged in the business of house building rather than boat building. It becomes kind of monotonous after a while laying down identical lengths of spruce, notching them into each other and banging them with a mallet.

But it's done now and the result is pretty good; a place to sit and admire the view. What's more it's light, whereas croft houses up here tend to be dark, with small windows dating from a time when the view was the least of your concerns. It was more a case of coming in from the fields, wolfing your porridge in front of a meagre peat fire and scuttling up to bed with  Morag holding a guttering candle. Must have been a miserable experience as these little cottages are hardly the best insulated, and certainly not in those days with earth floors and only thick walls to keep out the cold, rather than good old Kingspan thermal insulation.

I was told that a few inches of modern insulation is equivalent to a few feet of stone wall. Our log cabin has 130mm thick walls, a sandwich of spruce and insulation which means it's like one of those cooking boxes filled with straw in which you put your caserole in the morning and it's done to perfection by supper time.

Back to boat building next week with the added bonus that the third instalment is now safely in my bank account. Nothing like dosh to inspire you. And once again, an owner who is a joy to deal with. I'll work out how many boats and owners I have worked for in the last ten years one of these days but what I can say is that none of them baulked at paying; there has never been a formal contract with any of them and, with one exception, they all seem to have been happy with what I built for them. At least no one has come back to me with anything more than the usual wooden boat problems such as what varnish to use; and why is one side of my boat six inches higher than the other, to which I reply "natural movement of the timber. Quite normal."

Only joking...

Plus ca change...

Back from Brittany (balmy breezes, bright sun, baguettes, crepes, galettes, wine, flowers) to wall to wall gales, driving rain and Tesco's best. Why can't they bake French bread in Britain, or at least in Ullapool? Why is their cheese so bland? And their tomatoes tasteless, and, and...

We have a great local baker (struggling no doubt against the odds) but there's nothing like the taste of a baguette bought in the early morning from a boulanger, carried home on the handlebars of an old bicycle and eaten with unsalted butter and French jam. We live like peasants up here. Well, I wish we did. French peasants eat far better than us, with the exception of the sea food available here, most of which is shipped off to France and Spain. (And personally I hate crabs... indeed most things that crawl about under water).

 Sometimes it's hard to understand why we choose to live up here. Visitors go "ooh, what a lovely view... and we saw a deer too" and trip around the hills marvelling at the wild beauty. Those of us who live here see a landscape blighted by sheep grazing and denuded of trees by those same overpopulated deer, tolerated simply because shooting brings in money for the estate owners and adds to their value (and to hell with the damage to the countryside, let alone vehicles that habitually meet with them on dark nights).

No, for all the wild beauty of the Highlands there are some serious imbalances up here. Don't get me started as I would then have to enumerate all the blessings we enjoy: viz no cars, clean air, fresh water from those same hills (albeit tainted a wee bit at times by sheep and deer poo) good company, honest friends, great sailing (sometimes) etc, etc.

Anyway, enough of the post-Brittany blues. There's a dinghy awaiting a mast, and a lot besides so it's back to the grindstone and the charms of a draughty milking parlour and rain splattered iron roof. Once the radio's on and the coffee brewing it won't be too bad. It's just getting back into it after ten days that's the problem.

Off to France

At last, a holiday. With the Tammie Norrie at a nice stage of completion, it's time to take a break from the awful weather up here and head south for a few days. When I get back it'll be to make a start on the spars, flip her over and work on the bottom with a view to a late October delivery.

It's been a leisurely build to date, but it's time now to up the pace as there's another on order which I hope will keep me occupied over the winter.

Scottishboating.blogspot.com

I won't quote the whole post, as it would detract from Ewan's own excellent blog, but it starts well and gets better and is a measured response to my last post.

Read on, then go to Scottishboating.blogspot.com

'Adrian Morgan has just posted an interesting article on The Trouble With Old Boats, bemoaning the lack of profit in traditional boat carpentry, which he fears is partly caused by competition from colleges of boat-building taking on restorations as cost-subsidised teaching aids. His post ends with the words

' "Ultimately it's the likes of us, unfunded and unsubsidised what's trying to make a living from building boats, and a craft that can't scratch a living is irrelevant and deserves to die out".

'Some of the comments are reminiscent of the complaint by my wife's friend Pat, a now-retired professional opera singer, who would sometimes be approached after a performance by patrons asking "And what do you do during the day, dear, when you're not singing?" It's terribly easy for those on the outside looking in on what appears to be simply an enjoyable activity to forget that there's actually a lot of skill, self-discipline and time involved.

'Actually I suspect that the competition from the colleges isn't sufficient in terms of size to make a significant impact on the rest of what is admittedly, in the UK at least, a cottage industry...'

Well worth reading the whole piece, which ranges far and wide.

Speak for Yourself (2)

A couple of comments from people made me think I had not expressed myself clearly enough in my last ramble (below). So I've edited it. Those who read it the first time might like to revisit it with fresh eyes.

Speak for Yourself (edited)...

Any professional boat builder who says: "Well, I don't do this for money. Just for the love of working with wood, recreating the beauty of a bygone age, keeping the old traditions alive..." etc, etc, blah, blah, blah, is either reliant on a pension, independently wealthy or growing skunk in the loft.

Well I'll have you know that I, for one, am very fond of money and nothing makes me happier than the sound of an envelope being torn open to reveal the down payment on a new dinghy. My writing brings in a meagre sum every year, and decreasing steadily as fewer people are drawn to my erratic ramblings, which leaves me increasingly reliant on scratching a living in what the late John Leather, author and designer, yacht historian and brutal realist called "a precarious and unrewarding business..."

By which he certainly didn't mean we should not do our utmost best to make a go of it, but be aware of the difficulties and frustrations. John was not a romantic, but a true lover of boats and as keen as anyone to keep "the old traditions alive..." etc, etc. That had to be, in his view, of secondary importance, however, to earning a living plying a viable trade.

Those who build boats as a hobby have my full support and admiration. They can afford to build them to perfection, innovate, experiment. Who's counting the hours anyway? I and most of those foolish enough to build wooden boats commercially try and build as quickly as they can, for speed is good in many ways, not least your eye and hands keep fresh from day to day. And speed, of course, equals money.

So, the boat building perfectionists with a little more time on their hands are admirable. No one does it better. Admirable too are the charitable trusts and the training establishments. However, in passing on the skills, or keeping youth off the streets, are they helping potential boat builders secure commissions by taking on commissions themselves, at lower rates, or making it harder?

Ultimately it's the likes of us, unfunded and unsubsidised what's trying to make a living from building boats, and a craft that can't scratch a living is irrelevant and deserves to die out.