Lysander link

I recieved an email from James Robinson of the Lysander Owners Association who asked me to provide a link to their website. He writes:
I've been reading and enjoying some of your articles in the twin keeler website. My boat is a Lysander which was designed by Percy Blandford and built by Don Haslam back in 1975. I have only been out in the boat twice this year as I received it at the end of June and it took around three months to get it ready for the water and like many others I enjoy doing 'improvements' to my boat when not sailing.I was wondering if it was possible to include a link in your online newsletter to the Lysander website http://www.lysander.org.uk as I believe in a kind of solidarity between trailer/sailers and you never know we may get to read of more adventures of folk in boats than might otherwise be the case. I hope you like this picture of my boat 'Amity' where she is moored all year round at her mooring 'a running mooring that allows me to pull her in from the slipway'. I wish you all a lovelyChristmas & New Year and hope for all of us a good season of sailing next year.

The boat really does look nice. I have checked the website and couldn't really find out if it is a bilge keeler but I guess it is.

Mini website

David Chamberlain is the guy who sailed his modified Vivacity 20, "Mini" from the US to Hawaii in 1992. On this website he publishes useful tips for those who want to take their small craft over big stretches of water - or at least dream about it.

On the Hard

If you live north of about 35^o north (or south of 35^o south), your boat probably spends up to half the year out of its element – on the hard. The annual ritual of getting it there is part of the rhythm of boating, at least in the temperate climates.
When I had my Alacrity, the autumn haulout was a simple, if not easy, process that became almost second nature. After one last sail late in October, I took the sails off and lowered the mast to its cradle. Next I picked up my trailer from the storage lot and brought it home. Then I motored the boat to the next marina downriver where they had a launch ramp, while someone drove my trailer there.
Then came the hard part – getting the boat onto the trailer. In order to get the trailer low enough to allow the keels to slide on, I had to attach a length of chain to the hitch, and then back all the way down the ramp until the truck’s rear tires were just short of the water. If there was any wind, motoring the boat onto the trailer was a real challenge. It often seemed to have a mind of its own, and it sometimes felt like trying to put our cat into the carrier for a trip to the vet.
Anyway, I always managed to get it on, usually after some rather sailor-like language. The moment of truth occurred when I pulled the trailer out of the water, checking to see if the forward edges of the keels were snug against the stops on the trailer, meaning that the boat was properly balanced for towing. If not, it was back into the water for some adjustments. By that time, nearly everyone in the marina had become a spectator, most had offered advice, and some had even offered to help. Once the trailer was back on the hitch, the worst was over. After a quick stop at home to take off the motor and remove the last of the equipment, it was off to the storage yard to put on the tarp for the winter. Finally, a beer, to reward my helper of the day.
This all happened one last time when I sold the Alacrity this past summer, to make room for my new Ranger 26. This time my assistant was the new owner, literally getting his feet wet with his new boat. When I dropped the boat off in his backyard, I was done with this process.
But, along with my new boat came a new haulout routine. First, I had to find a new place to store it, since it won’t go on a trailer like the Alacrity. I had to find a real marina, with a TravelLift instead of a launch ramp. The marina where I keep it in the summer was out of the question because they barely have room for a parking lot, which fills up quickly in the autumn with the most favored boats. So I went shopping for winter storage.
I found a spot about five miles upriver, at the marina where I had been storing my trailer over the summer. In preparation, I stopped by and picked up a contract. On the second page was a list of questions that reminded me I had moved up to a grown-up boat, not the teen-ager the Alacrity seemed in retrospect. Did I want them to winterize the fresh water system? Did I want a pump-out? Did I want it shrink-wrapped? I could hear the cash register gaily ringing away in the background.
Finally I had arranged everything, and it was time to get Greyhound to her winter home. I took most of the “stuff” that had accumulated in the half season I’d had her home, and made arrangements to deliver her up to Ossining. Unable to arrange any crew for the delivery date, I decided to singlehand it. That decision began to look a little suspect as the weatherman predicted a “sou’easter” for the Saturday I had to sail. However, he said it would hit late in the day while I was sailing early, and I was going north, so I took a chance and set out.
As it turned out, I needn’t have worried. Although it was overcast, the breeze was manageable, ten to twelve knots, and Greyhound galloped up the river. There was hardly another boat to be seen, we outran the following swells, and I successfully avoided the little island in the river that I’d never seen before. I was exhilarated, and was a little sorry to reach the marina entrance in about two hours.
I was a bit worried about docking, since I’d never done it in this marina singlehanded, but the gas dock was just inside the breakwater so I managed to slide in. The management assigned me a temporary slip in the middle of the marina, and I was able to get in there with no bumps or bruises, in spite of the freshening breeze. As I rode home in the car with my wife, I was more than a little pleased with myself. Mission accomplished! Later in the day things really kicked up outside, so much so that a large tree came down just up the street, so I was doubly glad I had made the trip when I did.
This past weekend I found out that Greyhound had been hauled, so I went up to finish the winter prep. I found her in the middle of an aluminum forest, packed into a collection of sailboats, looking like a flock of swans ready to fly south. I had built a PVC pipe frame to support the tarp over the cockpit, so I muscled that and the tarp up the ladder in the drizzle. The hardest part of the job was wrestling the outboard off the transom and into my car. Funny, it didn’t feel this heavy when I was putting it on during the summer!
I ran the motor at home to flush out the salt water, inflated the sorry looking fenders, stowed the docklines, and headed upstairs to watch some football. Greyhound’s ready for winter, and so am I.

Twin or Bilge - what's really the difference?

During the years I have owned my Alacrity I have encountered some different viewpoints as of what the difference really is between a twin-keeler and a bilge-keeler. The first position I encountered on this was quite a simple one: the expression twin-keeler is simply American English for what in the UK is called a bilge keeler.
Now there have been some new interpretations of the issue which have gotten a hold even among the British crowd: a twin-keeler is a more modern design with assymetric thin fin keels, in contrast to a bilge keeler which is an old design with thick lead (or concrete) filled keels, or even just bolted on plates of steel.
This article in Small Craft Advisor seems to take the second position, although with a twist. The author seems to imply that bilge keelers really are tripple keelers, that is normal keelboats with extra keels bolted on. Boats like the Debutante (i e "Sea Dart").
I think I may have to differ. There has, of course, been some development among the multi-keeled craft during the decades they have been produced. However, if there is a clear distinction between species it has to be based on the number of keels and not the shape of them.
The modern twin-keeler with assymetric thin blade keels is merely a natural development of my Alacrity, exactly like the modern fin keeled cruising yacht is a development of the mighty old long keeler. In fact, development does parallell in the centerboard range of boats. Twin centerboard boats surely are a development of the single centerboard boat and not, as would be a consequence of the developing keel theory, a futuristic form of bilge-keeler.
I still think the different expressions are to be blamed on differences between American and British English and thus should not be confused for inherently different kinds of keel shapes. An assymetric bilge keeler is the same thing as an assymetric twin-keeler and neither of them has more in common with a tripple keeled Debutante than the ability of being able to take the ground at low tide.

P.S. This theory would be reinforced by the fact that there seems to be only one translation for both twin and bilge keelers into Swedish and German.

Mystery boat again

Another mystery boat. Got this email:
"Hi, found your website while browsing, looks great,could'nt find any yachts like mine,any ideas on the identity of this yacht type please. It has a bowsprit, two foresails and gunter rig, with a vire 6 inboard, we have been bringing it back to life during the summer and will be re-launched later this month, but we still cannot find out the type, any ideas would be greatful, the sail emblem resembles a flying bird like
symbol, similar to a Gull dinghy emblem,

kind regards John"

More pictures:






Goes without saying, any help to identify the make of boat is greatly appreciated.

Cruising as a Way of Life - part II

This engineless approach to cruising also reintroduces another pleasure, largely forgotten by many sailing people nowadays. It is the enjoyment of that richly thrilling moment when, after a prolonged calm, the sails first lift and swell to a hint of a breeze. The joy of laying aside one's oar to ghost effortlessly forward under drawing canvas was one of the great delights of sailors from Homeric times to the late nineteenth century. We have forgotten it. If we are motoring through a calm, the very special music of that first subtle wind-induced trickle around the bow is invaribly drowned out by the engine's roar.
It appears that we live in a strange age. Not only do some people laugh at the unfamiliar sight of a cruising yacht being rowed, but a few even consider it cause for a rescue attempt. Last summer, while happily sweeping Galadriel out to sea in search of a breeze, I was overtaken by a wouldbe rescue boat that roared up alongside. When I said good morning and politely declined their offer of help, the couple in the poweboat asked med what, precisely, I was doing. I answered that I was rowing.
"Gosh", the young fellow said, "I've never seen that before!"
I love oil lamps and hate the glaring excess of electrics. Even the riding light that my little sloop carries while anchored overnight is a small oil lamp. It can be seen from a distance of half a mile, yet it doesn't so grossly flood the anchorage with glare that one cannot enjoy the delicate glitter of starlight overhead. I'm afraid that my love of fellow yachtsmen fails altogether when their 500-watt masthead lights turn a dark, lonely cove into something like a floodlit supermarket.
My fetish for primitive lamps, however, seems to amaze many sailing people who come aboard. They ask if oil lighting isn't dangerous to one's health. When a friend complained of the smell of kerosene, I replied that, to me, it is the smell of freedom.
The essence of small-boat cruising is freedom from fuss and bother, of which there is plenty in our everyday lives ashore. A tiny, featherweight cruiser is the most trouble-free craft afloat. Many of my sailing friends have a mortal dread of going aground. If their 5-ton fin keelers get hung up on the rocks, disaster is a virtual certainty. By contrast, when Galadriel goes aground (as she does frequently), she sits comfortably on her shallow twin keels in two feet of water. To get her off, I simply jump over the stern and lift her clear.
Everything aboard my boat is crude and simple. If a boom fitting breaks, I just make another. The originals, after all, were merely handwrought bits of steel, rather than fancy items purchased in a yacht chandlery. If I drop a heavy anchor onto a bunk cushion and split it open at the seams, it doesn't matter. It's easy to redo my own rough handstitching. When her bottom needs a coat of antifouling paint, it is a simple matter to paddle her over to the beach and go gently aground. The cost of upkeep is almost nothing - an essential prerequisite to carefree sailing.
The shallow draft has introduced me to a special cruising pleasure denied to larger, deeper craft. I have discovered that British Columbia's rocky coast abounds in tiny cracks and crannies into which I can paddle my little boat. Inside, in water that may only be a couple of feet deep (and totally dried out at low water), I luxuriate in a private anchorage, while more conventional yachts cluster together in droves in the more usual anchoring spots.
Occasionally, I have watched a larger yacht, at the end of a cruise or a daysail, tacking back and forth in the harbour for an hour while someone tries without success to start the engine. Without power, of course, the owner of a big heavy-displacement vessel dares not to attempt the entry into his berth among the ranks in a crowded marina. My little pocket cruiser, on the other hand, works her way handily under sail into the thightest corner. If she does happen to drift out of control in a cramped spot, a gentle shove with the foot is enough to redirect her miniscule inertia and avoid collision.
Yet a little boat ot good design can be a fine offshore sailor, too, as is evidenced by Shane Acton's circumnavigation of the world in a Caprice class sloop like my own. While he was in Australia, Acton was offered the chance of an unbelievable trade - a new 30-foot ocean cruising yacht in exchange for his intriguing little 18-footer. He turned down the offer.
Like Shane Acton, I own a simple little boat that I know intimately and love dearly. It would be sheer folly ever to exchange her for the illusory attractions of something grander.

Philip Teece

Reprint: Cruising as a way of Life

Another of Phil Teece's articles in reprint. This one was first published in Small Boat Journal #68, 1989.

It is a calm summer evening just at sunset. In the stillness characteristic of this hour, among the wooded islands of the British Columbia coast, my little sloop Galadriel lies motionless on an inverted mirror-image of herself.
Her intended anchorage for the night, a sand-fringed lagoon on the lee side of a small densely treed isle, lies less than half a mile distant. If she had an engine, I might perhaps be tempted to ruin the magical quietude of this place with its jarring din.
Instead I step forward along her narrow side deck and unship the 10-foot sweep from its upright stowage position on one of the lower shrouds. Without hurry, I drop its long leather collar into place in the oarlock beside the cockpit. Then, standing with the tiller between my knees for control, I begin a slow, quiet oarstroke that moves the boat forward, gradually gathering a sedate knot-and-a-quarter speed in the direction of the cove. At this pace, it will take me perhaps half an hour to reach the spot on which I shall drop anchor. But why should I want to get there any faster?
Later, as my little ship lies peacefully in the gathering darkness of the lagoon, I go below for supper. While a can of stew warms up on the single-burner gimballed primus stove, I light the lamp. The tiny cabin glows warmly (and, in fact, actually warms up) in the mellow light of my bulkhead lamp. This small kerosene lamp is all that is needed to flood the compact space with a glory of light. Although supper is a primitive meal eaten from the billycan in which it was heated, it provides one luxury: Cleanup afterwards takes only about 20 seconds.
After the evening meal, I recline on my bunk with a good book. The ceiling is a scant few inches above my head, but I feel as comfortable as pampered royalty. The flickering orange glow that illuminates my page reflects dimly from painted wooden surfaces and casts deep shadows in the angles behind hull-frames and deckbeams. As I lie on the handsewn cushion of my bunk, my feet project forward almost into the open chainlocker in the forepeak. In fact, my living space is small enough so that, without moving from where I lie so comfortably, I can reach across to the galley counter to grasp my cup of coffee.
The style of cruising described above is unfamiliar to many yachtsmen of the 1980s. In recent years, I have encountered increasing numbers of people to whom a "small" boat is something of 27 to 30 feet in overall length, with a powerful engine, electrical wiring for lights and other elecronic gadgetry, and a built-in dinette and bar. To a surprising majority of the cruising fraternity whom I meet in various West Coast anchorages, my spartan 18-foot sloop is an object of dismay and even disapoval.
Yet, nearly two decades after her launching, Galadriel still represents my dream of the perfect boat for adventure. Her smallness and simplicity have become my way of life afloat. A shoa-draft design ny British naval architect Robert Tucker, she is a twin-keeled Caprice class sloop, a little over 18 feet in length and 1,600 pounds displacement. She sails well (a fact I learned fully when I finally gave up using and outboard motor), and she can be moved surprisingly easily by oarpower.
I enjoy depending on sail and oar. In more than one emergency situation, I have found that an outboard engine has failed to start; my long spruce sweep has never given that problem. The technique of rowing a vessel with a single long oar is onethat takes considerable practice. When the oarsman develops skill in balancing the turning-moment of the oarstroke against exactly the right counterpressure of the helm, he enjoys a great sense of physical satisfaction. There is a sort of pleasurable Zen of rowing with a sweep.
To be continued.