Good Boatsmanship versus Sailsmanship

Lest Mirelle be overcome with modesty

I think I can safely reveal that he is the Tilman crewman for whom Tilman had nothing but praise (as you discover if you read the relevant book)

Respect from Col. Tilman - Respect indeed!

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Re: A lesson never forgotten

My first real sailing was also as a teenager on Theodora in the 1962 Tall Ships race, then working on her in the winter in the OYC yard in Cowes. Equinoxe and Duet were both on that 1962 race but didn't finish - were you around then, we might have met! Theodora was the inspiration too for Hammond Innes stories including the ones about Dorothea in the London Evening Standard I think. Lovely boat, I was on Theodora 4 weeks on the Tall Ships and had a couple of other shorter trips and remember Equinoxe having the nickname El Sub because she was so wet to sail. Duet too was (still is) lovely, have seen her too in recent years in S Brittany and on the S Coast.

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
Quite possibly

Yes - I was, indeed, an active member of the OYC around that time and had some great sailing in the "Theodora".

Do you remember her gimballed saloon table? I have never forgotten the occasion when we had some dignitaries aboard. We were sailing down Southampton water - well heeled but smooth water - and preparing lunch for the dignitaries. The whole table was laden with plates of meat, salads, jars of this and that - quite a groaning board.

Well, one of the dignitaries decided to descend into the saloon, saw the table (apparently all aslant, as such tables do appear when the boat is heeled) and instinctively put out his hand to "put it straight" (i.e. make it look horizontal)

Oh, dear me........Naturally, everything went flying. You never saw such a mess!

You weren't in that gang of lads from the Army Catering Corps were you? Never forget that trip either. We ate very well, but...............;-)

Small world.

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I totally agree with you.

The French love to demonstrate their prowess in this way. it leaves me cold , every time I see it.

Martin

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Re: Quite possibly

Yes to the table, no to the army lads! The table could induce things to apparently run uphill and it was a favourite trick to play on those feeling a bit green. Lay a cigarette or pencil on it when she was heeled far enough for the table to reach the gimbal stops and what looked like the high edge was actually below horizontal and off went the ciggy uphill!

I also remember the engine, I was designated Chief Engineer because I worked at a filling station evenings and weekends. The clutch was wound in by handle one way for forward the other reverse, whilst standing in bilge water feet astride the propshaft. There were 4 cylinders which fired in pairs running on petrol to start up then paraffin once warm, so you could go half speed by half throttle on 4 or full throttle on 2! Plugs were cleaned regularly and with the engine running, decompress the cylinder by uncsrewing a little valve and short out the plug lead then take out the plug and clean it, easy.

I was at school at the time and the Tall Ships was considered education, 3 of us from Hitchin Boys Grammer School got to spend 4 weeks on the Tall Ships for £10! I doubt that the current Nanny State would approve and the HSE would have a field day with Theo's engine. Oh and the lifejackets were best quality waterlogged kapok and as for harnesses well you learned to tie bowlines.

Four weeks on Theodora cost me a fortune in addiction to all things sailing, still is 32 years later!

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
Wishful thinking?

I make it 42, not 32 :-)

Being a poor weak woman I never got near the engine - there's a lot to be said for membership of the fair and gentle sex ;-)

You put me in mind of my first ever holiday away from the family at age just 14. A week aboard the old Foudroyant in Portsmouth Harbour. When we got there we were asked "can anybody sail" I said, yes, I could - although almost all of my sailing up to that time had been as crew in dinghies. They immediately gave me a fourteen foot half decker and a crew a few months younger than me and we sailed to the Isle of Wight and back. No rescue boat, no lifejackets that I can recall and at one stage vis was so low we couldn't see land. Tide was whooshing out of the harbour when we got back and I got caught up alongside the Britannia. Some ratings were on stages working on the gold leaf and they finally managed to get us off. I think they were mighty scared for their beautiful paint job.

Couldn't happen now - but I felt like Magellan!

BTW Correction - the original name, now restored was not "Guiding Light" but "Kindly Light". I cannot think of a lovelier name for a pilot cutter. Yes - she was (and is) a beauty.
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Re: Wishful thinking?

Finger trouble as well! The year before I had been at Outward Bound Sea School in Aberdovey and rock climbing in N Wales with the School Scout Troop, again that wouldn't get by the Nanny State nowadays. We got a whaler stuck on a sandbank in the estuary and the lifeboat was summoned. The lifeboat got stuck on the sandbank too so we all got out on the sand and pushed it off whilst they went full ahead with the engine (I THINK the prop was in a tunnel....). some hours later we rowed the whaler back. Modern youth of course has computer games.

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
Boatsmanship may be innate?

I have always enjoyed "boatmanship" in the sense that you give the term. I recall that my father also enjoyed it, and I notice that my 9 year old son does. I do know people who are every bit as good seamen, nay, far better, but who do not particularly enjoy handling boats.

Big ship officers likewise divide pretty smartly into those who really enjoy shiphandling and those who really don't - it is, I think, precisely the same skill. Those who do enjoy it tend to gravitate towards offshore oil support vessels and pilotage; those wo don't are likely to be aboard container ships and oil tankers, though there are exceptions!

As a very small boy, I was fascinated by boats - provided they were afloat. I would look at them for minutes on end and would wangle my way aboard whenever I could. My children are just the same, and I believe that they are acquiring some subconscious knowledge of what a boat does, and why.

I agree with you that this has nothing at all to do with the ability to sail fast, which is also an unconscious skill, but clearly a different one!

<hr width=100% size=1>Que scais-je?
 
Re: Wishful thinking?

Robin and Violetta, unfortunately there was no possibility here of large sailing vessel experiences when I was young but these days we often share anchorages with the Spirit of New Zealand here in NZ, which lets us know that there is still alot of good in the young world.

She is a steel barquetine used for adventure training for young people and we are always amazed by the absolute enjoyment the kids are getting from the experience. Laughing and shouting all the time, off on tasks in the ship's boats and inflatables, much "heave, hoing" lifting them aboard again etc. I have never seen kids having such a good time anywhere else.

I assume that the other such vessels around the world all have such success. Not the sort of thing that is up every kid's alley (eg our own kids never had any real interest in boats of any kind) but for those for who it is, is a wonderful experience from our observation.

The first real live full sized sailing ship I ever saw had unfortunately just gone aground but I was just a toddler (still am in many ways /forums/images/icons/smile.gif) so don't remember where or what, it just stuck in my mind. The second was the Chilean Navy training ship "Esmeralda" when I was older, perhaps 5 or 6, and can vividly remember visiting her.

John

<hr width=100% size=1>I am the cat but I am only 6.
 
Re: Wishful thinking?

There are still a few such sail training vessels here in the UK, none though of 'ship' size like the big square riggers that some countries still have for Navy training. I'm not up on the active list but I think there are Amerigo Vespucci (Italian), Gorch Foch (sp? - Germany), Sorlandet (Norway) and I think the US Coastguard still have one (Eagle?). As a teenie on the Tall Ships I climbed the masts of the first 2 of these biggies in Dartmouth prior to the race, up one side of the rigging and down the other and without any harness or parachute. Nowadays I hate going up the mast and if at all possible will delegate......

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
On some of my Trans-Atlantics and other trips my boat was engineless. This does not mean that I would sail into or out of a marina with no regard to the other people in the area. I does mean that you must plan ahead and consider how you will sail out of any place you want to sail into. There are places that you just can’t go if you intend to sail out. I think you must exhibit better seamanship or “boatmenship” if you will, because you can’t sail into a pickle and just punch the starter button and motor out. Some people who are new to boating sometimes do not understand what it means be responsible and not interfere with others enjoyment of the sport. For them to truly be without the engine would teach them seamanship much faster then playing that they did not have one while in the back of there mind still depending on the engine as the ultimate backup.

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Interesting

My father (aged 88 yesterday) always longed to go to sea. However, all the ships were laid up in the depression and his father died, meaning that he had to leave school at 14 and go out to work pronto to earn some money for the family. But he got his chance when the war came and he ended up leading a half flotilla of minesweeping MLs. He always used to say that the thing he most loved was "shiphandling"............(only a little ship, mind you, at 112 feet)

My sister has never shown an iota of interest in things nautical, but like you, I was fascinated from the outset. My parents say that when we were toddlers and on a beach, my sister invariably toddled down to the water's edge and I invariably toddled to the nearest boat.....And when I got older I used to rush to help with any boat being drawn up from the water or launched (I am sure I was a most terrible nuisance) hoping against hope against hope that someone would invite me for a ride. Possibly my earliest memory is walking with an aunt with (with whom we were staying for a holiday around the yacht basin at Dover ) and looking along a line of foredecks. All wooden in those days and many with bowsprits. As if it were yesterday I can remember thinking "That's it! That's what I'm going to do". I guess I must have been about 5. (I could see no means of doing it then - the family had little money and sailing wasn't on the agenda. But, as we see written around the stern of the Cutty Sark "Where there's a will is a way")

I find it hard to believe there isn't some kind of a genetic tie up here.

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Its a great experience

I haven't been in the "tall ships" but did a lot of sailing in big yachts when young. The 70 foot gaff schooner Hoshi (built 1909) beam reaching at 14 knots through big Atlantic swells of the west coats of Ireland - now that is something! You are right, though - these vessels seem to bring out the very best in a lot of youngsters. I see something similar in the little sailing charity with which I am involved over here. There are a lot of inner city kids, many on probation or with learning disabilities and even in a week they can blossom. It does my heart good to see them!

I'm just working on wangling an invitation to sail in the Pioneer - a 70 foot ketch rigged deep sea smack built in 1864 that has just been restored to sailing trim. She is still engineless and I can't wait to get aboard. We also have the Thames barges here - 80-90 foot coastal traders that travelled all over the N. Sea and English Channel. There are about 30 still sailing here.

Can't you find a way to wangle a ride in the Spirit of NZ? I would love to have a go in her!



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Re: Quite possibly

Your comments as to the cost of Tall ships sailing are a little off the mark. I am a member of a Sailing Organisation that gives Boys & now Girls the opportunity of a weeks sailing in the English Channel for, this year it was £65 & I believe that next year it is going to be £85 but you get a free Crew Shirt. Now I don't know how old you are Robin but make allowances for inflation & I don't think that is all bad. The boats are all Ketches between 57 & 75 Feet & are all fully coded by the MCA.

Our Nanny State may not provide it but it still happens!

Martin

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Re: Quite possibly

Hi Martin

I wasn't referring to the cost and the nanny state but to the attitude the nanny state & HSE would have nowadays about a youngster standing astride a turning shaft ankle deep in oily water in order to wind the clutch in and out, or to the issue of ex-WW2 Kapok lifejackets and DIY harnesses. Incidentally in my 4 weeks on board I never once wore either a lifejacket or a harness, despite us being hove-to for some hours during a gale, and I also spent some time sitting on the spreaders looking for one race mark, a minesweeper off Ushant. (no GPS in those days!). As you say the Training Ships now are 'fully MCA coded' and I would imagine there are some strict rules about liferafts and harnesses being worn. Actually we did get to wear a harness - whilst 'sitting' on the taff rail as the loo was not working....if it was really rough there was even automatic flushing.../forums/images/icons/blush.gif

Our cost back in 1962 was £10 for 4 weeks so £2.50/week but that included a contribution from the then County Council. I have no idea how that would compare in todays money though I believe at the time a pint of bitter was 1 shilling and 10 pence (some figures stick in the mind I cannot think why!) and petrol about 4 shillings and 8 pence per gallon.

Robin

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
Cor, that's a serious question for a ship's cat John - not a little puff of steam coming out is there? /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

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Re: Quite possibly

Your right about that modern attitude. We have to be a lot more careful with the Little Darlings these days. But my kids go on the same trips & I wouldn't want them mistreated would I.

Martin

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Re: Quite possibly

Martin

Thing is, I never felt at all vulnerable, it was 'normal'. I still don't feel vulnerable on a boat 42 years later and harnesses and lifejackets are still rarely worn, though they are there and the best that are available. I watch people around though who seem to put on their lifejackets and harnesses every time they leave their berth, nothing wrong with that, it is their choice. But if they feel the need to have the security of a lifejacket and harness in a F2-F3, then surely they must be s****ng themselves by the time it gets to F6 and climbing, they have nothing left to bolt on in the safety stakes! That is the end result of over-protection, the nanny state has won.

Of course if I were in charge of taking a crew of trainees out now, they would be so wrapped in cotton wool they wouldn't be able to sit down - just in case some bastard broke a nail and decided to sue!

Robin

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
Re: Quite possibly

I thought it was a piece of anatomy a little lower down that needs protection!

Mind you, I had a ride on the flybridge of a Corvette 32 a while back and we crossed a relatively small wake, my bum left the seat and by the next ripple I was hanging on hard!

<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1>Sermons from my pulpit are with tongue firmly in cheek and come with no warranty!</font size=1>
 
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