Signal Flags

[biffothebare]

Hi all
I'm in a bit of a quandary that i hopeyou can help with.

A friend of mine is having her 50th birthday in a couple of weeks and for a treat we were all going to London to do the full weekend bit.
However I was very pleased when she asked if we could all go for a few days on the boat instead.
I want to deck the boat with signal flags saying happy birthday, but when I went on the "nautical know how" site I find that the flags all have specific meanings. H and A alone mean a pilot is aboard, and I have a diver down! Happy birthday in flags would probably be a declaration of war on Gibraltar!! (With my anchor dragging). Am I ok spelling it out?
If you can help, many thanks

 

[Skyva_2]

No reason why you should not spell it out. No one will object!

Another (possibly better) alternative is to fly flags so the boat is 'dressed overall' for which there is a defined sequence of flags from bow to stern.

I'll look up the sequence.

 

[Powersalt]

I did the birthday and age by flags thing and it was interesting to see who read the signal correct and called round to say they had sussed the message out.

 

[biffothebare]

Thank you Skysail and Powersalt
I'll get the paint box out right away!!

 

[st599]

You should only be using one of each flag though - so you'd need a third substitute for Happy and a first, a second and a fifth for Birthday.

 

[biffothebare]

Sorry SimonT
You've lost me completely. It sounds more complex than it's worth.

 

[Skyva_2]

What Simon is saying correctly is that ships only carry one set of letters, so when you need a letter twice (such as H in Happy and birtHday), you use the first substitute flag for the second H, where H is in this case the first letter of the message. But for your mate's birthday, don't bother!!!

Since you will not be signalling to the First Lord of the Admiralty, its acceptable to use one flag per letter of the message.

 

[biffothebare]

Ok Skysail,
I get it now!! Many thanks to all!!

 

[Sneds]

You could just buy her a card? /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif