4. Boating « Chine bLog

I was thinking of going for a paddle this week…

Posted on February 15th, 2010

… orrrr maybe not…

Snow on kayak

Catching up with the traditional boat blogosphere - recent stuff from some peers

Posted on January 22nd, 2010

I have so engaged in designing and building that I haven’t been on the computer as much in the PMs. I have clearly been missing out on what some of our traditional boat peeps have been putting up. In case you missed it directly, here is some stuff to check out:

Indigenous Boats
Bob over at Indigenous Boats always has great stuff. No falling off as we checked in.

The Hawaiian Double Canoe Hokule’a – Fantastic boat. I saw it in Hawaii on my honeymoon, quite by chance.
The Unusual Beothuk Canoe – These are unusual, and I confess I have trouble loving them. Great post on them and their history, though, and definitely not a design to forget.
Sabanis – Canoes or “Boats”? – Interesting Okinawan boat here.
Great Tlingit Dugout Canoe – Great boat here.
Canadian Canoe Museum – Awe Inspiring – One word: wow.

70.8
Tom at 70.8 has a few really nice posts: » Continue reading Catching up with the traditional boat blogosphere – recent stuff from some peers »

“Paddle Making (and other canoe stuff)” – a nice-looking blog

Posted on December 20th, 2009

Thanks to Bob over at Indigenous Boats for his recent post highlighting Paddle Making (and other canoe stuff), a blog by a Canadian canoeist / paddlemaker / artist named Murat. The site has a gallery tool to view paddles Murat has made – they are almost universally stunning. Well worth keeping this one in mind.

New paddling discovery – Mattaponi Creek, MD

Posted on September 12th, 2009

I got out in the kayak last weekend for the first time in a few weeks and followed in my paddle strokes from our first and only outing in PEACE OF THE PUZZLE a couple weeks before that. The spot? Mattaponi Creek, off the Patuxent River in Maryland. The canoe trip served to discover this sweet tributary. We went some of the way up and had to head back. I resolved to finish business as soon as I could.

The creek meanders through a gorgeous marsh with abundant wildflowers, bird, and butterflies. Both voyages gave close encounters with bald eagles, along with the usual herons and osprey. The paddle ends where the beavers have gotten to the creek – there were a couple of obvious lodges along the way. Spectacular find. Anyone in the Mid-Atlantic should check out this area (see directions here).

Nice recent piece on drift boats

Posted on May 19th, 2009

Those who fly-fish (I don’t) and want to do it like the classy folk of the American West should check out this nice piece from Vida, Oregon about the McKenzie River Wooden Boat Festival. The piece quotes “class” expert Roger Fletcher, who I wrote about a couple years back:

The combination of beauty and usability are what make the boats so popular, Fletcher said.

“You’ll see these boats all over the world, but lines of that are traced back to this river,” he said.

Even better, was this gem by attendee and enthusiast Ken Helfrich:

“There’s nothing like a wooden boat on the water,” he said. “It has a total feel of itself.”

Preach it, brother!

Co-sponsor of the show Tatman Wooden Boats is worth checking out for kits and materials. Pretty boats.

A long-overdue shout-out to Gary Dierking’s Outrigger Sailing Canoes Blog

Posted on April 22nd, 2009

I noticed a while ago that our friend Gary Dierking, the Kiwi outrigger maestro, has been running a blog to compliment and promote his work. Take this as a study in how well I am doing at keeping up on this blog these days – I am just now getting to an appreciation of this resource on these amazing craft. And an appreciation it deserves, because there is some great stuff here.

I particularly enjoyed Gary’s thorough study of ama lashings, done in six parts (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, and part 6). These posts provide good pictures of the different types as well as their derivation and advantages. Now he is on to different rig types, with the most recent post giving a nice overview. We’ll certainly be watching – and learning from – this excellent blog.

Wonderful detail on the viking longship Havhingsten fra Glendalough

Posted on March 5th, 2009

OK – here’s the deal: We have had some stuff going on, we haven’t been able to post in a bit, and we’ve built up a nice backlog on posts. And it JUST SO HAPPENS that two of them tonight involve the writing of Tom Jackson of WoodenBoat. Pure coincidence, folks. Let’s can those man-crush comments right now.
» Continue reading Wonderful detail on the viking longship Havhingsten fra Glendalough »

Thinking about a ocean voyage on a bamboo raft? Read “The China Voyage”

Posted on February 24th, 2009

I actually had the crazed idea to read a book recently. Doesn’t happen much – I am lucky if I can clear my magazine rack in a given month. Long on my to do list, though, had been reading some of Tim Severin’s works. Severin is an Irishman (at least he lives there) with an fascinating joint interest in history, archeology, and epic voyages, mostly maritime ones. Sound intriguing? It gets better. Severin’s shtick has been to identify an unproven or poorly understood historical journey, build a traditional boat, if a maritime one, that represents the type of that era, and then recreate the journey to see if it could have happened as theorized. Oh yeah, I am IN! I have known about him for a while and only just got around to checking him out.

I began with The China Voyage: Across The Pacific By Bamboo Raft. Apparently there are a group of archeologists who believe (or believed, as of the early 1990s) that there was contact between East Asian cultures and Central American cultures within the last couple millennia. » Continue reading Thinking about a ocean voyage on a bamboo raft? Read “The China Voyage” »

Great skin-on-frame kayaks and more – Cape Falcon Kayak

Posted on January 18th, 2009

In recent months I have again been diving, at least in thought, into the world of skin-on-frame boats. I had pulled out my copy of Building Skin- On-Frame Boats by Robert Morris (discussed here in 2006) and been flipping through it at bedtime. That got me thinking about looking for supplies… just in case… And that led me, via the magic of Google, to Cape Falcon Kayak in Oregon, a really nice source for skin-on-frame kayaks and other boats.

Greenland-style kayak from Cape Falcon Kayak

Proprietor Brian Schulz teaches skin-on-frame building, designs boats, provides paddling instruction, and leads trips. In short, I am wicked incredibly jealous (me and my $#^%* “traditional” career!). » Continue reading Great skin-on-frame kayaks and more – Cape Falcon Kayak »

Great traditional rowing boat video on the Fogo Island Punt Race

Posted on October 31st, 2008

Many thanks to Chris Partridge over at Rowing for Pleasure for highlighting the Fogo Island Punt Race, a 20-mile open-ocean race in traditional wooden rowing boats. Wow. I love the seriously traditional specs for race boats. For those not up on Canadian Maritime geography, Fogo Island is off the Northern side of Newfoundland, Canada. Chris embedded the video below, which is a really nice story of the race and the boats.

Incidentally, if you want more of a flavor of Fogo Island – or, in fact, if you are in the Chine bLog mindset at all – you MUST go grab yourself a copy of the song “A Boat Like Gideon Brown” off Newfoundland band Great Big Sea’s great album “Sea of No Cares.” Just do it. You will not regret it unless you only like death metal.

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