Gavin Atkin's weblog for the sort of people who like looking inside boat sheds. It's about old boats, traditional boats, boat building, restoration, the sea and the North Kent Coast
Alan Thorne’s crowd-funded project to give as many local people as possible an experience of boat building culminated in the launch of a John Welsford-designed Joansa rowing skiff a couple of weeks ago.
Quite a crowd turned out, I’m glad to say! The name Bridget refers to the local plan to build a new lifting bridge over Faversham Creek, which would allow barges, smacks and other traditional boats to be moored at the top end of the creek once more.
Arthur Copping’s amusing second book about his fictionalised adventures sailing and fishing with Leigh fisherman Gotty (in real life a chap called Alfred Boynton) has been reprinted and is available from Howard Turnidge.
The 1933 Malta-built Beaumont whaler Swan is back on the water for the first time for many years following restoration by a bunch of self-styled Bristol ‘shed men’. The sails in the picture are original cotton sails, by the way.
Read more about the Swan and the shed men here.
To celebrate, the shedders are organising a celebration on the 17 May (details below).
