Category: wooden boat

Matt Atkin’s photographs of the long-tailed working boats of Phuket, Thailand

Matt Atkin photograph of the boats of Phuket for intheboatshed.net

Matt Atkin photograph of the boats of Phuket for intheboatshed.net Matt Atkin photograph of the boats of Phuket for intheboatshed.net

Brother Matt Atkin has been on his travels again, this time to Thailand, and sent back this small collection of elegant long-tailed working boats on the island of Phuket.

Reua hang yao, as they are properly called, are powered by a road vehicle engine balanced over the stern; I’m curious that they appear to be overpowered with those big engines married to efficient displacement hulls. Still, those Thais will know what they are doing after using these craft for generations.

The bows of the boats are decorated with coloured scarves and other items that are believed to provide good luck and protection.

Thanks for the shots Matt! For more photos from my brother Matt, click here and follow the link to ‘older posts’.

The next BBA student launch day is on the 7th December – and you’re all invited!

Boat Building Academy student launch December 2011 invitation

Intheboatshed.net readers (and everyone else, to be honest!) are warmly invited to the Boat Building Academy’s class of March 2011 student launch at 2pm on the 7th December.

The boats include:

  • 13ft cold-moulded motor launch designed by Andrew Wolstenholme
  • 17ft clinker-built pilchard larker
  • 10ft foam-sandwich composite dinghy
  • 19ft epoxy-ply Caledonian Yawl (designed by Iain Oughtred)
  • 15ft West Greenland kayak
  • 14ft strip planked ‘Cassy’ canoe yawl (designed by George Holmes)
  • 14ft 1in strip-planked catboat
  • 14ft stitch and glue-built speedboat (designed by BBA instructor Mike Broome)
For building photos of these boats, click here.

See more photos from last year’s December launch:

Sailing barge film Red Sails free public screening at Faversham

Red Sails A4 free screening poster

Red Sails is a new Michael Maloney film that uses interviews and archive footage to explore the history and influence of the Thames sailing barge.

There’s a website to read here, and the film is to be launched to the public with a free public screening at the Royal Cinema, Faversham on the 7th December at 1pm.

Over generations, sailing barges had a huge influence on the development of London and towns, villages and rivers nearby and along the Thames Estuary and beyond, and this film looks at the craftsmen who built these amazing boats, their skippers, and the boys and men who crewed them.

For those of us who can’t make it (like me – I really should be working for a living that day!) there’s a page of links to preview Youtube clips here.