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
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The Chest of Books is a new source of boatbuilding plans I haven’t been aware of before now. Here are some samples, but I’d guess that more could be found using its search engine:
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A memorial of an astonishing trip, presumably by a
member of the local artistic community
It was grey and rainy the day we reached St Ives, but I was nevertheless captivated by St Leonard’s, the little port’s fishermen’s chapel on Smeaton’s pier.
Typescript history
A typescript history (we don’t see many of them now!) shows that the building dates back to at least 1577, and has been renovated several times, most recently in 1971, when it was reopened as a small museum. In the old days, it seems, local fishermen retained the services of a friar who led prayers and services in the building.
There are some nice models, a touching memorial erected in 1959 to the fishermen lost to their families and community, and seats for those who wish to sit and pray, or simply think.
That engaging character Mike ‘Kipperman’ Smylie has some good stuff about the St Ives boats in his book Traditional Fishing Boats of Britain and Ireland, which you may find at ABE Books.
Interior, models and memorial, another plaque, and the exterior
And just outside I found the real thing – a mackerel driver. And
notice the ancient lifeboat moored just behind it
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Hannu’s coracle. His site offers plans for a range of
small boats derived from traditional types
Hannu Vartiala has just let me know that he has moved his website to a new address – so I’d like to take this opportunity to direct intheboatshed.net readers over there for a happy few minutes.
It’s true that Hannu’s chosen boatbuilding material isn’t mainstream for intheboatshed.net, but those of you who yearn to build a small boat and are happy to do so in plywood may well find his plans interesting, for as well as the coracle pictured above, he has included some interesting boatbuilding plans and material on flat-bottomed swamp boats, drawings for a useful-looking 12ft flat-bottomed skiff, various variants on the Auray punt theme including Chapman’s Ekstock boat, and a couple of light-weight plywood dories. Well worth a look, I’d say.
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