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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Intheboatshed.net as it approaches its 200,000th hit
200,000 seems like a big number for a weblog devoted a such a niche subject. It’s great that we’re reaching lots of people!
If you’d like to receive a weekly digest, click on the link below – and if you’ve got a story to tell and pictures to share, please let us know at gmatkin@gmail.com. There’s no charge, and no obligation.
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We’d love to have more comments and discussion here at intheboatshed.net – social networking is now such a big part of many people’s daily life, that we think regular intheboatshedders should also have better ways of communicating with each other.
A small step in that direction today is a gizmo that allows readers to subscribe to comments – when you make a comment now, you will be able to subscribe to particular comment streams, so that you know when comments are added to a post of particular interest. I’d guess this will be useful to anyone interested in knowing about responses to a comment they’ve made.
Another innovation that many will find easy to follow is the Recent comments box in the left-hand column. So get commenting, and come back to see what the others are saying!
And still another is the introduction of Gravatars – little 80 by 80 pixel images that you can use to represent yourself when you comment. It could be a photo or drawing of yourself, or your boat, or whatever – but please play nicely children! Go to http://gravatar.com to set yours up.
Why not tell us what you think of all this using the comments link below? Is it a step in the right direction – or is it pants?
Gavin
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The Invisible Workshop’s Ben Crawshaw has been taking striking photographs of the beach outside his Tarragona apartment
You may have noticed the Blogroll to the right of this post. It’s meant to be a list of friendly weblogs and websites relevant to intheboatshed.net readers. And that’s exactly what it is – some of them are very old friends indeed (aren’t they Chris?), and I find they’re well worth a look whenever I feel I’m missing the water.
So tonight I’d like to draw attention to some particular gems on the intheboatshed.net Blogroll .
Ben Crawshaw of The Invisible Workshop has been taking a series of strikingly beautiful photos of his local beach in winter. Even in Spain, it’s now too cold to use the water with any pleasure, so he’s now walking, watching the sea, photographing it and, no doubt, dreaming about the spring.
Albert Strange Association webmaster Dick Wynne has been busy putting up news items, drawings and photos relating to their hero and his very attractive designs. And some of the news has been very good indeed – it seems Blue Jay has new owners, who have become members of the ASA.
Chris Perkin’s weblog Bumble of Loch Dubh currently has just one very interesting post describing how he built his first two clinker ply dinghies. It’s long and interesting, particularly because his next boat, an award-winning Iain Oughtred Macgregor sailing canoe has become something of a legend. (For more on the Macgregor, follow this link.)
Rowing for Pleasure is Chris Partridge’s wide-ranging weblog. Check out his illuminating posts about the boats of Venice, his trip round the backside of Portsea Island, the important place of the name Snarley(y)ow, and a rather sweet photo of the young Chris at the oars of a Thames Skiff long ago.
He says ‘I’ve been looking through family photo albums and discovered this pic of me rowing stroke on the Upper Thames in 1960 with Dad at bow. The boat was a beautiful mahogany double skiff called Snarleyow. Somehow, I can’t remember a single day when it rained.’
Funny that – I too can confirm that it never rained when my dad took us out on the Thames. Dads were much cleverer in those days and I sometimes think it’s a shame my kids have to deal with someone much more Pooterish.
And now for something completely different. George in Michigan is building one of Matt Layden’s distinctive little sharpies and tells us all about it at Building an Enigma 460. Many of home boat builders are intrigued by Matt’s simple and inexpensive solo and two-person micro sailing cruisers, and by his amazing sailing feats, and I’m no exception. There are still precious few designs for boats of this kind.