London Whalers are back

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Rowing a Montague whaler on the London River, with a Thames barge in the background

Rowing on the river with the London Whalers. You can join them –
just follow the weblink below

Dick Wynne has written to say that his restored 1934 Montague whaler is being repainted and will be afloat again in two weeks or so.

Regular readers will recognise Dick from the Albert Strange Association – see the Blogroll to the right of this post. This time, he’s recruiting a group of people to her off the ground (so to speak) in London under oar and sail. She’ll be operating evenings and weekends, given enough interest, so if you’re in London and fancy a little old-fashioned rowing – mixed, no doubt, with some old-fashioned socialising – get in touch via the London Whalers website.

Ilaut thole pin photos from Ben Crawshaw

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Thole pine from a Spanish Ilaut photographed by Ben Crawshaw

Thole pin photographed by Ben Crawshaw

A series of posts about the traditional Spanish ilaut have appeared at Ben Crawshaw’s weblog The Invisible Workshop over the past few days. Interestingly, they’re carvel built and rather like ship’s lifeboats in shape

I was particularly struck by one post about thole pins that might interest rowers in particular. Some appear not to have been used, while others are clearly very important to the boat’s owners, yet others show a characterful kind of neglect.

A sweet, romantic little rowing toy

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Video or rowing toy at the Paris Musee de la Marine

Wind-up rowing toy at Chris Partridge’s weblog Rowing for Pleasure

Chris Partridge reports that he found this video of a sweet and romantic wind-up rowing toy at the website of the Musee de la Marine in Paris. As it happens, I’m going to Paris next weekend, so maybe I should take my camera down to the museum.

Thanks for a really good idea Chris!