Tag: traditional boats

Baltimore Woodenboat Festival – don’t you just wish you could go?

[ad name=”intheboatshed-post”]

baltimore, wooden boat, woodenboat, tiernan roe, boatbuilder, boatbuilding, traditional boats, festival, heir island

baltimore, wooden boat, woodenboat, tiernan roe, boatbuilder, boatbuilding, traditional boats, festival, heir island baltimore, wooden boat, woodenboat, tiernan roe, boatbuilder, boatbuilding, traditional boats, festival, heir island baltimore, wooden boat, woodenboat, tiernan roe, boatbuilder, boatbuilding, traditional boats, festival, heir island

baltimore, wooden boat, woodenboat, tiernan roe, boatbuilder, boatbuilding, traditional boats, festival, heir island

Boatbuilder Tiernan Roe writes to remind me that the Baltimore Woodenboat Festival takes place in a few days, and kindly sent me some shots of local boats to grab readers’ interest.

His photographs are beautiful so I hope we do manage to persuade at least a few readers to make the journey to the far south-western tip of Ireland. They show currachs on land and in action, and the Heir Island lobsterboat Hanora taken at a charity row around Sherkin Island at the beginning of May.

Tiernan’s own boatbuilding outfit Roeboats will be debuting the Ninigret he built last year, and there should be lots to do and see, and hopefully a few good music sessions as well. It’s been too many years since I last visited the area, but I remember it as a charming, romantic and very musical place. Naturally there will be the usual races, dinners and parties one would expect at such an event.

A particularly significant shindig will be the framing out party for AK Ilen at Hegarty’s Boatyard – which will be followed by a talk on the traditional boats of Ireland.

Ireland’s national maritime radio programme interviewed Tiernan recently (look for the May 7th programme) and he also has a new brochure.

Thanks Tiernan!

To start receiving the weekly intheboatshed.net newsletter sign up here.

Ben Crawshaw looks at the traditional boats of the Spanish coast

Top: barque de mitjana Sant Isidre at Barcelona. Bottom the intriguing hull
of a polbeiro at a boat exhibition. Photos by Ben Crawshaw

Ben Crawshaw of the Invisible Workshop has been putting up some splendid posts about the exotic-looking boats he encounters along Spain’s coasts.

As usual, it’s best to read weblog posts in order – in reverse order to the way they’re presented. So I’d recommend looking at this one on the history of the heavily built boats of Catalonia first. They seem to be built for the grandchildren, in the local saying.

Then turn to this introduction to the polbeiro (just look at that rig and the astonishing tiller!, and this post on the cross-oared rowing technique, which also shows its interesting hull form. I’d say it shows some potential that could be exploited by today’s plywood boat designers.

The next instalment takes us to Barcelona, where Ben runs into the skipper of the Sant Isidre, who he met some time ago while cruising in his Light Trow, Onawind Blue. And finally, he tells something of the astonishing and complicated story of this 1925-built lateen-rigged barque de mitjana, which has done service as sail-powered fishing boat, been used for smuggling, pressed into service as a POUM gunboat during the Spanish Civil War, been used for diving and was finally restored and given her old rig back in 1993.

Finally, you might by now be ready for this whimsical piece about nice old boats that have been used as a kind of garnish for roundabouts. Thanks for this entertaining, informative stuff Ben!

Please fill out the Wooden Boatbuilders Trade Association’s survey – it only takes a moment

[ad name=”intheboatshed-post”]

The WBTA has decided to find out about the kinds of people who buy and own traditional boats, where they  go and where they get their information – and it has engaged an independent market research firm to run a survey.

I was very pleased to be asked to put up this link to the short survey questionnaire, as it’s potentially an excellent step, and hopefully will elicit some really useful answers.

I’d be most grateful if as many of you as possible fill it in – it really won’t take long, you might win one of Kathy Mansfield’s very nice calendars, and you will be contributing to keeping wooden boatbuilders afloat business-wise during the hard times to come.

Yes – you heard right. There are PRIZES to be won!

It would be an added bonus if you could also please find somewhere to say that you came from intheboatshed.net – there’s at least one little window you can use to convey this essential piece of information, and I’m sure we’d all like to see the WBTA making more use of intheboatshed.net’s ability to communicate with the big wide world.

Finally please pass this on to your friends – all you have to do is to email them the link for this site (http://intheboatshed.net of course!), as I’ll leave this post at the top of the pile for a few days.

Don’t miss something good – subscribe to intheboatshed.net