Out to Sea Again

It all sounds a bit mad?

Well I'll admit, the requirements in the previous post do sound rather challenging - some may say crazy, some stupid. Nevertheless, I would like to see how close I can get.

There are many contradictions. For a start it sounds like I want the comfort of a 10m+ cruiser from a lightweight car top boat. Deranged. Then I want a really stable platform that is also capable of easy self rescue. And a boat with less than 30cm of draft which can also make quite significant (and relatively speedy) coastal hops?

First things first - it looks like I want a multihull, all the stability stuff I want together with light weight steers in that direction. What I need to do is make sure that the ability to self rescue is not lost . Whether it is a cat, a tri, a tacking outrigger or a proa is still pretty open at this point but I suspect a cat will probably win out.

Something that will help is that I am not a purist. I like sailing, I like rowing and I even like motors too. Moreover I would be happy to use any combination of the three to get where I want to go. In fact, I want to relegate the sail rig to an assisting role so that it doesn't take over the whole boat.

Things that have inspired me include the tremendous motor-sailing Endorphin trimaran of Russell Maxwell:

The beach rescue 'Pattino' rowing catamarans of the Italian coast:

And all the various paddle/sail combos enjoyed by Sea Kayakers like:

Since the sail rig is not going to have to provide scintillating light weather performance it is going to be small, low and when it is not needed I want it to disappear completely.

The only thing to do now is try and develop my appalling sketching skills and provide some indication of what I want to build in the next post.

Breaking down the problem.

It would be dishonest of me to say that I don't have a final design in mind but I want to take some time to define the things I want the boat to do. This may make eventual solutions seem more rational.

So, we have the rather clumsy-sounding statement:

'A mobile platform from which I can enjoy being on the water'

I have used a 'mindmap' to break things down a bit further.

First let's tackle stuff that I have lumped together in 'WATER':

What water?

River - e.g. the upper Thames
Estuary - e.g. the Thames Estuary
Harbours - e.g. Chichester
Coastal - e.g. Solent to Weymouth

Shallow Water

Draft no more than 300mm
Preferably no underwater appendages

Seaworthiness/Seakeeping

Resistant to capsize
Self bailing
Rightable single-handed
Easy re-boarding from the water
Low tendency to blow away when capsized
Protects outboard motor from immersion when capsized
As large as possible 'footprint on the water'
Ability to carry and easily deploy/recover appropriate ground tackle

We can already see that there are some juicy contradictions to resolve here, with plenty more to come.....

Now, 'MOBILE'. This needs to cover both land and water. So:

On Land

Goes on top of the car

Maximum weight 60kg
No individual piece heavier than 40kg

Launching trolley stows aboard
Fits through a 780mm wide gate

On Water

Propulsion

Oars/paddle
Sail
Motor

Outboard up to 6hp
Preferably with remote tank

Peformance

Under sail/human power - 3knots cruising
Under sail/motor power - 8 knots cruising

Must be able to navigate by day or night
Steering

I don't want to be tied to the helm constantly

No rudder approach

Inherent self steering ability
Guaras
Paddle/Oar steering
Motor steering
Steer by sail trim

With rudder approach

Tillerpilot
Wind vane

Oh no - things are getting a bit weird here aren't they? I lurk on quite a few boating fora and they are full of people scoffing at people who expect too much of a cartopper. I don't care - I want to see if I can have it all before I get into compromises.

Moving on - to 'ENJOY':

Comfort

Sit, stand or lie down when underway

Protection from elements

Wind and spray
No need for wetsuit or drysuit
Rain protection (possibly not when underway)

Stability

Stay out of the water unless I choose to go in
No need to constantly balance the boat

I don't want to have to spend every second sailing the boat
Visibility

High eye line so that I can actually see over things like river banks

Evidently I don't believe that travelling on a small boat should be a horrific experience demanding constant fiddling about.

So, lastly, 'PLATFORM':

Sufficient area for:

Sailing and rowing
Camping
Passenger x 1 or:
Labrador x 1

Platform is above waterline.

Phew, what a lot of demands!

Why? and What?

This is the blog of a lapsed sailor.

In the past I did a pretty decent amount of boating - dinghy sailing, offshore yacht racing and a fair chunk of rowing both sitting down (Thames Skiffs) and standing up (a variety of Venetian boats).

Then work started getting in the way more and more until I had the rather crushing realisation that a sailor was something I used to be rather than something I am.

Being a typically emotionally repressed Brit it makes it a little uncomfortable to admit that now when I stand on a riverbank or shore I actually yearn to be out on the water. It is time to do something about this.

At the same time the long hiatus has made me realise that I want something different to what conventional boating (as defined in the south of England) offers. Put simply I don't want to:

Race
Sail anything that requires an accompanying safety boat
Be in the water except for times of my choosing
Sail something where I can't opt to stand, sit or slob about when underway
Have a lump of boat stuck on a mooring or in a marina
Own anything that can't live in my back garden (which brings the rather tricky restriction that nothing wider than 780mm gets in or out of it)
Mess about with trailers - though I may bend a little on this one
etc. etc.

Yes, it is all sounding rather picky and ambitious and in truth I have barely got started with the list yet. In a nutshell, what I want is:

'A mobile platform from which I can enjoy being on the water'

In this blog I hope to record the design, build and use of such a boat (or boats).