Dete Hasse and his family built a Goat Island Skiff in Geelong, Victoria a while ago. He has just written to me about his experiences trying to sail on Port Phillip Bay and more happily on the recently refilled (the drought is over!) Lake Eppalock.

Also he makes some good comments about reefing and how it changes an overpowered boat into a much more rriendly beast in stronger winds.

I like boat trailers that have other functions too. One way is to adapt another type of trailer – like a conventional box trailer at least for smaller boats. An alternative is to go for something very “bare bones”. One thing that makes a boat trailer more useful for different boats is to have a [...]

Well, it is light enough, but maybe have a close look at this series of photos from Simon Wein. Actually the pictures of the boat upside down on the roof makes it look very much like some of the Australian and NZ racing dinghies – like a Cherub or NS14. That’s my sailing background – [...]

Earlier this year I was contacted by Pierangelo from Italy who liked the look and simple construction of my 23ft Dayboat/Launch Designbut wanted something a bit more “live aboard”. He contributed a sketch of what he wanted and it looked quite sensible (right). When I say “sensible” I mean that the boat has a chance [...]