Sailing lessons 1 1/2 hours south of Manila on beautiful, natural Taal Lake. Boats, SUP boards and instruction, food, accommodation and Volcano and Eco Knowledge tours.
How to reef a Balance Lugsail. A neat trick of using shock cord (bungee) for the intermediate ties makes it much faster to tie in a reef as well as remove the reef after. it also minimises the risk of damaging the sail if something major breaks elsewhere.
So how does a lug rig boat go in club racing? My designs won’t be outclassed in club racing. I’m really keen to find out how the yardstick (handicap) changes as George and crew get used to the realities of course racing making the boat sail faster. We end up with an estimate of PY – Portsmouth Yardstick for the Goat Island Skiff.
A small collection of the many videos of the Goat Island Skiff Planing fast in different places around the world.
In general I don’t like most sailing books and most sailing lessons.
I think that a learner doesn’t need to learn many new words. Also because they don’t explain the correct principles in the beginning their explanations become really complicated.
If you understand how to use a sail to get power – when it is at maximum power and when it isn’t it all becomes very logical.
A few photos and a short report from Hungary.
They held their first wooden boat messabout. 30 people, 10 boats and a big pot of homemade goulash!
A problem with a single leeboard is after a capsize there is a 50% chance of it being out of reach. Here is a method of setting up a rope to help right PDRacers and OzRacers when the leeboard is out of reach. The nice thing about the OZ series is that all the boats come up with very little water inside when righted from capsize. Also the wooden mast doesn’t allow the boat to turn completely upside down.
The first New Zealand Goat Island Skiff has been launched by Ian Howeth.
He has taken a year to build it as spare time became available.
It was launched during the Xmas break
John Goodman and I sailed the immaculate Goat Island Skiff he built from my plan in the Texas 200.
The boat showed itself to be one of the faster in the fleet despite loading up such a short boat with food, water and camping gear for six days with little outside support.
We played with sailing the boat by the lee – a method used by racing boats to gain both speed and control.
I document the method here including a video showing how the angle of heel can be controlled using the mainsheet.
Photos and slideshow from the Goolwa Wooden Boatshow 2011.
Over 250 boats – mostly in the water. Wooden hydroplanes, “restricted 21s”, riverboats, putt putt launches, classic sailing boats, kayaks, canoes and more.
I had the quick canoe, the eureka canoe and the OzRacer on the stand that was shared with Duck Flat Wooden Boats and Boatcraft Pacific. Good time was had by all.
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.
Cameras, digicams, video cameras are fun on boats, but it is hard to get good pics of yourselves sailing the boat or the boat doing its stuff nicely.
John Goodman and Family built their Goat Island Skiff GIR and sailed it in the Texas 200 event as well as some solo river cruising.
They used a camera boom to great advantage – to move the camera away from the boat. Another alternative is a wide angle lens which can produce dramatic effects for marine photography but the toom seems much more useful. It works well with the steadying of anti-shake electronics.
You can pay money for dry bags to store gear in when canoeing, kayaking or sailing. Or pay even more for buoyancy bags that keep you boat afloat after capsize.
Here Ian tells us how we can make our own cheaply.
For the Goose – a first sailing report in moderate winds – and it works.
Also a free plan for a ketch/yawl version, and …
… Michael goes on a bit about the real differences between a ketch and a yawl
First detailed sailing report of the Goose 12ft sailboat.
The Oz Goose is a 12ft sailboat derived from the smaller OzRacer/PDRacer/Brick line. It uses all the same running gear as the OzRacer.
The conservative viewpoint is that traditional rigs are not very efficient. However allied to efficient hulls and set up correctly, lug and sprit rigs can be very efficient indeed – not too much slower than “modern” rigs, particularly when the same lessons are applied to trad sails and way cheaper.
This is a WIKI drawn from the group on the Storerboats forum discussions on setting up lug and sprit rigs for best performance building on the information in my webpage.
Robert Hoffman has been busy using his BETH sailing canoe that he built over a cold Polish winter.
There are now videos. I have also linked to all my videos on youtube – so you can see many storerboats sailing.
My friends Rob and Jane Hylton run sailing boat and canoe hire on some of my favourite sailing waters – the lower Murray Lakes – just an hour south of Adelaide.
The boat hire is quite cheap but linked with you overnight staying in the small town of Clayton Bay – on the edge of the Murray River. There are a number of different options. My favourite is a tent or an on site caravan on the river’s edge camping area. But there are classier (?) options as well.
Low season is quite cheap and the days down there can be very beautiful in winter with a good weather report. They also offer sailing lessons which can include a picnic and/or a tour of the fascinating Murray wetlands.
Sailing the Goat Island Skiff in the Texas 200 for the first time. The Goodman family boat is now a regular in this 200 mile quite difficult sailing event in often extreme conditions.
A bunch of photos of Robert Hoffman sailing his Beth Canoe.
He built it over winter but now is enjoying Spring.