A while back I was a bit rude about
historian Neil Oliver's rowing prowess, so it was a great pleasure to see that he hasn't given up on boats. In the opening sequence of part two of his new series, Sacred Wonders of Britain, has him emerging from the reeds in a coracle, rather tentatively and with iron concentration to be sure, but propelling himself.
I really want to try this sometime. How on earth do you stop going round in circles?
Later on,
Peter Carter, the eel man, demonstrated punting round the fens. He baited one of his home-made wicker eel traps with an eel just going rotten, which apparently attracts them mightily. Apparently his old dad used to say that a dead cat was the best bait, but I think he was just saying that for the camera.
Also, episode two of Dan Snow's Operation Grand Canyon took our heroes to their destination. More of the same really, enlivened by an outbreak of trench foot. If you live outside the socialistic domination of the state-controlled BBC agitprop machine and cannot view iPlayer, you can download
a very good ebook free from iTunes.
2 comments:
Circles?
In fact you use the paddle to scull over the front; wherever that is....
And actually, that is the point, you scull - moving the blade in a figure of eight motion, from side to side - toward whatever direction you want to go and rotate your lumbar spine until your pelvis is facing the same way as your shoulders.
I use the same method kneeling in the bow of a dangerously cheap, inflatable, toy dinghy as a tender for my little gaffer
Twist again anyone?
CW
Re: Socialist "agitprop" BBC comment.....you are so right..how was it allowed to become like this?
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