Mirrors Down Under

I was going to give the ongoing 'front-view mirrors' thread a rest, but Peter Miller in Sydney has had such a startlingly original idea I simply can't resist. He writes:

Chris,
Hi!
I too have been experimenting with mirrors for the 17 foot Dory I row on Sydney Harbour. I tried some caravan towing mirrors on either side of a plank going across my boat but found they would often shift out of position and not be of much use. I tried a small cycling mirror attached to my cap but found it a bit small for my liking.
Then I tried a 12 inch circular acrylic convex mirror like those fixed in car parks on blind corners. I attached it near the stern of my boat and found it worked really well. But sometimes more is more so I supersized to an 18 inch diameter mirror (see pic). The result is a panoramic view of myself rowing (a plus for any narcissist rower) but also a view of most of what is around and behind me.
I still need to turn around occasionally to get my bearings but all in all it makes the rowing experience more pleasant. It also makes weaving in and out of moored yachts a breeze.
At the end of the trip I unscrew the bolt holding it to the boat and store it in the cardboard box it arrived in covered with a soft cloth to keep down the scratches.
Keep up the good work with the blog.
Kind regards
Peter Miller
Sydney Australia

The only drawback is the cost - 18in exterior mirrors seem to cost about £60 here in the UK, though a quick search revealed a garage mirror for £32.50. Because recreational rowers never go out in the rain, using an interior security mirror might save a bit of money too.
UPDATE:

Chris,
FYI I bought my mirror from ebay. Being in Australia I had to pay postage but it would probably not cost to much to be sent from the US to the UK.
Regards
Peter

A Grim Warning....

...about outboard motors, the invention of the Devil, from the always-entertaining-and-informative Invisible Workshop.
Key quote: "To conclude: you’re much better off rowing."

Boats as street furniture

The Albert Embankment runs along the south bank of the Thames in Lambeth. When it was built by the famous engineer Joseph Bazalgette in the 1860s, a line of wharves was swept away but local rights to a slipway at the end of Black Prince Road, known as the White Hart Draw Dock, forced Bazalgette to build a new one, accessed through a tunnel under the road.

Right up until the middle of the last century there were boatbuilders here, but as industry left the dock was forgotten, filling and emptying unnoticed with every tide, hidden behind the high walls and flood gates that prevent it from flooding Lambeth on spring tides.
However, when Berkeley Homes wanted to build a block of flats next to the dock, part of the planning deal was to put money towards prettifying it. and now it has several imitation Thames wherries propped up on the wall for park benches and the dock has a line of pointed timber arches over it. It looks very good - congratulations to Handspring Design of Sheffield.

Mirror, mirror...

Robert Bells in British Columbia has also been messing about with mirrors. First, he attached a mirror to a metal stalk that carries a running light and is attached to the transom, but eventually replaced it with ingenious plastic one that appeals very much to my bodgemania, being assembled out of plastic pipe and a spring clamp. He writes:

I was a bit uneasy with the running light stalk, as the stalk is metal. Where I row, in the mostly wilderness lakes and the inlets just east of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (the eastern reaches of the Salish Sea), the weather very quickly jams itself into the little fiords and mountain valleys, and can stack up some good lightning and thunder without very much warning. (And not many places to haul out in an emergency.) As a solution, I put together the current rig which is just about metal free.

I modified a 3" plastic spring clamp (cheap!!), re-contoured the jaws a bit, attached rubber padding cut from a doorstop with goop, bolted on a foot section of 3/4 inch plastic plumbing tube (more marine-goop), and a mirror from an auto supply store. Total cost about $20 Canadian.

I clamp it on my starboard gunwale a couple feet astern of my outrigger.

I also put together a boat hook pole with the same 3/4 inch plastic plumbing pipe, stiffening it with small wooden dowels inserted into uncured spray-foam insulation, to keep it completely metal free. I really do not want to be swinging around one of the commercial aluminium poles when the weather turns dangerous.

The "Front View Mirror" is best for lining up sight-lines for rowing in openish water, one landmark over the transom, one land mark in the mirror. I still have to twist around to check bearings and make sure I am not going to run over canoeists and kayakers. The best solution, have a pretty passenger in the stern seat (who has a clue) to point to clear water.

I really enjoy your blog, especially your commentary and photos of your adventures of Britain's rivers and inlets. I would like to try out some of your rivers and canals someday myself.

Blessings,

Robert

Thanks for that, Robert. I must say, the lake looks fabulous.
Just to provoke thoughts, here are a couple of alternative ideas from the Web. First, a 'wrist mirror' invented by Carl Ribeca (US Patent 4054375). You could make one by attaching a velcro strap to a powder puff.

And what about this one...cool, eh?

Boating on the Box

You can tell the weather has been horrible - both this blog and intheboatshed.net have been watching the telly. Gavin links to a very splendid Channel 4 series that I missed, called Classic Ships, available to watch on 4oD. This episode focuses on pleasure craft, including the Thames skiffs and slipper boats that my grandparents used to have when I was a kid.

One clip stood out - a Thames bargee rowing a huge dumb barge with a pair of giant sweeps at Rotherhythe. He wasn't really powering it, of course, as the tide would have been doing most of the work, but using the sweeps to keep the thing going in the right direction would have been hard enough. I was standing on London Bridge once, watching a barge practicing for the barge races. Two blokes were rowing and another was steering. The tide was flowing very fast and they were swept against one of the piers of Cannon Street railway bridge. Being empty, the barge sounded a mighty DOINGGGGG that must have been heard in Croydon. You can see the dent it made in the bridge to this day.

I don't normally watch An Island Parish. the BBC's reality show about the Scilly Isles, but last night's episode featured the launch of a new pilot gig for a Dutch club. It is available on iPlayer, which has the big advantage that you can fast forward over the stuff about the lovelorn vet and the visiting bishop.
The local Methodist minister blessed the boat with a lovely Celtic benediction, and even spoke it in Dutch, one of the world's least pronouncable languages.
There was a thoughtful discussion of whether a religious ceremony is necessary in these secular times. I think it is purely because every community, including rowing clubs, needs ritual at certain points and a religious service fits the bill whether you believe in it or not. As the scientist Lord May said on Desert Island Discs when asked why he goes to church despite being an atheist: "I believe in following the rituals of my tribe."

Noah oop North

Here's a tale of true Lancashire grit and determination from Stanley Holloway. If your Lancashire geography is a bit vague, Bury is on the River Irwell in the north of Greater Manchester. Blackpool is about 50 miles to the west.
The clip was put up by Hawkmoon - lots more lovely stuff on his YouTube channel.

Not lovely boating weather

A small group of cockeyed optimists shivered in the lee of the Royal Oak this lunchtime as a sharp shower blew over, propelled by a brisk F8 wind. Then a lovely double rainbow appeared over the old mill, but whitecaps still covered the harbour so we called it a day and headed for the warmth of the bar.