Picomicroyacht

What's the best fun you can have in a Laser? Rowing it, of course!
Robin Morris has proved this conclusively by rigging a Laser Pico with a sliding seat and a pair of carbon fibre cleavers for an epic row along the South Coast.
He started in Kent and has made it in weekend-long bursts of about 15 miles a day to Dartmouth. The picture shows him rowing up the estuary at Salcombe.
The Laser Pico is not the hull I would have thought of first for conversion to rowing, but it is stable, tough and buoyant.
He left the centreboard in, keeping it down when at sea so he can be assured of being able to right the boat in the event of a capsize. Of course, capsizing is highly unlikely as when rowing you stay firmly in the middle of the boat and never ever do anything dangerous like hike out. And there is no great big flappy thing trying to pull the boat over in the first place.
He has a GPS, which is just common sense, but also a clever automatic steering system that keeps him on a constant course relative to the earth, which must save an awful lot of neck-cricking.
This picture shows it at Itchenor in Chichester Harbour, with both masts up and a big flag so even the drunkest motor boat fiend can't miss him.
Mind you, if the Salcombe picture is anything to go by he seems to have built up a bit more confidence as he goes along.
He even tows a tender....
On July 29 Robin plans to row the English Channel in aid of Epilepsy Research UK - sponsor him generously!
See Robin's great blog for more.