Dimbleby Round My Parts

And who should be rowing up to Bosham but David Dimbleby, in his latest TV docu-thing Britain and the Sea, yet another farrago of high mind and middle brow almost as bad as his previous effort Seven Ages of Britain.
At least he takes to the oars again, bless him, in the rather attractive tender to his repro gaffer Rocket, fitted out with nice bronze crutches (the technical name for that rowlock shape) and traditional sculling oars with leathers.
So it would be churlish to point out that he was rowing with one leather out of the crutch, a good way to damage the shaft very quickly. And the fact that the stitching is underneath the oar where it will be worn away by the crutch shows he has the blades the wrong way round.

Stay-at-home Rowing

Took a novice crew out early on Saturday morning in adventure gig Deborah (one of the plastic pilot gigs used to train cross-Channel rowers). The two proper wooden gigs Heart of Hayling and Spirit of Langstone swept past, powered by crews training for next year's regatta season. They looked great.
On the downside, I realised that I haven't been on waters further than six miles from Langstone for far too long. I need to get out more.
While I plan something, have any readers had any good rowing adventures lately? Send me the details, with lots of pictures!

A Question

A question for you experts out there: Does hanging a plastic owl in the shrouds deter gulls from pooping all over your boat?
(Picture taken in Emsworth channel today).

Claydon Skiffs (cont)

The next step in the colourful if obscure history of the Claydon skiff was the spread of the type to Gravesend, the town on the Thames where the Indian princess Pocahontas died.
Gravesend has a very long established regatta, first recorded as long ago as 1698. After the war, the Town Regatta Committee bought four traditional clinker-built, 21ft skiffs for racing, including the Long Ferry Race from Westminster to Gravesend. This punishing event retraced the route of a ferry granted exclusively to the watermen of Gravesend by Royal Charter in 1401. Winning boats were presented with decorated backboards (the backs of the passenger seat), several of which hang in local rowing clubs and pubs to this day.
The wooden boats eventually fell victim to time and were replaced by a number of Claydons, but by this time the name seems to have morphed to Clayton.
The hull was slightly different as well, and usually regarded as slower than the Felixstowe boats. For several years they had a slightly better handicap at the Great River Race but that seems have been eliminated these days.
According to the Gravesend RC website: 

The popularity of this type of rowing lives on, with crews of both sexes and all ages formed from local clubs and pubs. Today there is still much cross-over between the two types of rowing, with many Gravesend RC members competing in skiff events, and many skiff rowers continuing to train and race throughout the winter as members of the rowing club.

Gravesend brought one of their Claydons down to Langstone Regatta in 2009 and whopped us round the course, but it seems that most of the star rowers of that crew now row sliding seat coastal boats, and no Gravesend-based Claydons have been entered in the GRR for some time. A great pity - does anybody know what is happening to them?

(Photos from the Flickr stream of Paul Johnston)

Better camera weather

Amazing what a bit of extra light does for image quality. Went out in Lottie, one of the Teifi skiffs, at 09.00 this morning and met Christine Ball getting a bit of paddleboarding in before work. That's the Mill and the Royal Oak behind.
It was so warm I was down to my T-shirt in no time. What month is it?

Cameras

Cap'n JP at captainjpslog.blogspot.co.uk has been comparing all his fancy cameras, including a Canon DSLR, an incredibly compact mirrorless Sony NEX, an Olympus water/dust/shockproof jobby and his Google Nexus 5 smartphone (only just out - what a slave to tech he is).

I seem to have been taking only my Samsung Galaxy Note II phone out recently. Yesterday on the evening tide off Langstone I discovered that its low light performance is not...so...very...good.

In fact, the image looks like something Edvard Munch might have knocked out on one of his less optimistic days at the easel. 

I must resume packing my Ricoh splashproof camera. Or possibly get one of they Nokia Lumias with the 41 megapixel sensor.

Yet another big bloke in a small boat

This is John Konstanzer of North Texas rowing his new rowboat, built to Jim Michalak's WeeVee design. It is just 7.5ft long, with a deep V hull after which the design is named.
John gives an excellent account of the build and launch at Duckworks Magazine. He reports that getting in is a bit of a challenge, which is to be expected with a boat that has very little below the waterline at the edges, but that she has a remarkable turn of speed for such a short boat. Jim himself also noted this.
But the really nice thing about boats this size is that they are so easy to take to the water and launch, allowing you to grab those opportunities that might otherwise pass you by.