Tag Archives: Boats

Lightning Craft

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by Josh Masters


Photo: Claudia Myatt

Introduction from Julia Jones (RDA Journal Editor):

I am one of many river users who is currently wondering what I can do to reduce my carbon emissions. The RYA (Royal Yachting Association) has recently published their aspiration to make the UK’s recreational boating sector zero carbon by 2050 with a 50% reduction in carbon emissions from boat engines by 2030. https://www.rya.org.uk/about-us/policies/environment-and-sustainability. 

It’s perhaps easier to see what can be done with new-build boats than with yachts like mine, built as a motor-sailor in 1946. While I can safely undertake to use my sails as frequently as possible (that’s the joy of being a water-born hybrid) it will remain impossible to push one’s way out of the narrow Deben entrance against a spring flood if the wind is adverse. Continue reading →

Who’s that boat? Or, Venice comes to town

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by Nan McElroy

If you’re a devotee of Woodbridge boatyard and the River Deben, you may have spotted Eric and Maxine Reynolds manoeuvring a particularly unfamiliar, curious-looking traditional craft towards the end of 2020. It’s wood, of course, but awfully skinny, and perhaps ten metres long with minimal draft. It’s outfitted with long, flat wooden oars, but no rigging. What is it, exactly? Where’d it come from? When will we see it again? And how, exactly, does it work?

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Happy Memories Sailing a Cornish Shrimper

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by Robin Whittle

Gillie and I retired from 505 dinghy sailing in 1995 and bought our Shrimper 19, ‘Bumble Chugger’ (124) in 1996.  The Shrimper is one of the most popular of small yachts built by Cornish Crabbers Ltd.  ‘Bumble Chugger’ has provided us with some wonderful adventures exploring the local estuaries and distant shores.  She has also enabled us to continue racing which has been of more interest to me, but Gillie has taken part with great skill, even if not with my enthusiasm!

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The Longshore

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By Peter Willis

A bit more about Sam Doman’s pretty dinghy Longshore, which featured in an article by Robert Simper in the Autumn 2020 issue of The Deben. With her eye-catching blue clinker-style hull and cream single battened lug sail she’s become a distinctive sight off Woodbridge. She’s also been shortlisted in the ‘Spirit of Tradition’ section of the annual Classic Boat awards. (If you read this article before voting closes – 8th March, we hope you’ll be inspired to vote for her – voting link at the end of this article).

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