What's on the pond?

In the winter I was building a scale model ship and enjoyed it so much that I decided to start doing small model boats out of Balsa wood just for the fun of it. No works of art, just something to get my mind off work.

Meet Frederik, he is now the local fisherman on my Goldfish pond and hopefully he will soon catch the "big one" for supper. 

More detail - Boat - 4 inches / 10 cm    Frederik 2 inches / 5 cm

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B-O-A-B

We all know that BOAT stands for Bail-Out-Another-Thousand, btu the Yacht History Supreme takes it to a whole new level that one would need to use BOAB - Bail-Out-Another-Billion.

The 100 ft yacht has a price tag of $4,8 Billion and one can believe it if you look at the following trimmings:

• 100 000 Kilograms gold & platinum 
• Meteoric Stone wall inlays
• Petrified T Rex Bone

For more visit G Captain

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Bad Weather Sailing

J.S. Elcano 1:250 scale

Every year when winter approaches and the rain starts falling, I start building model boats. It keeps my hand steady and me day dreaming of the days of old square riggers and majestic clippers.

The one I am busy with currently was a present from the wife and is a 1:250 scale relica of the J.S. Elcano that was launched in 1927 at Cadiz.  It was a Spanish Navy training vessel and was capable of 15knts.  She was 94.13 meter and could carry 36 Officers, 143 Sailor trainees and 70 marines.

This model has many small bits and pieces and very, VERY tiny intrinsic rigging work, so hopefully I will finish before the summer time.

Power Idiots!

My annual vacation is usually just after New Year, when most of the power idiots get back to work.  Usually you can then find a parking near the beach, without doing a half marathon just to get to the water.

This time of the year is also the only time I keep my head low when passing fellow sailors.  See my parents own a ski boat and usually on holiday I play a bit around on the water and leave sailing on the banks of the lake.  As I speed across the lake, I am astonished to see how idiotic and uninformed the power boating community are. To them "Rules of the road" does not exist, especially after the first beer.

Now if you think "Rules of the road" is a foreign concept for them, wait till you see them trying their hand at mooring.  On the lake their is small "coves"  where they beach their boats for the night. Since it is protected water, none of them even think that the afternoon/evening 30knts + wind can kick up a bit of a swell and a cross wind that could move their moored boats around.

One such power idiot could not give a S@#$ about it and needless to say irritated the hell out of me.  In the evenings he retired to the warmth of his braai (bbq) while nurturing his 1 millionth beer for the day.  Only using a very SLACK bow line to keep his boat from drifting off, his rubber duck floated a bit higher in the swell and turned sideways in the cross wind.  This would've been okay , except his stern, with his prop protruding, was bobbing millimeters away from the smooth side of our boat.  Haven't he heard of a stern spring before???

Trying to be of service to the greater boating community, I suggested a few mooring ideas to MR P. Idiot.  But to no avail, every late afternoon I had to get wet and re-moor his rubber ducky.

Note to Power Boat Association - include mooring techniques in syllabus for skipper license.