"Of all the fabricks, a ship is the most excellent, requiring more art in building, rigging, sayling, trimming, defending, and mooring, with such a number of severall termes and names in continual motion, not understood of any landsman, as none would think of, but some few that know them." Captain John Smith
"No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned. A man in a jail has more room, better food and commonly better company." Samuel Johnson
I dont think ol' Sam ever sailed. Sailing is playing with mother nature. There's no feeling like the wind pushing the sails and flying over the waves. The power of the play between the wind, boat and water. Its magical. Sure you might get a little wet but thats part of sailing!
WTF? From wiki: I think he probably knew a little more about it than your average 'pleasure boat day-sailer'.
Newsletter December 2011. Dear Sea Gypsies, Things are looking very Christmassy now, as the snow falls and we prepare to delve into the forest on the hunt for the perfect Christmas tree. Snow isnt quite at head-height yet, since its been a tropical December. Today shows a toasty -10 on the thermometer. Woofers are holding their breath, waiting to see some proper winter-conditions, thus facilitating giant snowmen, igloo-building, skiing, and perhaps a model sailing ship crafted from snow and ice? Anything is possible on the farm! This month however has been a sad one. Our friend and one of the seagipsy family, Casper, died a few weeks ago. At almost 14 years old, he was happy, eating many waffles, until the end of his life. We buried him in a peaceful spot overlooking the raspberry patch. He was a beautiful dog with a beautiful heart; we know many of you loved Casper and he will always be remembered. Other news is that, after a much-needed trip to the Canaries for some of us for some serious sailboat spotting, we are back and working hard to...yes, you guessed it, work of the roof which is now thankfully finished! Otherwise we have been trench-digging, honey-stirring, shed-cleaning and wall-painting, trying to finish everything that needs doing before our beards and toes start to freeze. All of us are itching to get back into the boat shed however, desperate as we are to start sewing the sails, melting the ballast, carving the mast and welding the deck...only a few more steps until our beautiful sailboat is ready for her maiden voyage! If you want to join our happy sea-gypsy tribe, feel free to drop us a line. Have a good Christmas everyone, and remember to put out a big bowl of porridge for the Fjosnisse. This gnome lives in the barn and he can get cranky if he doesn't get his fair share at Christmas! Pictures of the month a: Finding a nice christmas tree in the forest. b. two pretty mermaids painting the storage shed inside. c. Casper, our beloved sailboat dog passed away this month. d. and again, merry christmas to all of you from all of us! http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=77243&stc=1&d=1324226133 http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=77244&stc=1&d=1324226141 http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=77245&stc=1&d=1324226147 http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=77246&stc=1&d=1324226152
A friend of ours recently purchased a 61'-foot oyster smack built in 1907 with a diesel the size of your kitchen for $4,500. And steamed home in her!
Well then sounds like he had a bad attitude about sailing. Probably a land lubber. lol Sweet! Whats he going to do with her? Fishing?
While I know no one wants to advocate Piracy, especially not a floating commune,,, I would like to mention that not everythig on torrent sites happen to be copyrighted materials, while that may in fact be the majority of whats around, some are in fact simply collections of individuals putting information together for use by the masses. That being mentioned, I'd suggest googling "the boat builders free plans v2.0" and see what ya' think. Or maybe it was you who put it up? I dunno. In any case, :cheers2:
But I have seen some perfectly marvelous boats built by true beginners (though rarely by those who do not already possess at least journeyman woodworking skills). I have seen many disasters, too.
Newsletter February 2012. . Dear Sea Gypsies, Spring is slowly coming our way, This winter has been really nice compared to last winter. It has seldom been below -15, which is quite out of normal. We had a really nice christmas on the farm, with lots of friends and seagypies. This year Santa Claus had an australian accent. We tried to teach him the only one and important centence in norwegian - "Are there any nice children here" but in last minute he forgot - but the "kids" still got their presents. The small ones got proper vikinghelmets and dress of course.... What else for seagypses? Else we have been doing regular winter maintainance on the farm and been looking forward to the spring. The boat project is going forward working on small and big pieces on the boat. We have been doing some work on how to make a furnace to melt all that scrap aluminum into more useful stuff like portholes. Casting is not something new. People have been doing thise for ages. Hopefully we manage to make something out of brick run on propane or better firewood which we have plenty of up here. Any foundry and casting experience out there? Anyway, its quite busy up here now but dont forget to enjoy the early spring folks! .. and if you want to join our tribe please contact us! Pictures. a. Enjoy christmas dinner with friends and seagypies. b. A young seagypsy quite happy whith his christmaspresent - proper viking helmet! c. Out walking the mast. Even a mast need some fresh air these days! d. We want to duplicate these guys! Anyone with casting/foundry experience out there? We want to learn! a: http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=112591&stc=1&d=1330274085 b: http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=112601&stc=1&d=1330274091 c: http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=112611&stc=1&d=1330274096 d: http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=112621&stc=1&d=1330274103
Newsletter April 2012. . Dear Sea Gypsies, Still some time until we are ready to put the seeds into the soil. Its more or less -5 degrees C during night last weeks but daytime is above zero. The days have been spent welding and welding and when we havent done welding we have spent time troubleshoot welding machines. They have a tendency to break down unfortunately. So we bought 2 more big machines. We also got hold of another ton of lead. There seems to be no end to how much lead we need for ballast. Ahh yes. We got more chickens on the farm. one of our hens found out we need some easter chickens this year and she missed by 2 days. Not bad. The small one is a little shy so its hard to take a picture without getting attacked by the angry mother. Today it will be traditional easter-dinner here on the farm with people from near and far. Wish you all fair winds and following seas and hope you all have a peacful easter. picture from last weeks. a: our chickens are enjoying longer and warmer days. b: two more welding machines arrived on the farm.. It seems we cant get enough welding machines. c: Our easter chicken arrived 2 days before easter. http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=135841&stc=1&d=1333813538 http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=135851&stc=1&d=1333813545 http://weldingweb.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=135861&stc=1&d=1333813551
Few sailors would argue that both natural light and good ventilation are requirements of the comfortable cabin. There's no insurmountable barrier to having ventilation that is nearly as effective when a boat is rail down going to weather in a driving rain as it is when at anchor. Underway, the only ports that can safely be left open are those mounted in the cockpit well to ventilate the quarterberths. Marine air conditioning is almost priceless during the dog days of August and you don't have to be an engineer to do a competent job. The concept of roughing it by choice seems as archaic today as using a wooden bucket for a head.
Hey have you considered (or have I mentioned) towing along a methane digester on a raft or two and a safe distance fro the rest of the craft? BioChar made from sea veggie compost would at least still allow it to be used for filtration of ocean water after distillation I think AND provide producer gas to cook with or to drive your steam boiler,,, (OR Caked Biochar briquettes, or like Forrest Gump say's, "Maybe a little of both?")
http://www.hipforums.com/newforums/showpost.php?p=7250576&postcount=11 Another thought I had was to simply take a Bass boat of some sort and insulate it with foam, seal the top and have it auto-fill with a float switch or two and some simple controls then use solar heat and piped waste heat ala a ship engines coolant system to steam it off to the condensing apparatus (Under the ocean in the water,,, enclosed in a large impermeable membrane of some sorts as a portable cistern??)