Viajador's 2014 Summer Tour!

[Jasper & Karen]

We're kitting up right now to take off on a 4-6 week venture, end of this month.  Our first destination is the north end of Vancouver Island:  a lovely large cove named "Sea Otter" which has the bad luck to be on the receiving end of all the debris being washed up the outer coast of Vancouver Island.  There, we'll spend a couple of weeks with a team of volunteers collecting and sorting the debris, much of it from the Japanese tsunami, for recycling or landfill.  Toward the end of that time, we'll have a helicopter and landing craft come in to lift it all out in enormous bags--there's several tonnes to be taken out! (One of my staff found an intact Japanese refrigerator on the beach when he went to reconnoiter.)

Once that's done, we're off to play:  further up the coast to Kitimat, at the end of Douglas Channel; and if the weather holds, over to Haida Gwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands) to visit friends and hopefully catch a few salmon.

On the way home, we'll stop in at my head office (Living Oceans Society) in Sointula to make sure the staff is still working!  Then on down through the Broughton Archipelago and Desolation Sound, back home to beautiful Howe Sound.

On our return, Viajador goes on the hard and we become landlubbers for the winter.  We're going to set her up under cover near to Jasper's shop and get to serious work on the 'glass, which has deteriorated badly (after only 58 years!).  We've got rusty nails bleeding through on the hull, rents in the deck and cracks everywhere there's a curve; no doubt some fairly extensive rot behind it all, too.  Looking forward to showing off some pretty pictures when it's all done, but we won't spare you the details when we get into it!

Hope you're all enjoying summer weather (well, those of us in the Northern Hemisphere) and good sailing!

[Clyde A. Phillips]

Karen,

It pleases me that Jasper was able to get some help from the drawing.  It's interesting how you can do something as a matter of course and half a century later someone can use what you did.  And this gives me the chance to speak on the Newporter dinghy. 

Many people see a resemblance of the Dyer in Ack's wee boat.  My understanding of it is that Ack popped a mold off of a Dyer Dink (don't remember it length) and he raised the shear as it went forward to make it three or so inches higher at the "stem."  That, from a point about three feet aft of the stem.  The Dyer Dinks had a flat sheer, the Ackwadink had a nice looking (compared to flat) sheer.  Ack also (though this may have been a Dorchester addition) molded in, fore and aft, a couple of flotation tanks that served also as seats, and where I see centerboards mentioned for the Dyers the Ackwadink had a daggerboard.  I'm guessing Ack's dinghy was twelve feet long, no shorter than ten feet and not fourteen feet.  Dyer's Dhowls back in the 1960's, as far as I could then find, where less that ten feet long and the Dinks were ten, twelve and fourteen feet long.  That makes little difference in the present discussion.  I'm sure the basic design, though changed by Ack, started as a Dyer.  That type of redesign was and is common.  I've made some redesigns myself and two of my favorite designers wrote in their books that they expected people to make such changes, making mention that when one little detail of the design is changed the design is no longer theirs and the resultant redesign becomes the responsibility of the redesigner.  Speaking of design changes, I think the same idea works with words.  Seems to me there was an "Aquadink" somewhere in the market place and from that came the Ackwadink for Ack's dinghy. 

[Jasper & Karen]

...pics to follow when the light permits.

[Jasper & Karen]

Hi, Clyde--

I came home today to the most beautiful vista:  our "almost an Ackerdink" on the falls at last!  Jasper has owned the hull of a Dyer Dhow for over 40 years and he's been refitting it for almost a year--glowing mahogany and shiny brass, she's so pretty I'm afraid to think of tying her up on the beach.  Jasper was sure glad to have your diagrams for the strapping to secure the dinghy on the davits.

[Clyde A. Phillips]

Karen,

Good to hear from you.  You're the one that really got me started digging back into my past for some interesting and useful tidbits.  I know we are going to enjoy what will be said as you don't spare us the details of your repairs.  This site thrives on those details.  We have lost some boats to rot and a lack of determination to effect successful repairs because, I think, some owners had not seen the results of a little effort.  Look at what Bob has been doing.  It has been amazing seeing him plow into that apron and finally dig out the old rotten one and replace it with a new one while the boat was sitting on the hard.  That kind of stuff is encouraging and shows what can be done.  I've watched Jasper go through a few projects and have seen his final fine results.  Have no fear, he is able.  As an old shipyard foreman I drool thinking of having a yard with the likes of Jasper and Bob in my employ.  Those two would be assigned their jobs and would be left alone until they finished.  Foreman and owner would both be happy with the results.  Others are out there that know they can do it, and some are there who with the encouragement of the stories of how similar jobs were done will find that they can do it too.

Enjoy your four weeks of a working vacation and your landlubberly days on the hard as your home renews herself.  I have missed you two and rejoice in my memories of you.

Peace,  Clyde