Vancouver on the Medway

[Dick Wynne]

A completely unexpected and happy result: I had run out of time and energy maintaining a crew for my Montagu Whaler VANCOUVER in London, and was preparing to mothball her in an East Coast mud berth pending a sale, when from nowhere sprang a bunch of historic boat enthusiasts attached to the Chatham Historic Dockyard (http://www.chdt.org.uk/), and bought her from me. They had been looking for a MW and she'll be safe there (unless the Dutch get ideas again (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raid_on_the_Medway)) and in very good company, alongside a 32ft naval cutter, and old warships including HMS Gannet. Spot the deliberate mistake in the latter's figurehead:

http://www.chdt.org.uk/images/larger/ZZ_1156418903_gannet06_small.jpg

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

I thought "the beak is wrong" but I had to check why I thought so - the gannet, being adapted to diving from heights, entering the water at speed, has no external nostrils.

Delighted to hear that your "Vancouver" is going to such a suitable spot - I hope they keep her in the style to which she is accustomed!

[Dick Wynne]

The nostrils didn't occur to me, but I think they got a goose to pose, bill-wise, here are some Gannets:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/93/Morus_bassanus_9.jpg/387px-Morus_bassanus_9.jpg

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

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With that bump on its head it looks more like a goose than a gannet. And anyway, the colour is all wrong....

Here's a gannet --

http://www.seabird.org/assets/gallery/birds/gannet4.jpg

Many a time I've watched them diving (at Bushranger's Bay, for Victorians) and what a wonderful sight it is -- their wings fold into a W at the very last minute, then they hit the water like a vertical torpedo. They grab a fish on the way down, and the dive can take them down up to thirty feet.

Congratulations on the Whaler. Makes it easy, doesn't it?

Mike

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

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Uh-oh. Clearly a time delay between posting and seeing the result. But we came to the same conclusion anyway.

Mike

[Thorne]

Figurebeak...er...head aside, congrats on getting a great new home for your whaler. Sure wish many other wooden boat stories had equally happy endings.

[Dick Wynne]

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Congratulations on the Whaler. Makes it easy, doesn't it?

Mike

Yes we were lucky to find each other as the demand for such a boat is small (but discerning!). Two clinker-built boats was a bit ambitious for any one. I still have my first love of course.

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

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I've just sold my first love, Dick -- Aileen Louisa (http://www.woodenboat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=98971) -- and it was not at all an easy thing to do. But it was good for her. And she chose her new custodian without any fuss whatever, just like your Whaler seems to have done.

I'm sorry I can't say the same quite the for my second love Sanderling, but at least she has a new owner now who I think (hope?) values her as I did.

Mike

[peter radclyffe]

in the west of ireland, they would tow a green plank behind a currach with a dead fish nailed to it, & lo the gannet would break its neck diving, gannet supper