Boat Swaps

[PaulC]

I put a note on the Building forum regarding Thorne's oars which got me thinking about the question I forget to ask every spring.

Are there swap meets for boat "stuff"? In the ham radio world, swaps can be found almost weekly without having to drive horribly far. When I could ski, swaps were a regular fixture in the autumn. Are there boat swaps in the spring time? How does one find them? FYI - Thorne could use a well used pair of oars and gosh, heaven knows what I might find I need!

[Thorne]

(Gosh, I thought this thread was gonna be something racy like a nautical takeoff of the 60's wife-swapping parties where everyone put their car keys in a bowl and went potluck on the results -- only maybe with dinghy keys or slip numbers...)

;0 )

Yes, Paul, there are Nautical Swap Meets in many locations, often hosted by yacht clubs to fund racing fleets or other activities.

I find most of them out here in the calendar of Latitude 38, the local sailing rag, although the SF/Sac TSCA annual meeting in January is also usually a swap meet of sorts. I attend every one possible, even turning up a bit late to some Saturday rowing events with lots of new bronze hardware jingling in my pocket.

Got everything but a pair of 8' oars recently, some killer deals on all sorts of bronze hardware, a pair of foulie pants, rubber seaboots for the woife, extra lifejackets, a huge bag of mixed SS, brass and bronze fasteners, various books for cheap, and a never-used Sabot mast cover that protects 95% of my new fir mast for $20 -- suchadeal!