Sailing

Islesburgh's sailing experiences

Easter 2009
Akaroa Classic Boat Festival, 21-22 November 2009
Rigging update and cabin detail, 11 November 2010

Easter 2009

Here are some photos of our Eun Mara on Lake Benmore, on our Easter cruise with the Otago Trailer Yacht Sqaudron. There were seventeen boats together on the Friday night, then we went to another place on our own for Saturday night, and joined the others again on the Sunday. Benmore is a fairly convoluted hydro lake, in what was a steep valley. We did some sailing but a lot of motoring too. We had beautiful calm autumn weather. From Benmore we went to a motor camp at Lake Wanaka, where some Auckland friends joined us, on tour with their caravan. We took them motoring on the lake, on another calm day with perfect reflections.

(Sounds idyllic to me - R)

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Akaroa Classic Boat Festival, 21-22 November 2009

Here are some photos from the Akaroa Classic Boat Festival last weekend, 21-22 November. We were judged the Best Boat overall! The judges were top people on the New Zealand classic-boat scene. They knew of the canoe yawl tradition of Albert Strange and George Holmes, and were very pleased to see one in New Zealand. They liked my work too! I thought you might like the Tammie Norrie. My tabernacle is 3" (75mm) higher than in the plans. In the "trailing rig" photos, she's parked over a large pot-hole.

New trailing rig

Caledonia Yawl 'Thwistle' and Eun Mara

Tammie Norrie "Archie"

At moorings

Ensign at the Mizzen Gaff

A visitor

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Rigging update and cabin detail, 11 November 2010

Here are some photos of the latest improvements to our rigging, and a couple from our recent tripping around. The jetty is at the launching place on Lake Benmore. By combining the mizzen topping lifts onto a central cleat, I have got a bit more steering now, which improves our tacking. I have done a similar thing with the main topping lifts, which allows me to control the whole operation from the mast when hoisting or lowering the sail. The beaded luff-ties are similar to Dale's. They are quicker to do up and undo than the back-and-forth lacing system I was using before, and I can reef the sail without the whole luff going slack. (I had started putting hitches in the lacing at the reef-bands, but that took even longer.)

Lake Benmore

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