Peter McKenzie and his sons from Queensland Sunshine Coast built a standard Eureka paddling canoe.
Weight was the standard 44lbs. Peter’s email gives some nice tips.
They are very happy campers.
Every year we do a Calendar of the Goat Island Skiff. This is the cover of the 2017 Calendar. The GIS facebook group collects over 100 excellent photos then we all vote on them to get down to the best 12 or so for a yearly calendar.
Malcolm Eggins, boat builder and designer has passed away.
A small tribute to one of the many people that has influenced me and many other sailors and designers. He was a part of the development of Moths, NS14s, VJs, VeeEsses and many other Australian racing dingies as a builder and designer along with his son Darryl. He won several State Championships.
The Goat Island Skiff Calendar is out for 2013.
Goat Island Skiffs from around the world. It is put out yearly by the Goat Island Skiff group on Facebook through an open voting process using the Facebook “like” function.
I used to work at DuckFlat many years ago.
I visited them in Adelaide. Photo and text of a fast plywood trimaran, 40ft steam liveaboard boat, kayak, rowboat and a Hartley Powerboat restoration
List of Kit suppliers for Storer Boat Plans. UK and Europe, USA, Australia, South Africa. Kits make building a Storer Boat even easier.
AlexN, who is building an Oz Racer and I drove up to Toronto at Lake Macquarie for the Classic Boatfest 2011. I think I will go again in 2012 and try to have a boat to sail around.
Shows on the water are the nicest type and this one has good access for small sailing boats and canoes.
We met up with Bruce (Woodeneye on the storerboats forum) who had is “for sale” Goat Island Skiff.
Jack is rather happy with his newly launched Eureka Canoe.
He has built it as a woodworking project over the last couple of years as time became available from his busy architectural practice.
Anyway … a bunch of nice photos and some of Jack’s writing.
Photos and slideshow from the Goolwa Wooden Boatshow 2011.
Over 250 boats – mostly in the water. Wooden hydroplanes, “restricted 21s”, riverboats, putt putt launches, classic sailing boats, kayaks, canoes and more.
I had the quick canoe, the eureka canoe and the OzRacer on the stand that was shared with Duck Flat Wooden Boats and Boatcraft Pacific. Good time was had by all.
Dete Hasse and his family built a Goat Island Skiff in Geelong, Victoria a while ago. He has just written to me about his experiences trying to sail on Port Phillip Bay and more happily on the recently refilled (the drought is over!) Lake Eppalock.
Also he makes some good comments about reefing and how it changes an overpowered boat into a much more rriendly beast in stronger winds.
The Goolwa Wooden Boat show is on the coming weekend.
Storer Boat Plans and Duckflat are having a joint stand as per normal.
The show itself is free this year with 250 boats entered in events or on display.
A rare beast, a circa 1960s 12 square metre sharpie with some of the original rig is for sale. I am not involved, but in the interests of helping preserve a little bit of Australian sailing and boat design history I would like to help find it a good home.
The 12sq metre (heavyweight) Sharpie came to Australia for the 1956 Olympics. NZ first, Oz second.
However the boat totally changed the approach to the design of Australian skiffs. Thought you might be interested to read my understanding of the design issues and influence.
How the Sharpie name went from the USA to Europe and then to Australia – and how it changed our boats.
A nice little reverie from Clinton who built a Quick Canoe this year.
After a hectic day in the city he paddled out into the middle of the lake to watch the eclipse in his $300 canoe.
I am currently helping at a boatbuilding school in Adelaide.
There are boats designed by me, Oughtred, CLC Kayaks, Joel White and Woodenboat.
People are from Queensland, NSW, Victoria and Perth.
My friends Rob and Jane Hylton run sailing boat and canoe hire on some of my favourite sailing waters – the lower Murray Lakes – just an hour south of Adelaide.
The boat hire is quite cheap but linked with you overnight staying in the small town of Clayton Bay – on the edge of the Murray River. There are a number of different options. My favourite is a tent or an on site caravan on the river’s edge camping area. But there are classier (?) options as well.
Low season is quite cheap and the days down there can be very beautiful in winter with a good weather report. They also offer sailing lessons which can include a picnic and/or a tour of the fascinating Murray wetlands.
Cliff and PJ live in Warm Queensland and Wintry Tasmania. However they both like to go the the yearly (June) wooden boat festival in tropical Far North Queensland.
This year they decided to build one of my Quick Canoes. They started on Saturday and finished including putting the canoe on the car roof by the following thursday.
They are experienced woodworkers so added some very nice details.
Tom has built his MSD Rowboat in Brisbane.
I met up with him recently and we drove down to the coast towing the rowboat to the river at Nudgee. A bit of wind and a lot of current because of all the rain.
Tom has trimmed down the skeg to get the boat to balance nicely in all directions. Before the modification the bow used to blow around – now it behaves nicely.
I took quite a few pictures.
Fiona Harbison and friends have just launched their new Handy Punt for fishing and family outings.
Fiona is the sister of Helen (hope I have that right) who built a Nutshell pram in a number of the Duck Flat spring or autumn boatbuilding schools.
It is called Farnark, which will strike a chord with Australians and New Zealanders through the work of John Clarke. There is a picture of the boat and a clip of John Clarke reprising his farnarkling spiel.
This podcast/mp3 talks about why Australian (and New Zealand) wooden boatbuilding is different from the rest of the world..
Click to listen to the talk. This is the third of three.
About to leave for the USA – Let me calculate …. that means about 45 important emails I have to answer when I get back to civilisation!!! Not to mention about 150 posts on the PDRacer forum and another 200 here.