A Viking Send Off

Yesterday, after a long time contemplating its demise or gifting away, I decided to put the old Bolger Elegant Punt out of her misery. She had been languishing in the garage, against the wall, for a couple of years. I had tried several times to give her away to friends and acquaintances, but no one wanted to commit the time to learn how to handle a small sailboat safely before I could let go in good conscience. Rather than face the liability of their drowning deaths, I opted to give her a Viking funeral.

As a note: a dry plywood boat, once cut into small pieces, will flash fire like a big pile of dead leaves. I only put in one chunk at a time, but it burned hot and fast. It'd have been pretty glorious to have torched it whole, but that might have been against city codes and my general sense of self preservation.

Coracle (Cwrwgl) Model

Last night I finished up the small model of a coracle that I was working on. It's about 3"x5" and fits in the palm of your hand. A tiny version of a tiny boat. I'm leaving it rough and uncanvased. Like most of the models I build, it's complete enough that I could glean info to build a full-size version later, if want should arise.

Coracles were some of the first boat types to come about. Having been made for thousands of years out of simple materials like willow and animal hides. Later being made with ash laths, calico or duck canvas and tar or bitumen paint to seal them. In Asia they are even made from woven split bamboo or put together with vertical staves like a giant wooden bucket or barrel.

I've been mildly fascinated with coracles for a few years, as well as their longer Irish cousins, the currach. Part of my family came over from Wales and Cornwall in the mid-1800s. When researching aspects of Welsh culture about the time my daughter was born, I discovered these funny little watercraft. I've been wanting to build one since, but there's only so much room in a one car garage and there's three boats in there already.

Family Cycling

This morning, Gwen and I biked to her preschool. We winded our way through the neighborhood just east of ours, past the small lakes and the swans and Canada geese with their fuzzy young running across the street in front of us. It was a 40 minute round trip. 25 to get there, 15 to get back. I feel like I've gotten a real workout in pulling her 40-45 pounds plus the steal-framed extension trailer up and over a dozen hills, but it's a good feeling.

We also road to Sequiota Park yesterday evening, down the Galloway Creek Greenway. About 30 minutes there and 30 back. Great trip. The vegetation is really green and lush with all the rain we've been having. I may have eaten a bug, I certainly ended up wearing a few, but that's a small price to pay for an evening of family fun and exercise.

Memorial Weekend

As far as I can tell, I'm recovering really well from my surgery a couple of weeks ago. I still have glue on the sutures and have to be cleared from my surgeon on the 4th of June to do anything really adventurous outdoors, but I did manage to knock out a 2x6 garden box over the weekend and take in a bike ride around the neighborhood with the kiddo in tow, as well as BBQ, make enchiladas, chili and cornbread and drink a couple pitchers of margaritas with friends and family.

My daughter, at four and a half years old, is really coming into a fun and interactive age for doing things outside. She helped me dig out some compost, fill the garden with it, soil, vermiculite and peat moss, plant the heirloom tomato and pepper plants we hope to grow and then she watered them. She also helped catch, slightly mangle and release a couple handfuls of earthworms and pill bugs.

We had a blast. She's promised to help me water the plants each morning before work and school.

Also, we finally got around to buying a tandem bicycle trailer. Unlike the two wheeled cart version we picked up on Craigslist last year, this one gives Gwen a little more sense of balance and involvement. She gets to peddle along with me and feel what it's like to lean into a turn. The smile from ear to ear tells it all. I think it's going to open up a lot of outside fun for our family this spring, summer and fall. Especially since we live maybe ten minutes ride from the Galloway Creek Greenway and fifteen minutes from the South Creek Greenway.

The old cart trailer, with its weathered canvas and webbing, needs an overhaul. I'm planning to strip it down and build a crate box on it for heading to the Farmer's Markets on the weekends.

Life on "pause"

I won't be posting much of interest for a while, I had an appendectomy and a mechel's diverticulum removed on Monday. Nothing like emergency surgery to kill your short term camping, kayaking and sailing plans. 

All I've got for the meantime is daydreaming. 

As of late

I've been fairly busy over the past couple of weeks. The house has needed a long string of spring repairs and odd jobs, from clearing brush, vines and weeds, building a stone firepit and setting paving stones out back, planting flowers and apple trees to mowing and seeding the yard, etc. Also, I've been trying to get back in the habit of cooking more meals at home and trying to be a stress relief to my family instead of a stress maker, at least until my wife's work eases up a bit.

In between stuff I've had to do and entertaining the family, I've been trying to squeeze in a hobby or two or a dozen. Between Friday and Sunday, I taught myself to bake bread. I'm tired of buying the store bought stuff with it's mile long ingredients list. What I made over the weekend, all six loaves, had unbleached all-purpose flour or wheat flour, sugar, salt, yeast and water, and they were so good that I only have a single loaf left this morning. Pretty cool, really. 20 minutes to prep the dough, wait two hours for it to rise, 10 minutes to shape and pop in the oven, 25-30 minutes later, eat fresh bread.

I've also been working on a canoe paddle laminated from kayak and outrigger project scraps. Pretty cool to take offcuts and make something pretty and useful out of them. It's roughly shaped, but needs some finer shaving and sanding done before possibly painting or glassing the blade and oiling the handle.

I also drug the Wa'apa outrigger sailing canoe out of the garage to fix everything I broke on it last fall. The two struts that angle towards the main hull had to be completely reset and epoxied back into the ama (side float). They are set in place, now and I plan to add several layers of reinforcing glass to them before getting it back out on the water. I also plan to lash them in cordage like I had previously. The lashings were the only thing holding them in place when I unwrapped them to work on them.

And lastly, spring has really sprung at our house. The abundance of rain we've been getting has really greened the yard. Birds have nested all over the property - house wrens out back, cardinals in the bush next to the front door and robins above the garage. It took them three tries to build a nest there. Hopefully this one sticks, since it's quite occupied.

Kayaking Aldrich Waterfowl Refuge - Stockton Lake, Missouri

Friday after work, my friend Brian and I drove northwest an hour to Stockton Lake State Park. We camped overnight to the sounds turkeys and owls, dodging deer and opossum to get there.

It took some creative ropework to get the boats on the car.

A little Guinness Extra Stout and caveman TV on Friday evening.

An improvised camp chair from a 5gal bucket and an old creek chair.

Saturday morning, we ate breakfast and headed over to the easternmost point of the lake to Aldrich Waterfowl Refuge where we paddled around for half a day in the lazy flowing waters of the Little Sac River. Some birds that we saw on Saturday's paddle: white pelicans, blue herons, bald eagles, bluebirds, cormorants, wood ducks, mallard ducks, turkey vultures and pileated woodpeckers

When we stopped for lunch, I crawled up the hill and and onto a bluffline to "mark my territory" and found a series of dead and bleached turtle remains. My best guess is that an eagle caught them, then dropped them to the rocks below before eating what smashed out in the process. I found the remains of three of them, in different states of sun bleaching and disarray.

I crawled out of my kayak onto a narrow peninsula that marks where a bridge causeway once stood. Took a couple pics from below and decided to climb up to the area that had eroded a little less. In the process, I had to run across the narrow strip between my boat and the dirt embankment I wanted on top of. When I hit the top, I scared the crap out of a nesting mother Canada goose. She exploded off her nest in a fluttering, honking fury and in the process, scared the crap out of me. I started laughing at the absurdity of it, sorry to have scared her from her slumber and then heard more honking from her mate coming across the lake to see what was going on. I opted to get back to the boat instead of take any more pics from a higher vantage point. Sorry to have roused the poor gal and not wanting to get my head pecked off by dada goose.

Aldrich Waterfowl Refuge is a neat area. I was glad to get the chance to explore it better. Could have seen a few less bass boats, but it was a nice day and I really can't blame anyone for wanting to be out on the lake. Lots of birds there this time of year and there was a lot more water in the lake than last time I paddled it.

As usual, thanks much to Brian D. for going with me and his half of the pics posted here.