Wherries

What wonderful pictures - looks like a really great day. Well done the Organisers!

Anorak time: I'm sorry to say that wherries are an enthusiasm of mine, so skip this unless you want to be bored. The two definitive books are "Black Sailed Traders" by Roy Clark (who was involved with saving the Albion in the 1950s) and "Wherries and Waterways" by Robert Maltster.

Lots of old wherries were used to strengthen banks of rivers and dikes - they were sunk in place and then filled with mud dredged from the bottom. They weren't - as far as I know - sunk in the Broads to prevent German Seaplanes landing; getting them up again would have been almost impossible after however many years. Instead the Authorities (useful term) commandeered a lot of the pleasure boats in the region and moored them strategically all over the Broads to prevent floatplanes coming in. Many of them were in a pretty sorry state by 1945.

There never was a real wherry called the Sir Garnet - that was Ransome's invention based on the name of a local hero, Sir Garnet Wolsley (see the pub in Norwich Market named after him). There was a wherry called the Garnet, but I think this was after the semi-precious stone and pre-dated Sir Garnet himself. But in all respects the accounts in Coot Club and The Big Six of sailing a wherry are spot on, especially the stuff about working the tides.

Wherries didn't have topsails - there was no need to catch the wind high up in those days when there weren't many trees along the rivers, and the wherry mainsail was huge - quite big enough to drive the shallow hull even in light airs. Instead they had a "bonnet" - a rectangular sail that laced to the bottom of the mainsail closing the gap between the foot of the main and the deck for use in the lightest winds - a lot easier for a two man crew to manage than a topsail. I suspect the writer who talked about topsails was getting confused with Thames Spritsail Barges.

One strange thing about the Albion - as far as is known it was the only trading wherry which wasn't built of overlapping clinker planks; instead it was carvel-built with planks which butted against each other on very stout wooden frames. So it really was the odd one out of all the hundreds which were built.

Am I boring you?

Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.. 

I said don't step back... 

The pace of life... 

Are we there yet? 

Is this art? 

The birthday boy 

More from the wherry trip

The previous posting is taken from my ocusin's email - hope that was OK Derek. Going to put some more pictures up now from another film and then we promise no more!

Newsletter from the Arthur Ransome Apprciation Society (Dronfield Group)

Hello Naomi (or should it be "sailor"?!)

First of all, we hope you had a good day on Monday with your birthday celebrated on firm land (presumably).

Back to the water however, I have consulted my copy of "The Big Six" and now realise that I haven't yet read it (as part of the re-read the Arthur Ransome books exercise) but can tell you that the wherry in "The Big Six" is the Sir Garnet which from the illustrations is exactly the same as the Albion, in particular the winch arrangement for the sail in front of the mast! The boat in "Coot Club" (which I have read) is in fact also the Sir Garnet - AR must have had a bit of a soft spot for that particular vessel!

When we got home Sunday (in 3 hours - a very good journey we thought), I dug out our copy of Pallas's "East Anglia" and looked up wherry (actually Norfolk wherry ). The footnote is quite extensive and mentions by name the Albion -

"One trading wherry remains afloat on the Broads, called Albion. It is owned and sailed by the Norfolk Wherry Trust. The only other trading wherry alive is Maud which is under restoration at Upton Dyke and hopes one day to return to her native waters. There are two pleasure wherries - Hathor and Solace; and three wherry yachts - Olive, Norada and White Moth. Note for underwater archaeologists: on Ranworth Broad (and some other lakes as well), a number of these gaff-topsail boats were sunk during the Second World war in order to prevent German seaplanes from landing".

Cecil may be interested to read of the sunk boats (his story is that they were sunk to strengthen the banks - for all I know he could be right and the book wrong) but either way it's all very interesting, at least I think so!

Having got all this off my chest and the footie having already started on the box, I'll wrap this up now. Pat sends her love to you and Paul (of course!) and again thankyou for what was a very enjoyable weekend and memorable experience.

The pace of wherry life was a revelation... 

We toughed it out, hardend sailors all... 

The weather went from bright sun to very stormy...but not enough to keep us off the deck. 

A few pictures or our Wherry trip last weekend, celebrating Naomi and her dad's joint birthdays... 

Happy Birthday Dear Naomi . . . .

Blimey, we got through a few bottles yesterday lunchtime! My hangover started at 7.30pm. Why is it that, when I only intend to have just a glass or two, something like a Birthday comes along and before you know it the candles are lit, the Birthday Girl is breathing hard all over the cake, and I seem to have downed a bottle of the best? Paul looked a bit glum at the end; I hope it was because he was the designated driver and not that his hangover had already started. If you all enjoyed it half as much as I did then I enjoyed it twice as much as you. It was good to see Will and his pal Simon, too. And remember the words of Tennessee Ernie Ford " . . . another year older and you're deeper in debt . . . " Happy Birthday!

Meanwhile...

..back to the mundane. We now have 2.3 mbps on broadband. Quick or what?! I know I'm just showing off really. The alternative would have been a blow by blow account of my day with my mother at the consultants (photos of scar on request). Suffice to say that I am now downing a very large glass of wine.

Letters from a Stoic

I too though Jeanette was wonderful, but if anyone wishes to see her an an exemplar of the stoic approach to art and life, they may also have to accept that she herself would not despise the supposed great adverseries of the Stoic philsophy, the Epicurians. And Seneca himself is always quoting Epicurus with approval, if only to show that there is no monopoly on truth. Nonetheless I cannot resist quoting from Seneca's letter XXXIII in support of John's contention that art needs working at:

" So give up this hope of being able to get an idea of the genius of the greatest figures by so cursory an approach. You have to examine and consider it as a whole. There is a sequence about the creative process, and a work of genius is a synthesis of its individual features from which nothing can be removed without disaster."

More trivially, I've been away from a computer with interet access for most of the last week, hence no posts! Back in earnest now.

this week

Is anyone else still posting to this blog? Nothing since Tuesday? C'mon, people. (Or, if Michael Howard is reading, pippull.)

Anyway, it's been a pretty good week for me, not least because N&P&L&J went to the UEA on Wednesday evening to hear Jeanette Winterson speak, and read from her new novel, "Lighthousekeeping". What a wonderful hour-and-a-bit! She really is great - and cherishable. Yeah, OK, she is a bit of an old hippy, and she is a bit fey, and she is very self-confident (and we know working class women aren't meant to be that) but, by the gods, she speaks well and makes a lot of sense in these dark days. And bollocks to the pseudo-academics who would denigrate her (no names, no packdrill, but John Carey is one of those of whom we speak). Art (any art) is not easy, nor lowest common denominator, nor Tracey Emin (even if Paul fancies her). It bloody well needs working at, and it is worth the effort. Nice one, our Jeanette.

What a cheery bit of news

I was so thrilled when I saw that the dreaded Ravenscroft had gone. No more listening to her droning on about how the sooner schools went back to the good old days the better it would be. This is from the Chair of the Education committee or cabinet or whatever they call themselves now. And of course what a shining example she was of good old fashioned schooling - so literate and scholarly and what an open mind. Restored my faith in the power of voting.

Worth looking at

Another new blog - our son James' boat blog about his very tippy vintage National 12 racing dinghy:

Twocrewed

As your medical adviser I recommend you to checkitaht!

The election

I also want to record here that when it came to it, in the booth, I couldn't not vote Labour, despite Iraq and everything else. A vision of our sitting MP's face convinced me; and reading Polly Toynbee's article in yesterday's Grauniad ("Blair must go very soon after the election" was the gist). And as for the County Council, as soon as I saw the dread name Ravenscroft . . . . well, what can I say?

More birds

I'm aware that I might be seen as the man who dreams birds of prey, but tonight Linda and I saw what could only have been a Merlin flying low along the Foulsham to Themelthorpe road in front of the car when we were on the way back from casting our votes at about 7.30. It was a female, brown with a strong barred pattern, dark bar to the end of its tail, a bit bigger than a thrush but much smaller than either a Sparrowhawk or a Kestrel. It was flying at between two and eight feet above the ground and we followed it for about 200 yards until it flew up to a perch on a roadside tree. We both got a very clear view and both pored over the bird books to confirm the sighting when we arrived home.

Earlier this year I'm convinced I saw a Goshawk on the old railway track near here (it had brought down an adult Jay, and was half as big again as a Sparrowhawk) but I'm starting to worry that I might be fantasising these birds! (Though not tonight, because Linda saw it too.)

I suppose the problem is that when I first started watching birds in North Herts in the late 1950s you just didn't see birds of prey - the odd Kestrel or Sparrowhawk was a rare sighting. I only ever saw one owl - a Barn Owl - in literally years of watching (I recorded everything I saw from 1958 to 1963). This scarcity was partly due to where I was in the country I'm sure, and partly due to the effects of pesticides on raptor populations (which was only then becoming understood). Now they have undoubtedly returned, and we are seeing them much more often. Witness the Guist Honey Buzzards and the Marsh Harriers in the Broads (I've seen six at one time circling high over Deep-go Marsh near Ranworth - Paul, you've seen them there from the boat too).

Anyway, I'll try to be quicker with the camera next time.

I can't believe he's done this

I was on the point of giving someone this blog address so she could admire the pictures of our pond, but I meant the large pond in the garden not the small pond upstairs. Perhaps I'll wait until it gets archived.

FROM SUBLIME TO REDICULOUS
I cannot resist sharing with you all the wonderful lavatory seat we bought in the Homebase sale last week. Naturally, it comes with a matching bin. We could have chosen a more subtle mosaic-effect set, or a slightly less fish-themed marine look, but in the end, trailer-park taste won out.

Paul

EARLY PURPLE ORCHIDS
This is a response to a much earlier pic from Roy ansd Michelle. Our Norfolk early purple orchids at Wood Dalling are now fully out and look like this...

Paul

These flowers we have seen in several locations, very close to the ground and I thought they might be associated with tree roots (?) but roy disagrees. 

We took these pictures when we went down to the quarries, this is whwere cro magnum man hangs out. 

This view from outside Les Elzies is the one we saw many years ago, and watched the people walking along the walkway which is just behind the trees in the the field. 

Roy took this view from the bar where we had a drink, its just around the corner from the next one. 

Another view of the houses in the rock. 

His coat at the moment is like velvet and one of his hind legs has a white sock. 

Here is Pasha, just a couple of hours old and still unsteady on his legs. 

These three pictures were taken on our forest walk on sunday, prizes for identification of either of the flowers. My wild flower book is, of course, in store. Most frustrating! 

This is the one I described in my e mail, we saw it again today, any ideas? 

This is a flower for identification, starts off bluey and fades to white, is it wild garlic? 

Land Rover Show

It's on the 10th - 12th June at Bircham Newton; do you feel a trip coming on?

Mayday, Mayday . . .

Following Paul’s sighting - and my hearing - a Blackcap after our impromptu lunch yesterday in the Themelthorpe back garden, I decided later to spend an hour with my new binoculars (oh alright, Linda’s new binoculars) seeing how many different bird species I could spot in or from the garden.

In one hour, between 4.30pm and 5.30:
Blackcap
Blackbird
Blue Tit
Chaffinch
Chiff Chaff (heard at first - very difficult to spot in the trees at the back)
Collar Dove
Great Tit
Greenfinch
House Sparrow
Jackdaw
Moorhen
Pied Wagtail
Robin
Starling
Swallow (the first this year)
Wood Pigeon
plus what looked like a large bird of prey flying high in a north-easterly direction; possibly a Marsh Harrier? Wings too narrow for a Buzzard or the local Honey Buzzards.

And earlier in the day:
Goldfinch
Mallard
Songthrush
Sparrowhawk
Yellow Hammer

Not bad, and although there is definitely a shortage of Starlings compared to a few years ago - as has been reported nationally - there is no shortage of House Sparrows - we have twenty to thirty living and breeding. In our nest boxes we have Blue Tits and Great Tits sitting, Sparrows nesting in the house gutters, Goldfinches in the shrubbery nearby (last year they nested in the wisteria on the front of the house) and Mallard and Moorhen with young on the pond - there were ten ducklings, now there are six, there are seven or eight little moorhens. Linda's word for it is fecund, but I think that's rude. In fact it's a fecund rude thing to say.

(PS - I've given up trying to publish pictures to Blogger and have deleted my early attempt to do a boat blog on this site; it's now only on http://lugg.blogeasy.com/)