salt and wood

1. From rubbish to boat.

2. Me and Tiwi and J W with the Exon.

3. Early enthusiasm.

4. Bon Voyage Exon.

5. Bon Voyage Tiwi.

The outstanding pictures in this Post were taken by our friend Christian Borchert. Actually two boats Tiwi and Exon were a competitive enterprise whipped up on the beach at Fisherman’s Bay. Our friend Johnnies Exon was a plank and sand tub affair with foam core sail and rudder wedged into slots in the sand tub. The Tiwi was a smaller plank and foam outrigger number with a trapezoid foam core sail. Apart from being easier and quicker to manufacture than sheet style sails the foam core sails seem less prone to flipping the vessel. Probably because as the boat tips forward the air pressure is shed from the top of the flat plane.  Whereas it tends to ‘hook’ in the slack at the top of a plastic or cloth sheet sail. The Tiwi pushed rapidly out into the Pacific Ocean. In fact when we left the beach and walked up to the top of the headland we could still make her out way out past the heads. Sadly the Exon, as per its namesake, came unstuck in the chop around a near reef and spilled its load of sand into the Pacific.