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Thursday, 20 April 2017

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Download Boat Plans to Construct Your personal Boat

MyBoatPlans is really a complete collection of 518 , 40 videos and about 500 pages of boat building guides. I've just purchased the entire package and this really is my overview around the item:

What exactly is MyBoatPlans?

The solution delivers step by step blueprints on more than 518 boats and video lessons on boat developing. The creator, Martin Reid delivers a basic, efficient and user-friendly program to construct any kind of boats within a simple way. MyBoatPlans shows the user how you can develop more than 500 different types of boats ranging from straightforward canoes and kayaks to complex styles like a cabin cruiser.

The Pros:

Under are a few of the points I was actually impressed with.

- An enormous Array of Plans To choose from

They give you detailed plans and diagrams, total with color photos and examples on a lot of types of boats. Sailboats, skiffs, canoes, kayaks, houseboats, paddle boats, yachts, catamarans, flat-bottom boats, dinghys and dories, to name a number of. There are numerous plans accessible for each kind of boat, so you have some range to choose from.

- The video section is complete

The 45+ videos on boat developing leaves no stone unturned. It consists from the entire boat building procedure from conception for the final item. It really is excellent for beginners who want an easy to comply with video guide on boat building. You will find also videos on boat repair and boat design calculations that are wonderful for professional builders

- Fantastic bonuses included

The bonuses you get with this item are great. You get a Cost-free boat designing software program, a book on boat building suggestions and the boat-builders handbook which can be massive in and of itself.

- Complete Color Pictures

I appreciated the quantity of full colour images and diagrams which are integrated in the manuals. I am a very visual person, so it is easier for me to adhere to a image or diagram instead of reading paragraphs.

- Funds Back Policy

The 60 day cash back assure is constantly appreciated. I like seeing a merchant who stands behind their product 100%. It puts the customer at ease, understanding that they are not going to shed a cent if they select to not use the technique.

The Cons:

- It requires a although to download

As a result of the huge quantity of content offered, there is certainly about 900 megabytes to download. This may possibly take a even though for those who have a slow connection. Nevertheless it is possible to go for the DVD edition within the members area so that solves the concern if you are on a slow network

- Less than 20 mega yacht designs

I'd prefer to see far more mega yacht styles and plans. This will be wonderful for professional boat builders like me that are thinking about mega yacht designs.

Wednesday, 19 April 2017

Our Pompeii Adventure

July 29-31, 2013

THE MUST SEE in Southern Italy is the ancient ruins of Pompeii, uncovered reasonably recently after over 1,500 years of being buried under thick layers of volcanic ash. We certainly weren’t going to miss it so we were up early for our foray around the Bay of Naples to the foot of the Mount Vesuvius.

A small section of one of many incredible mosaics uncovered in Pompeii

Our first problem was where to go ashore as the entire area around us seemed to be all private waterfront. We decided to take the direct approach and take the dingy straight into the small beach nearest us and see what happened. We hauled the dingy up the narrow beach and tied it off against the sea wall. The only sign of life at this early hour was a guy hosing off all the paths and paved areas in preparation for an influx of paying beachgoers so we hoped he could persuaded to let us leave the dingy. This is Italy, so our strategy was for Karen to go and ask the question. You’d may not be amazed to hear that a female gets a more friendly reception than a male when seeking help in this country but it is very marked difference in success rate. We’ve even got to the stage of having Karen radio or contact marinas when we’re looking for a berth because she seems to get a lot more assistance than Rob. Our new friend with the hose had very little English but through the use of Karen’s limited Italian, mime, and lots of smiles he reluctantly agreed to let us park the inflatable. Italian men do have trouble saying no to a pretty lady. Fortunately it was not still the weekend or we’re pretty sure we would have been out of luck regardless.

Karen talked our way into scoring a Possilipo dingy parking
spot directly in from the boat

Our next task was to get to Naples’ central station. We had loaded its address into Maps on the i-Phone and jumped on the first bus coming past. We rode it for as long as we could see it was headed in the general direction of the station then jumped off when our little blue GPS dot on the screen started to head in the wrong direction. We were still a couple of kilometres short of the station so found another likely looking bus stop and grabbed the next one along. The GPS soon confirmed we were now headed the right way again and this time made it to within a block of the station before it turned away. We were off at the next stop and were soon buying our very cheap tickets for the train to Sorrentowhich also stops right at the entrance of Pompeii.

There's now grass in the foreground at Pompeii's entrance where once the
waters of the Bay of Naples carried trading galleys.

It’s believed that the town was founded in the seventh or sixth century BC and was captured by the Romans in 80 BC. By the time of its destruction, 160 years later, its population was approximately 20,000. Pompeii, along with nearby Herculaneumand many villas in the surrounding area, was mostly destroyed and buried under 4 to 6 m (13 to 20 ft) of ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. Evidence for the destruction originally came from a surviving letter by Pliny the Younger, who saw the eruption from his position across the Bay of Naples at Misenum and described the death of his uncle Pliny the Elder, an admiral of the Roman fleet, who tried to rescue citizens. It is believed the initial eruption occurred on August 24, just one day after Vulcanalia, the festival of the Roman god of fire, including that from volcanoes.

An artist's impression of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius that destroyed Pompeii

The site was lost for about 1500 years until its initial rediscovery in 1599 and broader rediscovery almost 150 years later by Spanish engineer Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre in 1748. The objects that lay beneath the city have been well preserved for thousands of years because of the lack of air and moisture. These artefacts provide an extraordinarily detailed insight into the life of a city. During the excavation, plaster was used to fill in the voids between the ash layers that once held human bodies. This allowed one to see the exact position the person was in when he or she died.

Karen in the remains of one of the grander residences of Pompeii

Pompeii has been a tourist destination for over 250 years. Today it has UNESCO World Heritage Site status and is one of the most popular tourist attractions of Italy, with approximately 2.5 million visitors every year.

We arrived soon after opening time and only needed to line up for about ten minutes to get our tickets. Tripadvisor reports wait times can stretch to well over an hour in the height of the summer season. Once again we were making use of one of Rick Steve’s fantastic audio tours which we’d been able to download free on Karen’s I-Pad. The first thing that struck us as we entered the ruins was that we were passing docks where sea going trading boats used to load and unload their cargos. The waters of the Bay of Naples are now many kilometres away demonstrating how much the world can change.

The wheel tracks of chariots clearly visible along with the stepping stones
for pedestrians in this paved one way street in Pompeii.

The second thing that struck us very quickly was what an advanced and well ordered society had existed at Pompeii before tragedy struck in the year 79 AD. The whole city had a very efficient water fresh supply fed from mountain springs along a major viaduct and into storage reservoirs and cisterns. Rather than the mish mash of twisting, turning streets, lanes and alleys we’d become used to seeing in medieval towns a thousand years or more younger than here, Pompeii had a well planned grid system of two and one way streets with reasonably wide pedestrian footpaths each side. The streets were almost half a metre lower than the pedestrian level and sloped away from the central forum area of the city located at its highest point. This allowed them to be flooded every morning which washed away the previous day’s horse droppings, urine and any other general grime. They were also designed with raised stepping stones to accommodate chariots which were all built with a uniform width wheel track.

The interior of the communal baths and sauna in Pompeii

Fertility symbol or erotica.

With Rick Steve’s audio tour guiding us to and explaining highlights such as the, temples, law courts, markets, large amphitheatre, extremely ornate communal baths and saunas, commercial sized bakeries, taverns, bordellos, takeaway food stalls located virtually on every intersection, the mansions of the rich and the more humble but still significant housing of the average citizen Pompeii emerged from its 2000 year slumber and came alive for us. Without an audio tour to explain what you’re surrounded by we’re sure all your eyes would see is little more than a pile of old stones. Thank you Rick.

Take-away food outlet Pompeii style

Pompeii's main street with Mount Vesuvius in the background.

By the time we’d spent three hours exploring the ruins, the summer heat really started to kick in so we were quite happy to retreat back to the station and head back into Naples for the next stage of our Pompeii experience. Through the Tripadvisor website, we had become aware that a vast number of the real treasures discovered during excavations of the city over the years now reside in the Naples National Archaeological Museum located just a couple of stops from Naples’ central station. These even include complete walls and floors containing large frescos and mosaics literally carved off building and removed. We’d seen the ruins now we made our way to see the recovered art it had contained.

Many of Pompeii's mosaic treasures are in the Archaeological Museum

Huge frescos were removed from house walls in Pompeii

We were certainly not disappointed. Truly going to Pompeii without also viewing the huge range of artefacts in the museum would be like visiting the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and only looking at the building and not the paintings. The huge number of frescos and mosaics depicting Pompeii life gave us a much more complete insight into how the general population lived during the height of the Roman Empire. We actually spent as much time here as in the ruins themselves.

It was interesting to learn that a clash of cultures between the Pompeii era and the ultra-conservative prudishness of the 17^th and 18^thcenturies led to an unknown number of discoveries being hidden away. It’s been suggested that when some of the famous erotic frescoes were discovered during this time, they were reburied in an attempt at archaeological censorship. Even many recovered household items had a sexual theme. Such imagery and items indicates that the sexual mores of the ancient Roman culture of the time were much more liberal than most present-day cultures, although much of what is described as erotic imagery was in fact fertility imagery.

Those Pompeii peeps were a saucy lot. These are a couple of the less
graphic examples in the Secret Cabinet exhibit.

Incredible that this fresco pre-dates Botticelli's Birth of Venus by over 1,000
years yet was still buried when the Reformist artist produced his masterpiece

A wall fresco which depicted Priapus, the ancient god of sex and fertility, with his extremely enlarged penis, was covered with plaster and only rediscovered in 1998 due to rainfall. In 1819, when King Francis I of Naples visited the Pompeii exhibition at the National Museum with his wife and daughter, he was so embarrassed by the erotic artwork that he decided to have it locked away in a secret cabinet, accessible only to "people of mature age and respected morals". Re-opened, closed, re-opened again and then closed again for nearly 100 years, it was briefly made accessible again at the end of the 1960s, the time of the so called sexual revolution. The Secret Cabinet exhibit was finally re-opened for general viewing in 2000. The graphic nature of many of the items, mosaics and frescos displayed sees minors only admitted in the presence of a guardian or with written permission.

In addition to those from Pompeii, the museum contained many other treasures.

By the time we relaunched the dingy and made our way back to Alcheringa we were two very impressed cruisers. The city of Naples in general may be a very grimy, unattractive and even depressing, but our Pompeii experiences at the ruins and museum made this stop one of the highlights of our time in Italy.

We upped anchor and farewelled Possilipo next morning, making our way across Golfo di Napoli to Marina di Stabia on the southern part of the bay. We moored in this recently built, very large marina about lunchtime and were dwarfed by some of the huge super-yachts around us. Some would have probably qualified for the mega-yacht title. We spent two nights in this horrendously expensive marina topping up with water, getting our overflowing laundry bags back under control, reprovisioning for the coming couple of weeks and most importantly, welcoming Karen’s parents on board. It was fantastic to see them after such a long time away and, with the highlights of the Isle of Capri and Amalfi Coast next on the agenda, we were very much looking forward to their company on the next leg of our Italian adventures.

One of our neighbours in Marina di Stabia

MARINA REVIEW: Marina di Stabia – Naples **

Nightly rate for our 43 foot (13.2m) yacht – 130 Euro (including VAT, water. Metered power)

This is a very large, well equipped, brand new marina however it is hard to understand why this location surrounded by derelict, abandoned commercial buildings was chosen for it. The township is a long walk from the marina and taxis are few and far between.

The marina does offer excellent protection from all weather. Fuel dock on site, a small but reasonably well stocked chandlery is located approximately 1k from the marina and other marine services are available at the boat yard adjacent to the marina. An expensive, upmarket restaurant is located in the yacht club within the marina. No other shops or cafes are nearby. Bathroom facilities are modern and clean. Token operated washing machines are located next to the bathrooms. A supermarket is located in the township about three kilometres from the marina.

As good as the facilities are, the location and exorbitant price means only two stars on the value meter.

Sometimes we’re so busy out doing things we don’t have enough time to write about doing things and our blog slips a little behind time. We’re working at getting it all back to current at the moment.

To stay right up to date with what we’re up to these days and see lots more photos check out and 'like' our Dreamtime Sail Facebook page at Dreamtime Sail on Facebook

If you have only recently discovered our blog and would like to read how it all started, or work through our previous adventures, click the link to go back to our first blog entry. Stuff it. Let's just go sailing anyway. We hope you enjoy reading the previous posts to catch up on our story.

Friday, 14 April 2017

Model Wooden Boat Kits Includes Over 40 Videos On how tos And Boat Building Construction Tips! See Our Products

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Dealing with Current And High Winds When Boating

When finding out to cope with poor climate and rough water it's important to discover how to recognize and anticipate the flow and direction in the waves. If a wave appears like it truly is going to break, your only out may possibly be to back down prior to the wave gets towards the vessel. Keep very conscious of any wave combinations and keep away from spots ahead where they have a tendency to peak. If they peak ahead inside the same location, odds are they are going to peak there whenever you as well as your vessel are closer. Don't let a slightly distinct wave or wave mixture catch you by surprise!

Inside a situation when the present and seas are going in the same direction, present has the impact of lengthening the waves. Longer waves are far more stable, together with the crests farther apart, with this said

Wednesday, 5 April 2017

Our Mirror Dinghy CNC cut kit progress

Peter, the boat builder who is licenced to build our Mirror Dinghy kits, says he is more than happy with the fit of the CNC shaped plywood panels. They certainally impressed myself when I went and visited this morning.

Click on the picture for a larger image.

Check the panel fit, the lead weights are holding the seats and fore deck in place, there are no fasteners and we will have the decks bonded in early next week.

More pictures of the process and whats to be found underneath the ply panels tommorrow.

Roy

Tuesday, 28 March 2017

Sunshine now powering Our Dreamtime

July 31 2015

The last major upgrade on our to-do list before we cast off the lines and finally go cruising on Our Dreamtime was completed today. It was also one we have been looking forward to the most. Thanks to three solar panels now fitted neatly on the cockpit roof, the majority of our electrical energy is now being harnessed from the sun.

Previously we had to rely solely on the two alternators hanging off the sides of our diesel engine to produce electricity once we left the marina. This is fine when motoring along but on nice sailing days when the engine stays off our batteries still need to be charged. Even worse, there is nothing more annoying than shattering the serenity of a beautiful anchorage by running the engine for a couple of hours morning and night solely to charge the batteries.

We were able to fit two Enerdrive 150watt and one 55watt panel very neatly on the cockpit roof and were extremely pleased that they blend in very unobtrusively. We really did not want panels hanging off all over the place spoiling the classic lines of our Whitby 42. They are fixed on mounts that provide an air gap between the panels and the fibreglass roof. That keeps both the panels and the roof cooler improving the efficiency of the system and our comfort.

We also included an Enerdrive ePRO monitor in the system which tells us exactly how many amps are flowing into or out of our battery banks, what voltage they are at, what percentage of full charge they are holding and how many hours of service remain available at the current rate of discharge. We won’t really know just how much of our power needs the solar will be able to provide until we try it in operational conditions when we set sail north in a couple of weeks but a test in the winter sunshine this afternoon with all our navigation gear, radios, and refrigeration running and our computers and i-pad charging, the battery charge percentage dropped by only about 5% over five hours which was very encouraging.

Our system was supplied and fitted by Electech Industries who are based here in Manly Harbour. We could not have been happier with the service provided by Daine Mulkeams and his team. On his first visit to our boat to quote on the job, Daine went to great lengths to understand exactly what we wanted to achieve rather than just tell us what he thought we wanted. His price was very competitive and we were able to achieve 355watts via three panels for only a few dollars more than others quoted us for just two 120 watt panels. We also took up his suggestion that we could save some money by doing some of the work ourselves such as running the cables from the cockpit roof down through the boat to the battery bank.

Now all we need is lots of sunshine.

We love to receive comments on our blog from readers. If you do leave a comment and you also have a blog, please leave a link as well. We'd like to click over for a visit and leave you a comment too.

To stay right up to date with what we’re up to and see lots more photos check out and 'like' our Dreamtime Sail Facebook page at Dreamtime Sail

If you have only recently discovered our blog and would like to read how it all started, or work through our previous adventures, click the link to go back to our first blog entry. Stuff it. Let's just go sailing anyway.

We hope you enjoy reading the previous posts to catch up on our story.

Sunday, 19 March 2017

Our crossing from T C to Dominican Republic

Our buddy boat, Kelly Nicole

There's so much to share about our trip to the Dominican, that I'm breaking it into segments. Part II will be about our week in Luperon. Possibly another post about the cost of things in the DR. Stay tuned.

South Caicos to Luperon: We're up too early and eager to go. We lost a day yesterday, so we're skipping Big Sand and going direct Luperon--100 miles. 24 hours. If we leave too early, we'll arrive at Luperon's tricky entrance before daylight. The group of sailboats ahead of us are posting positive experiences in the DR, so we're getting excited.

I send a message over to Kelly Nicole that we're leaving at 8:00 am. As I motor off the anchor, I see what looks like a waterspout outside the harbor. We creep forward until is dissipates and make the turn as Kelly Nicole raises anchor & hoists the main. We have 3 kts of current coming into the mouth at the tidal rage. They clear the harbour 0.4 behind us, but quickly pull ahead and unfurl their jib. They ride next to us for the first hour with winds SE @ 12--not good. We're waiting for a wind shift. We unfurl the genoa, turn 10 right, and shut the starboard engine off. We're making 4-4.5 kts with 1-2 ft swells on the nose.

By 9:30 am we have Big Ambergris in sight. The wind has slowly started to shift E allowing a turn 10 degrees back left. After two tacks east, we still end up just off Whale Breaker on a 190 COG (course over ground) at 3:00 pm. (On this heading we may miss Haiti! No bueno.) The wind lessens to 7-9 kts, but never enough to furl the genoa and turn back towards our course line. Kelly Nicole tacks, we tack, we pass them, they pass us.

The electric blue Atlantic Ocean

I head down below for a nap at 5:00 pm, as we are slowly turning back towards Luperon. I'm awoken by Amelia staring at me from the table. She wants her water cup, which she immediately tries to knock over. I make new blend of English breakfast tea & ginger tea with sugar as I head out for my shift. By 8:00 pm, we are back on a 160 course, Kelly Nicole 2.5 miles ahead with 14 kts off our beam. Amelia wakes up Daddy & successfully dumps the water on the guidebook. She loves overnights. There's always somebody in the salon to cuddle with and give her snacks.

By 2:00 am, the wind is still 15 kts off our beam instead of dying as forecast. That's good. However, the sea is like a curvy, hilly country road with railroad tracks, potholes and rumble strips. Gheez. Hard to sleep. The Captain describes it as someone banging on the bridge deck with a hammer. There's a cargo ship coming up behind us. By 3:00 am, the wind has shifted back SE. I spot a red light in front of Kelly Nicole. Is that traffic or land? We turn back to starboard for a wind shift. At 4:30 am, a 1000-ft passenger ship appears on the AIS. I'm awake! And this is what we do all night.

The Captain waiting for the sunrise

Following Kelly Nicole into the Luperon harbor

As the sun creeps above the horizon, The Captain starts to see the mountains of Hispanola. I pop out about 6:00 am and can clearly see the mountain range of the Dominican. I wasn't able to get a good photo. It reminded me of the Smoky Mountains except it was different shades of pink & purple. The harbor entrance is difficult to pick out, and the island, much bigger than the other's we've visited makes it feel like forever to motor the last 5 miles. With Kelly Nicole on point, we try to make sense of the channel markers, ultimately ignoring them and following our chart plotter (does that mark the channel? Where's the other marker? Or is it marking the shoal? The first set of markers weren't on either chart and the second one, appeared orange instead of red, probably marking the shoal of our port side.). A fisherman ducks between us and drops a fishing net. Really? As we round the first corner we see a huge clump of boats. "Uh, oh. Is it that busy here?" There's no backup anchorage! No, that's just the outer portion of the harbor. Then the harbor opens up in front of us and is packed! It's been a month since we left the busy anchorage in Georgetown. Culture shock. We creep along behind KN, eyeing a few possibilities and looking for a spot to turn around when a small runabout approaches Kelly Nicole. He seems to point out a spot to them, so we wait. Papo approaches us and says, "Mooring? $2/day?" The Captain says, "Sure." Wait a minute. We don't know how they're secured? Could be a cement bucket? "I'm tired and I don't want to clean our chain. We'll consider moving tomorrow." Papo leads us to a mooring and hands the line up (At some point, I realize this is my first time at the helm while picking up a mooring! It doesn't matter, though, we're creeping along so slowly that we'll glide to a stop well before we reach the mangroves and could only "love tap" another boat). He asks if we need a Dominican flag for $10! YES! He's won me over. We left woefully unprepared on the courtesy flag front, hoping to pick them up as we go. Papo heads back to Kelly Nicole, who is pointing over our way, "Hey, they got a mooring?!" They have a manual windlass and muddy anchor--but are soon headed to the mooring next to us. Hey, neighbor!

We're here!

We straighten up the boat and Papo returns with a young customs officer in his Navy dress whites and his armed guard (who looks 14, but with a holstered 9-mm beretta). He comes straight into the salon & sits down. The Comandante speaks good English with a heavy accent. "I was at church and today is our Independence Day." He welcomes us to his country, takes some pictures of our passports and points us into town to complete Immigracion. We head over and tie up next to the other dinghies at the half sunk dock and head in. It's supposed to be a 5 min walk, so we walk right past the offices at the gate and end up finding Wendy's, a cruiser bar with wifi, where they point us back to the gate. Immigration speaks little English and we pay $90 (overtime?) and are advised to finish up with the harbor master, tourist cards and Agriculture on Monday. Kelly Nicole catches up and we back head back to Wendy's, where the el Presidente comes in 24 oz for 125 pesos/$2.85. There is a gato that has her own bar stool and The Captain ends up with an adorable perro under his chair. They point us onto de la France for lunch.

On the way back, we meet the oficial who provides our Tourist Card ($10 each) and who speaks excellent English ("You understand my English?" Si. Big smile). The Captain is asleep as soon as he hits the couch.

Monday, 13 March 2017

Andreas builds an Argie 15 from our kit

This is one of the most popular boats we offer and a lot of boat from six sheets of plywood only.

The size offers space for at least four adults and when two use it you can lie down and sleep inside, so it makes a fine camper when a cover is placed over the boom at night?

http://sayachts.blogspot.com/2014/06/argie-15.html

Roy