Dinghy Cruising
with Roger Barnes
Sunday, February 21, 2021 – 1900 GMT/UTC
The guy who wrote the book (literally) on dinghy cruising will be taking us through his favorite boats, places and stories of camp cruising in Europe. Q&A follows the presentation.
Roger’s Website: www.RogerBarnes.org.uk
Roger’s Book: Contact Roger directly for an autographed copy, or CLICK HERE to purchase from Amazon.
RELATED VIDEOS:
Off Center Harbor’s video on Francois Vivier’s ILUR design (same design as Roger’s dinghy AVEL DRO):
A Boat for Sail & Oar Camp Cruising — Francois Vivier’s Ilur, WAXWING
It’s now 2024 but I watched it again. ROGER THAT! Absolutely charming. Thanks OCH for making it available.
My wife and i Sail a Hartley TS16. We see her as a dinghy with a lid. SWN y MOR is 16′ weighs only 360Kilos. has a cabin that sleeps two. This dinghy cruising is what we do in her. Love these videos They give a lot of incentive to “get out there”.
Sometime people ask my advice on what kind of vessel they should get, I always tell them the same answer. “Think of the smallest vessel you can be comfortable with and then cut that in half and that is the vessel you will have the most fun with.”
Caledonia and her ilk represented in this presentation fit that concept to a “T,”
Thank you! I no longer feel guilty enjoying my dinghy sailboat so much. I thought I was going crazy, leaving my Winnebago of the sea 40′ two stateroom, two head white yacht back on the dock with friends and family.
I can’t get to Douarnenez anytime soon – is Brooklin the next best thing? The festival looks especially appealing …
Awesome presentation and insights to the joy of dinghy sailboats. My first sail boat experience was in a 1980 Widgeon (Fibreglass). It’s pop-up keel into a trunk was perfect for the 50 foot tides of the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia, Canada. I did have a “call to the coast guard” situation, when my keel would not drop out of it’s trunk, because it was jammed full of muddy sand. I was drifting out to the deep ocean, in an extra windy day, that would have been a 10km trip to the far shore. The waves were 6-8 ft when I made the call. All ended well. You can see some photos of it on my photography site: https://www.perfectphoto.ca/blog/2021/2/sailboat
Back in the 60s and 70s the junior sail program at our club in Cleveland was conducted in Mirror dingys built by members. Great stable easy to sail boats for Lake Erie. Enjoyed your talk and your YouTube channel.
Just wonderful! That’s it just wonderful.
I really enjoyed the presentation. Thank you for sharing Roger and OCH. I would love to order a signed copy of your book. Your web site directs me to Amazon. Can I order direct?
You can definitely order Roger’s book direct from him (he even said he’ll sign it!). I’d suggest messaging him on his facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/RogerBarnesMusings
I just watched the video of Waxwing, the Ilur with mizzen. Hard to improve on the Ilur but this may be it unless you love one of Vivier’s other designs already offering a mizzen. I am a big fan of a mizzen and the things it can do for a single hander such as:
hold the boat into the wind on a tidal mooring to shelter under the cuddy, hold the boat into the wind when reefing a mainsail, and not least balance a jib when the conditions are such that you want to dump the main entirely. Lovely boat.
Thank you Guru Roger! Hope to see you at Le Semaine du Golfe, Morhihan in “Pippin” (wooden Swallow Bayraider 20) this year. I brought my Memory 19 in 2017 and I can say that it was one of the best small boat festivals I have ever attended. The French hospitality (including free mooring, launching and recovery) was extraordinary! Here’s hoping Brits will be able to attend La Semaine du Golfe with the covid regs this year. Mark
make that Morbihan.
While I was not able to catch Roger’s presentation live today, I am thankful to OCH for making this available afterwards. I have enjoyed Roger’s Youtube channel and would love to be able to buy him a pint somewheres down the road. Great show, Thank you!
How do you get rid of rain and sea water accumulations inside your hull – probably more than one method I suppose?
As always, enjoyed the presentation by Mr. Barnes. His YouTube videos and zeal for dinghy cruising led to the construction of my Ilur.
The video recording ended abruptly, is there a full length version available?
Hi Remi – Sorry about that. The feed picked back up pretty quickly, but yes – I am uploading the full version as I write this! It will available on this page soon.
Amazing work. Thank you.
Roger,
You are , I think my most favorite small boat cruising guy to watch and hear from. What I love vest about you is your good sense of humor, your obvious heart and cross cultural respect. You clearly are very experienced, but humble and most of all kind hearted. I started going smaller and smaller in my boats. Had a Westsail 32 years ago that was bullet proof in a really rough sea but cost me so much to keep, I ended up giving up on ever really sailing her abroad. Next was a Vertue Class Sloop, and went the furthest in her, but still wanted smaller. Then a wonderful 21 ft. Crotch Island Pinky with a beautiful cat ketch rig. She sailed and rowed great, but needed 300 lbs or rock ballast in the bilge. Though she never came close to a capsize, I always worried about that that when it blew up. And she was way too heavy to park up beyond the surf on a beach. Then a little 16.5 cutter with a tiny cabin, and even a fireplace and miniscule pilot house hatch, which allowed me to steer from inside on a nasty day. “Eider” had a 2ft draft fixed keel but that protected her bottom, and she was easy to beach camp with a set of very short beaching legs. I cruised her a lot, including a week 30 miles off shore, solo to Catalina Island in southern California where I was born, and wanted to revisit for old times-sake! Now I’ve just bought, about a year ago, a lovely glued lap 13.4 Melonseed skiff, “La Vida e Bella”. She sails and rows, like a violin and has a very comfortable curved coaming, which I think should be quite easy to convert a pop tent to for beach camping this spring! please take a peek at her. She’s here in the show! I have been very fortunate to be the temporary caregiver of all these beautiful vessels, and to have been able to live in, and cruise out of, beautiful Port Townsend, WA, now for almost 30 years. You perhaps know, we have the fourth largest wooden boat festival in the world here in our tiny town. Like most we’re stumbling a bit now due to Covid limitations, but if or when we finally conquer this epidemic, hopefully we can invite you to come, present at our show, and just maybe, if you like, I can offer you a day out on our waters with myself and a bunch of my small boat cruising buddies!!!! It’t be a great joy to thank you, in that way for all the heart-felt joy you’ve given to us. Please look me up!
Kirk Gresham
Great presentation. As another native of the northwest of England with a childhood of Lake District sailing it was good to hear.
I don’t see a link to buy your book on your website?
Thanks again, Roger, for your presentation. I enjoy your videos and they have inspired me to enjoy dinghy cruising here on Vancouver Island.
Your videos are informative and encouraging. As yours are too, Steve.
Thank you Roger! Thank you Off Center Harbor!
What an awesome and inspiring talk! Thank you Roger.
Tom Avery
Colorado
Very nice and interested. Thanks.
Thank you, Roger. Wonderful presentation. Best of luck in your future cruising. Keep the videos coming!
Toiletry on a small boat on inland waters is a challenge.
However if the ‘pee and the poop’ can be kept separate it’s much easier.
In cruising a W17 trimaran, I use a very small box with a removable seat that uses a small. bag attached. This allows poop to be tightly bagged (old bread bags are excellent for this) and these are stored in a larger garbage bag in the ama of my boat (another trimaran advantage) to eventually be brought ashore.
1 will be posting more on this on my website later this year (www.smalltridesign.com)
More info re: You all might like to have a look through Dick Callahan’s “Gear List of the Golden Moon” if cruising in an open wooden boat holds appeal. Harbor Seal Press, Juneau AK.
https://smallcraftadvisor.com/product.php?productid=546&cat=0&page=1
There is a whole discussion going on, on the WoodenBoat Forum on toilets and waste disposal for small open boats: http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthread.php?275385-Small-(rowboat-sized)-Boat-Toilets
Lots of solutions
So why did you go for the traditional ‘route’ in dinghy cruising? More modern plywood and GRP dinghies and their fittings are often cheaper and easier to come by; is there a particular reason why you went for the traditional (and arguably more expensive) path?
In Canada, as in the UK, private property ends at the high tide line, so you can land on any tidewater beach here, too.
But on many inland waters in NA, it’s the low waterlevel that is often used for lakeside property ownership, so be warned and best to be prepared with an alternative landing option.
Toiletry on a small boat on inland waters is a challenge.On
However if the ‘pee and the poop’ can be kept separate it’s much easier.
In cruising a W17 trimaran, I use a very small box with a removable seat that uses a small. bag attached. This allows poop to be tightly bagged (old bread bags are excellent for this) and these are stored in a larger garbage bag in the ama of my boat (another trimaran advantage) to eventually be brought ashore.
1 will be posting more on this on my website later this year (www.smalltridesign.com)
Would you please discuss heavy weather incidents, situations and locations. Thank you, Greg
You mentioned that you called the lifeboat in the Bristol Channel… What communications and safety equipment do you have onboard?
How do you handle electricity for chart plotter or phone, radio?
Sorry to ask, but what do you do when “nature calls”?
Great show Roger. Is there much regulation in France to deal with regarding dinghy cruising, France being the birthplace of bureaucracy and all?
Thanks
Mark
I notice that Roger doesn’t mention dealing with flies or mosquitos as a part of camp-cruising. Is this not part of the UK/European experience?
If you can’t wait, link to Roger’s website here: http://www.rogerbarnes.org.uk/rogerbarnes.org.uk/Welcome.html
Very well done Roger.
Excellent narration
From: Baltimore County, Maryland USA
Cruised Gunpowder River, off Chesapeake Bay.
No comparison to what you have presented.
Thanks
Enjoyed it a lot. Have your book and have been considering “cruising” my Crawford Melonseed. It’s on the small side, for sure but it is a lovely sailing boat.
How can we contact you, Roger? Email address
Thank you Roger, fantastic presentation!
Hi Sean same here but clicked the live button again in the top menu and back on.
How long does it take to bail out after capsize? Buckets?
Can be far too long. If cruising in open water, I’d personally always rccommend a boat with a self-draining cockpit.
This advice comes from being swamped and then capsized by breaking water in the Solent in the UK and being lucky to survive. It’s partly why I now sail and cruise a W17. The other reason is that I want the ability to sail safely upwind in heavy weather.
This is fascinating! How insightful, thanks for your inspiring story Roger.
Thanks Roger! Wonderful presentation! A question about drying out: How do you know where the bottom is mud or sand? How do you avoid drying out on a bed of sharp rocks?
That was brilliant!
I envy the freedom you have to land ashore in so many intriguing spots. Here in the US much of the coastline is private and even landing ashore, much less camping, is less welcomed. Likewise, it sounds like there are fewer sanitation/effluent disposal issues than here. Do you have any thoughts about how the latter is handled in small boats when dinghy cruising?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Morbihan and https://www.semainedugolfe.com/
What do use for a head while cruising?
You all might like to have a look through Dick Callahan’s “Gear List of the Golden Moon” if cruising in an open wooden boat holds appeal. Harbor Seal Press, Juneau AK.
Thank you Roger! Excellent presentation. Owing both a large plastic boat that has taken me across the Atlantic twice and a home built 18’ expedition trimaran, there is NO doubt which one gives me the greatest joy. Thanks for all the reminders why!
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Roger, are most folks (land owners, govt officials, fishermen, etc.) generally ok with you stopping along banks or tying up where you do? Are there cruising permit requirements or overnight costs? Love the sense of freedom in your journeys.
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A sailing dinghy en francais, is ‘un voilier’ or ‘un dériveur’ (when it has a centerboard called ‘un dérive’
Was hoping to hear more about the details of cruising a dinghy rather than old fishing boats. But 25 mins in, we are still not there. What about actual cruising in a small boat and dealing with rough water and swamping risks etc ?
Most of these small open boats are shown in smooth water which is not my experience as a once serious coastal cruiser. Suggest the viewer reads about Frank Dye and Peter Clutterbuck’s voyages.
(By the way, the Mirror dinghyy was not ‘designed by the Daily Mirror’, but by dinghy designer Jack Holt (who I personally knew in the 50’s)
It would now concern me to cruise in a small boat that will not go to windward in strong winds. Sadly that includes quite a few traditional ones with inefficient rigs.
Totally agree with the pluses of sculling a small boat though …. and there are now improved ways of achieving that with better sculls. Works VERY well with long slim hulls that ‘wag around ‘side-to-side’ much less …. like a small trimaran. Sorry guys , couldn’t resist slipping that in 😉 Enjoy the show!
Nice to have such expert viewpoints. Seems to me, you all ready know the answers?
Mike, I see you got in to the show! Good to see your comments here. Enjoy the show, Rann
I scull my Arctic Tern with an oar suspended by a strop, rather like the steering oar on a lonk boat. I couls probbly post a picture if you want ….
Here it is in words: have a stout cleat amidships near the stern. Have a fairlead on the gunwale to port and/or starboard; ours are 10 inches in front of the forward face of the aft stem (you don’t really have a stern post in a double ended boat). Hang a strop (a closed loop) on the cleat and feed it through the fairlead. The length of the strop must be such that the loop that forms outboard of the fairlead makes a snug fit for the loom of the scull, but not so tight that it cannot twist with the sculling action. The scull fits through that loop.
In practice, you put the scull through the strop before hanging the strop on the cleat, then take the strop into the fairlead.
I WOULD LOVE TO SEE A PICTURE OF THIS STROP ARRANGEMENT.
Hi again, Wendy; I’ve put a picture on My Account here so if you click on my name in this reply you should see it. But – it’s not very explanatory. I will rig the scull up tomorrow (ashore, alas) and send you some better images by email – please drop me a line.
Hi Wendy,
Seems I can’t post the pictures in this reply. Please email me, j.b.pilkington@gmail.com and I’ll mail them to you.
Sorry. long boat. Probably.
Beautiful! see a similar dinghy sailing daily here in Herrick Bay, Brooklin
Fantastic! Big thank you.
Ok works now…
Your tent attaches to attachment points on the outside of your hull…what are those?
I have used flat hooks, somewhat like picture hooks. I don’t remember what they are called, but those and bungee cords do the job well.
Another day of amazing storytelling! If you have any questions for Roger, post them below and our crew will ask him at the end!
Roger! When did you switch from the blue smock to the orange smock? The world wants to know.
I am so excited. Have seen Roger’s videos and now to see him almost in person will be fantastic! OCH you are amazing!
Hello Roger. You’ve done a superb job chronicling the small boat cruiser. I rally enjoy your videos, especially during the off season in the US.
One question, has the Britain/EU kerfuffle changed your future cruising plans?
Roger, you might well answer some of these questions in your presentation.
You bought the Vivier Ilur in 2003 and I wonder if you could tell us more about your thinking at that time and the choice. Also how’s she’s stood up over time and with hindsight how do you now see that original decision? Finally, if you don’t mind, when purchased was she new build for you, or from a previous owner?
Roger Barnes – architect, sailor, raconteur. It will be fun and interesting (et en français, si vous voulez).
What’s the advantage of a tanbark sail? Is yours canvas?
Thanks
YOU DON’T GET AS MUCH GLARE FROM TANBARK AS YOU DO FROM WHITE. MORE TRADITIONAL IN SOME AREAS, BUT THE DISADVANTAGE IS THAT TANBARK ALMOST DISAPPEARS AT DISTANCE. NOT GOOD IF SOMEONE IS LOOKING FOR YOU.
I met him in 2017 during La Semaine du Golfe, nice guy. And he lives now in Douarnenez, I envy him . Frank
Roger Barnes is a very interesting person. He has a terrific YouTube channel. Looking forward to hearing what he has to say.
Ditto!