Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter Seven
Decisions on hull material.
Boatbuilding memories.
Ferrocement anecdote.
We build Déjà vu.
Déjà vu was built on two separate farmsteads on the northern sprawls of bustling Johannes-
burg in South Africa. Little did anyone suspect then that a political fuse was burning low
and that revolution was inches from the surface underground. The signs were everywhere,
yet they were taken seriously by few but the farsighted. We were all in for a terrible shock as
history has recorded. Judi, my ever patient and positive wife, was a never-ending source of
encouragement and resolve. Let it be said again that without her constant help and smiling
American personality that Déjà vu would still be just a dream.
When I had made up my mind to get a boat and go sailing, I began agonizing over how I
was going to acquire said boat. I realized quickly that I could not afford a new one, or even
a hull and deck, or even an old rotten carcass, so I decided the only way to do it was to build
by hand, by hook or by crook, the vessel of my dreams. “Boats are like women.” Oh, how
true that old saying is and, like women, there are no two boats afloat that are similar even
from the same factory mold. I had to consider exactly what I wanted from this woman: what
was it I would use her for and how much of her could I handle, afford, and maintain?
I considered building a concrete boat which was very vogue amongst amateur boat builders
in South Africa at this time. Relatively new on the yachting scene, it involved making a
seagoing boat out of concrete, or ferrocement as it is better known, and bird wire. The prac-
tice had surfaced, like so many good ideas, out of necessity from the Second World War:
building materials were scarce and expensive, and concrete and mild steel were relatively
cheap. However, the idea never sat quite right with me. The thought of sailing off into the
wild, blue yonder on a boat made of stone was ridiculous! It is clear why the fashion sank
like most of the disasters built and buried in countless gardens and boat yards.
I also considered wood as it was the classic means of boatbuilding. I suppose to really do
the job properly I would have had to stay in a little wooden hut like Thoreau and contem-
plate the trees I would ax down, apologizing quietly to them that this was for a greater cause.
Then by hand, I would hew off the bark and store them to dry somewhere next to my cabin.
But in all honesty, building a boat from timber these days and even back then was courting
more disaster than building one out of concrete.
Wood is the purest form of boatbuilding; it is the real thing. Wooden boats have body and
soul and are much warmer and sound, feel, and smell wonderful just like that woman! Un-
