In our last Journal I sounded off about the pleasures and perils of deserting a dinghy in favour of the sloop Thea, 2½ tons. I was not to know it would incur a critique from the pen of our Editoress!

In the field of dinghies I’m sure she’s more experienced than I, and she makes what perhaps the 2½ ton exercise has proved are a number of very valid points. To these I would add but one, and to her query on what I did or have since done in the keelboat that I could not have done in Alicia, my answer must be a somewhat less than conversational ‘nothing’!

Repent at leisure, they do say, though in another article [072/13] I have at least offered atonement in regard to the 17 foot Dockrell. Thea has gone to a new home, and when the spirit moves I’ve no doubt it will be towards a tubby little version of the traditional such as a Dockrell. Whatever, my boat will be manageable, seaworthy within her means, and in all respects capable of being handled by the sort of individual who presumably goes dinghy cruising.

Perhaps it’s that kind of individual that accounts for the 2½ tonner being an episode, for there one is behoven to others: do we surrender an almost selfish independence? Maybe MacGregor was the archetype, or perhaps Robert Louis Stevenson, yet it seems there is a distinct pleasure in being able to deal with every aspect of one’s little ship — of being able to sail her, navigate her, row her, beach her, maintain her, and if need be even build her, without recourse to outside help. Is that the streak of individualism that characterises dinghy cruisers? I digress, yet it seems relevant: perhaps we all want to do our own thing, a thing largely devoid of the paraphernalia of ‘yachting’, where we may creep into some secluded creek denied all others, and see events with a similarly privileged eye.

“But you can do that with the 2½ tonner by anchoring and taking the dinghy,” someone will say. True, true. Like parking the caravan and taking the car to go sightseeing, wondering what might befall in one’s absence. How much nicer to come quietly on the wind, slide to a halt in the mud’s soft grasp, and know no ill will befall. Our 2½ tonner is aground, meanwhile, and all sorts of hazards loom. Perhaps we like our sailing simple.

That seems the great thing about a dinghy — it doesn’t ask for devotion. Times I have thought that all one does with a larger vessel is mess about with it. Observers of the plastic-infested marina may disagree, but I submit that here the evidence is merely less visible. Expensive things transpire behind yard walls in the dark days of winter — ‘boat’ is a four letter word. Osmosis, did somebody say? Boat pox? Ye Gods — as if the gribble, the jellybags and the upstream effluent of the local chicken factory weren’t enough! Our dinghy, however, is a simple soul, and if we wish, it’s but a few minutes work to remove her from this evil murk.

Far from gallons, she may demand the odd quart of antifouling, and how long does it take to scrub her down? A lick of paint, a little therapeutic varnishing, and once again she’ll be as bright as a new pin. Then for another year we can concentrate on what we bought her for — sailing.

Yes — that’s what I like about a dinghy, and looking back it seems the smaller the boat, the more one does, back to a battered old canoe with over a thousand miles behind the paddle. As many years with the 2½ tonner and maybe she’d have done likewise, and within her ⅝” mahogany planking we might be snug, safe and warm, along with the one point I’d add to Joan’s advantages. The roof of ⅜” planking laid upon ample beams gives what a naval architect would call a measure of ‘watertight integrity’. Okay — so who wants to go sailing in that kind of weather? But nevertheless, it’s the reason why some people buy that sort of boat. For us, however, there are pleasures other than riding out a gale or thrashing into a force 6, and we’d pride ourselves on having the weather sense to avoid it. Tucked in some secluded creek, or in the upper reaches of some scarcely navigable river, there’ll we’ll find the one small boat that might comfortably reach the spot — rugged little dinghy cruiser. Further up there’s even more to explore, and, come to think of it, I might just build myself another canoe…