Tag: Galway Hooker

SB Glenmore

October 7, 2012 / / 0 Comments

SB Glenmore model by Tony Brooks, Picture by Matt Care

On my recent trip over to the UK to stay on Cambria, I was in Hoo with Dave B tracking down Ray Rush’s now restored and back-in-the-water Galway Hooker and I had the pleasure of being invited back to Dave’s Dad’s place to see the model that they are currently making of SB Westmoreland but also an older, completed model of SB Glenmore. Regular readers will know that Dave’s Great Granddad was Barge Master on the SM Glenmore, the famous George “Navvy” Brooks. Dave’s Father Tony built this model originally as a working model sail boat (obviously with a lot less detail) but then fell in love with it and was anxious that the fun and games on the pond in the park were causing it damage. He decided to change it into a display model, so added all the detail of rigging etc and now has it nicely on display in the living room in this glass case with a lovely brass plaque naming the barge and an old black and white photo of ‘Navvy’ himself hanging above it on the wall. It is a beautiful thing to have and to admire and especially given the family connection.

Thank you to Dave B and to Tony for allowing me to see it, photograph it and share it with the surfers on here.

An Dreoilín (The Wren)

September 4, 2012 / / 0 Comments

I have posted before, back when I was in the UK about the Galway Hooker being restored by friend of the Cambria, expert in barges and owner of “about 10,000” photo’s of barges in trade, Ray Rush. This boat’s restoration is now complete, she has passed survey and she is back in the water, in Kentish water for the first time. Named An Dreoilín (The Wren) because a wren nested in her while she was derelict (I am sure I recall, but Ray or Dave Brooks, please feel free to dive in and correct my memory), she is actually a ‘repro’ having been built new half way up Bray Head (a small mountain just South of Dublin) on a farm to the lines of a genuine old hull from the 1890’s. She is now in Hoo Marina where I hope I can go see her for real when I am back over in UK briefly at the end of this month. Nice one Ray and thanks for the picture, Dave B.

An Dreoilín (The Wren), Galway Hooker restored by Ray Rush at Hoo Marina, photo by Dave Brooks.

Meanwhile Cambria Watch approaches the end of its 2012 ‘transmissions’ with “Our YSS extended training is completed for another year. Cambria is now lying at Maldon for a few days before we race her in the Colne Match next weekend. After that we head to Gravesend to say goodbye to her for now. The following day we will be back aboard Reminder out of Maldon with a new group of young people.” Thanks for that and all the previous Cambria Watch reports. It’s been fascinating to get a window into her working life through the summer.

Queen of the Ladybirds

August 22, 2012 / / 0 Comments

Banrión na Bóinne, Galway Hooker on the hard for restoration in Connemara

While it’s all quiet on the Cambria front, I thought I’d sneak in another Galway Hooker photo, this one up on the hard getting some TLC from the local shipwrights up an inlet in Connemara. The name on her is Banrión na Bóinne which according to our trusty dictionary, translates as Queen of the Ladybirds. This photo shows very well the deep bellied hull and keel and the characteristic “tumble-home” of the hull; where the width of the hull at the rails is much less than the width lower down. Flat bottomed barge, she is not! Incidentally there is a very good book on the subject of these craft should you be interested, “The Galway Hookers” by Richard J Scott (pub Ward River Press, 1983/1985, ISBN 0-907085-58-X currently out of print but freely available on the well know book dealer internet sites).

Incidentally, the Galway Hooker Association have a website on http://www.galwayhookerassociation.ie/default.asp?contentID=1

High and Dry

August 18, 2012 / / 0 Comments

Galway Hooker high and dry in Kinvarra at low tide, pic by Matt Care

Ah well, the plan to watch Hooker racing didn’t quite work out. Seeing the harbour at Kinvarra on Thursday at mid tide we didn’t appreciate how it was at low tide – just acres of rock and bladder-wrack. When we caught up with a race programme and everything seemed to start at 4pm we thought “Ah well, there will still be boats coming and going, jilling about in the bay to photograph”. Not a bit of it. Never mind, we saw lots and took plenty of pics, then drove home the scenic route back through Connemara. A lovely day. We now have the perfect excuse to return tomorrow and see if we can get a bit more lucky.

Robert Simper on Hookers.

August 17, 2012 / / 0 Comments

Galway hooker stern, Kinvarra Harbour 2012, Picture by Matt Care

By an amazing coincidence, my latest Galway Hooker witterings struck a chord with the fact that I was re-reading Robert Simper’s excellent book, The Cambria Story (Robert Simper, ISBN 978-0-9563299-2-9, pub Creekside Publishing, 2012; available through our shop pages). In the section on the end of trading days (page 29) Robert says that “She had no rivals for her place in history since it was several years since the last Ipswich barge had carried a cargo under sail; only a few hookers on the west coast of Ireland were carrying turf”. So there you go Cambria – you might be last ‘sailorman’ in UK, but maybe not in Western Europe as a whole.

Kinvarra

August 16, 2012 / / 1 Comment

Galway Hooker in Kinvarra Harbour, Aug 2012, Photo by Matt Care

There’s no point being a blogger on a trad sailing work-boats website and living within an hour and a half of the centre of Galway Hooker restoration, Kinvarra, just south of Galway, if you can’t indulge your own passions for things non-barge occasionally. Today we went all touristy and headed off first for the ‘wrong’ Kinvarra (there are several, and this one was in Connemara so it seemed like a good bet. We enjoyed superb West of Ireland mountain + lake scenery for an hour or so, but that Kinvarra proved to be 3 houses and a farm. No beach, no harbour. We headed in along the north side of Galway Bay and on through the city of Galway, then South to the next Kinvarra on the list, the one down in Cliffs of Moher / The Burren country. Here not only did the town signs have hooker logos on them, but as soon as we could see harbour we also spotted the lovely black hull of the big hooker Cliona na Toinne moored alongside (plus a smaller one, possibly of the type they call “púcán”)

Trad Boat Festival Poster, Pic by Matt Care

Naturally we had to stop and take so many photo’s I filled my memory card. Not only that, we discovered notices around the town saying that the Traditional Sailing Boats Festival is Friday (tomorrow!) Saturday and Sunday of this weekend. Will we be heading back, do you think?

David Rye and Niagara

August 15, 2012 / / 0 Comments

Niagara under construction at Hoo. Picture by David Rye.

As well as the Dave Brooks stuff on the newly restored barge Niagara, I received some nice picture of her under construction in Hoo Marina. As David says, “My cousin took me to Hoo (and other places of barge interest) last summer.

As you may know the ‘Marina’ is interesting to say the least including the rather rickety structures.

After insisting to speak to the owner personally he eventually allowed us in ‘at own risk.’

I managed to get the attached photos of Niagara (and others) and thought you might be interested?

Amazing what we saw is now sailing again – wonderful.”

Yes, David, we know Hoo well. My best visit was to go and see a Galway Hooker (Traditional gaff rigged sailing vessel from the West coast of Ireland) being restored by barge expert and friend of Cambria, Ray Rush. Unfortunately I left for Ireland before Ray had managed to get the boat surveyed and back into the water, but I understand she (The Wren or “An Dreoilín”) is now back afloat. She is actually a 1980’s copy of an 1899 (or so) boat taken from the lines of a hulk and then built (says Ray) on a farm “Half way up Bray Head”. If any of you have been watching the olympics, the homecoming for Irish boxer gold medalist, Katie Taylor happened in Bray, her home town. It’s just south of Dublin on the East coast, so about as far from Galway Hooker territory as you can get!