A YouTube on refurbishing a Sea Snark popped up recently and jogged my memory. This quintessential piece of sailing Americana has all been ignored by the sailing cognoscenti, a trend I hope to reverse by opening up this blog to Sea Snark stories.
When my sailing friends gather and we all are well into our cups, inevitably Sea Snark stories start spilling forth ..... what do you expect for a solid styrofoam dinghy with a pencil thin mast and usually a tobacco brand plastered over the lateen sail. So pony up your Sea Snark stories. Put them up on your blog. Add them to comments on my threads. Go over to my profile and email them to me.
Click here to see other Sea Snark stories on Earwigoagin.
To educate those who may not have had the opportunity to sail a Sea Snark.
First the Wikipedia entry for the Sea Snark .
Next the YouTube that jogged my brain, this fellow actually glassed over a Sea Snark. You get a feel for how tiny these boats are;
And another You Tube. This one advertises Pepsi;
Frosty
8 hours ago
3 comments:
Yup, I learned how to sail on a Snark. We won it in a local church raffle in Michigan when I was in jr high school. We used to take it down to Gulf Shores Alabama and sail out in the Gulf from the beach. I remember my cousin trailing his hand in the water... until my dad asked him if he was trolling for sharks! We did get a visit from some dolphins once, I'm sure they were bigger than the boat. We also used it as a diving platform with the mast out back home in the pond. Not a very stable platform. Remember that sharp metal plate holding the rudder on? I have a nice scar on my elbow from that. Still, who would have thought learning to sail on a styrofoam Snark would lead a girl from an island in Michigan to wind up sailing around the world in the Whitbread?
Just In the Midst of cleaning up an old Sea snark i bought of ebay for £30, so far Sanded it down completely, attached rubber runner to the underneath of the hull, to offer it protection from stones, now currently in the midst of painting with waterbased paint mixed with strong builders waterproof PVA glu,e
any advice would be nice
wilddean@gmail.com
A Sea Snark was the first boat I owned, after I learned to sail in the school cadets. My dad got it extra-cheap somewhere locally as a new hull with used rig, etc, and I lovingly painted it with unnecessarily expensive paint (should've used emulsion like everyone else!). I noticed there was a soft patch in the bottom - I should have left it alone, because when I probed it in the garage after the first season the polystyrene underneath hadn't expanded properly and started falling out, so I had to bodge it with filler! I soon realised how slow it was compared with every other dinghy around, and when I started reading yachting magazines I used to dream of somehow turning into something like a Sunfish by carving a new hull out of foam, or changing the rig in some way. And I'd read about the Int.Moth and wanted one......but that's another story. So, Rod, is anyone building a Redwings scow from those plans? I wish I'd made a copy....
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