The Flotsam Boat Filosophy
A - A flotsam boat should be made with as large a percentage of man made waste as possible. Spars for rigging can be difficult to find so sticks, twigs or bird quills may be used.
B - Flotsam boats should be made, when possible, in situ.
C - The use of a pocket knife is acceptable, but a fully kitted out workshop is unsporting.
D - Ballast rarely occurs as flotsam or jetsam so natural materials such as rocks or sand can be used.
E - Any man made materials collected but not used should be taken home and disposed of.
For our purposes Flotsam is natural or accidental waste found at sea.
For our purposes Jetsam is man made discarded waste found at sea.
These few simple guide lines are provided as goal posts to make the sourcing and engineering of materials a more thought provoking, resourceful and creative process. There is no reason why one couldn’t whittle a stoneage fire making tool to provide heat for your boat building needs. There is no reason why not, if you have enough materials, you could build a vessel large enough to carry a person. How about creating a self steering mechanism to give your vessel a better chance of arriving on distant shores. There is no need to be too ambitious at the start. Why not pick up a handful of materials and with your bare hands assemble them into a sailing vessel. A piece of wood with a triangle of rigid plastic forced into it becomes a flotsam sailing boat.
Do you have the ambition to build a motorised vessel. Is it possible? Using garbage that we decorate our seas and shores with to create a small vessel that will be blown across the sea in a direction you have chosen by natures own power source is achievement in itself. To see a small wake in the water telling you you have created an independent craft that is capable to commuting in a direction counter to the prevailing wind and waves is more than satisfying.
Once your creation is ready it’s time to launch. Take a few snaps for the record and send her on her way. Now, this is the interesting part. Have you given her enough ballast? Have you over powered her with too much sail? Does the centre of effort balance with the centre of gravity? Is she traveling on the tack and point of sail you wanted? Of course, if you get it all right then off she goes, but if you get it wrong will you learn from your mistakes for the next flotsam boat or be tempted to remodel? What does you conscience dictate?
The subtext to all this effort of course is a shared concern about the amount of plastics floating around in our seas. From within a generation we have moved from the shock of finding one plastic bottle and perhaps wondering romantically if has drifted from some distant land to being so overwhelmed by bottle after screw cap after plastic bag that we have become blind to the state of our shores. Flotsam boat making should be fun, and makes for a constructive diversion for those who find lying on a beach sun bathing or reading a book difficult. The benefit for the environment; the very process of flotsam boat making will collect jetsam which will far out weigh the materials used on your craft. Disposing of your cast offs will help to make a dent in the everyday trash of our seas. Flotsam and Jetsam which we would more likely walk right past returns into our waste management system. Maybe your flotsam boat, once discovered, will inspire another boat builder and perhaps one day only flotsam boats will remain to scavenge materials from!
Bon Voyage!
FAVOURITE the Nike shoe boat... Andy Stuart
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