Wednesday 13 February 2013

Scullying

The launch celebrations of the St Ives punt next month will feature lessons in the grand old skill of 'scullying', propelling a boat with a single oar over the transom.
I've not had much practice at sculling because you need a boat with a reasonably wide beam and a beefy transom for the leverage to work. Most of my boats have been too long and thin, with the exception of Nessy, which proved to be an ideal platform for the Scullmatix.
But Glyn Foulkes has been doing it for most of his life on the Hamble, where it is very useful for threading through the mass of parked boats to a mooring. This video, shot for Practical Boat Owner, shows him in action after a brief demo by Philip Meakins.

2 comments:

O Docker said...

The Pardeys used a sculling oar instead of an engine to work their cruising boat through tight places. They adopted a technique popular in Asia of tying the oar to the deck with a short line to increase leverage and to help start the required twisting motion at the end of each stroke. Have you ever heard of anyone doing this in a small boat?

More here.

Anonymous said...

Good video!