January 2024 Archives - Small Boats Magazine

Pot Cozies

Christopher Cunningham — Sun, 31 Dec 2023 14:40:05 +0000

It's easy to make a cozy to fit almost any camp-cooking pot. The insulation is provided by Reflectix, a double-reflective, double-bubble insulation made for use in construction to provide thermal insulation for everything from water heaters to walls. Its silvery metalized polyester outer layers reflect heat and the two layers of polyethylene bubbles provide dead air space for insulation. The bubbles can’t be popped like those in bubble wrap can. I can stand on Reflectix with all my weight on one heel and not pop a single bubble.

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Banjo 20

Christopher Cunningham — Thu, 28 Dec 2023 17:08:29 +0000

Before Sam Devlin fired up the motor and backed BANJO from the dock, the two of us relaxed in the cabin and chatted about boats each of us had designed and built, family, and getting older. Without even casting her off, the trailerable 20′ outboard pocket cruiser had lived up to one of its primary purposes: providing a comfortable place to welcome company.

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Getting Lost

Christopher Cunningham — Thu, 28 Dec 2023 02:48:53 +0000

I took whatever safety equipment was available and affordable at the time, but that didn’t amount to much more than a weather radio. If compact handheld VHF radios, tracking devices and phones equipped with GPS, and satellite messengers and emergency locator beacons had existed, I might well have purchased them. Fortunately, in thousands of miles of cruising, I had the good fortune never to have an emergency that I couldn’t manage on my own. I did get lost a few times, in as much as being lost meant finding myself unsure of my location and not knowing which way to go.

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Compact Electric Air Pumps

Christopher Cunningham — Sat, 23 Dec 2023 01:46:09 +0000

While the comfort of my largest sleeping pads has been well worth the time it takes to inflate them, I took a chance on buying two compact electric pumps with internal rechargeable batteries. Both are rated IPX4 (splashproof), include five adapter nozzles, and have LED area lights.

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SOME PIG!

Jenny Bennett — Wed, 20 Dec 2023 15:52:05 +0000

In 2015, Jim built a new house with the workshop he’d always wanted: “Big doors, easy entrance, good heat and light.” Over the years since, he’s built a number of small boats from a 16′ cedar-strip Cape Split peapod to a replica 17′, 1908 Palmer Fantail Launch, which he built with a friend who had a 1908 one-lung engine that needed an appropriate boat. And along the way he built a rowboat for his nephew’s six-year-old son.

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The Boston Whaler Montauks

Tim O’Meara — Tue, 12 Dec 2023 16:11:51 +0000

Boston Whaler began offering a 16′ 7″ hull in 1961, and the company soon rolled out diverse models and marketing plans targeting every possible use from yacht tenders to bass boats to Coast Guard boats patrolling the Mekong River of Vietnam. In 1973 the company distilled what had become a dizzying scramble of 16′ 7″ models to focus on what they called the 16 Montauk.

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Eversprout Telescoping Boathook

Audrey and Kent Lewis — Tue, 12 Dec 2023 15:57:39 +0000

We can pull as hard as we want with the pole, and while Skipper cannot push hard enough to get the pole to overcome the lock friction, I can slowly compress the pole using around 50 lbs of force, which is much more than I apply when pushing away from a dock. We have had no issues with the friction lock slipping in normal use.

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Lake Roosevelt

Bob Van Putten — Tue, 12 Dec 2023 14:23:16 +0000

Ever since I first saw Lake Roosevelt, a Columbia River reservoir in northeast Washington, I’ve wanted to voyage down its 133-mile length. The place seems made for small-boat cruising. The shoreline is almost entirely undeveloped because the west side of the lake is mostly tribal lands and the east side mostly federal lands. The sandy beaches, coves, and campsites are seemingly endless. The summer of 2023, decades after my first encounter with the lake, the stars aligned, and I was able to shove aside the affairs of life on land for two weeks.

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