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Merlin Rockets are a “Development Class” of dinghy, which means a considerable degree of latitude is allowed in design, within certain broad parameters. In the case of the Merlin Rocket these parameters have allowed a particularly wide range of designs. A number of designs, designers, and builders have proved especially successful, while others have fallen…

In 1975 four members of the British Kayak Expedition completed a journey from Bodo to Nordkapp in Northern Norway, Europe’s most northerly point. Their chosen craft for this pioneering expedition was a kayak designed by Frank Goodman – the Nordkapp. The 480 mile journey, which took a month to complete, was undertaken through the worst…

The use of glass reinforced plastic for boatbuilding began in the USA in the early 1940s, with the first GRP dinghy produced in 1942 and reportedly thousands of small GRP boats had been produced by the late 1940s. In Europe, however, despite wartime shortages of other materials, it was still to be some years before…

In the years following the Second World War, as rising living standards and increased leisure time led to an expansion in leisure boating, Fairey Marine was an important player. Employing and developing techniques used in the production of wartime aircraft, Fairey Marine produced a number of widely varied craft, from the Firefly dinghies used in…

This canoe was probably made by Sarazin of the Algonquin Reserve in the Ottawa Valley of Ontario. It is a modern interpretation of the most developed form of birch bark canoe. It was presented to Prince Edward on the occasion of his visit to Canada in 1901 and has been lent to the Museum by…

This strip-plank wooden canoe was one of many imported into this country in the early 1900s from North America by Rowland Ward & Co. and sold through large London stores, in this particular case, Naturalists of Piccadilly. The heavy decoration is not typical of canoes in North America but appealed to the European market. Length…

The sport and leisure activity of canoeing became popular in the latter half of the 19th century. And as a result large numbers of traditional North American birch bark and stripped plank canoes were imported into this country, to be sold through the large department stores or via smaller boat builder/agents. This particular canoe is…

This is a typical example of a traditional outrigger canoe from Sri Lanka primarily used for fishing, both off the beach and further out to sea. The shallow dugout hull, carved from a single log, is raised with side strakes fixed on shaped inserted frames and sewn to the hull with coir. The two booms…

This raft is from the Lobito Bay area of Angola and is one of relatively few examples of rafts found in Africa. It is believed to have been built about 1950, is constructed from a series of long and curved balsa wood branches/trunks, using the wood in the round, secured together with a mixture of…