Join the Athenian Navy and see the Edge of the World

During the Summer of 1988 I had a rare opportunity to combine my interest in travel, with my interests in experimental archaeology and the ancient world. I joined the ancient Athenian Navy.
           I had read a very interesting article about John Coats in WoodenBoat magazine, and how he and a group called the Trireme Trust was trying to build an actual 170 oar Trireme so that they could do a series of experiments to find out how it was rowed, how fast it would go, and how well it could maneuver. Cool.
           Several weeks later while reading another periodical, an advertisement caught my eye, it read: “Join the Athenian Navy and see the Edge of the World”.  It appeared the Trireme Trust were recruiting crew for the sea trials of the Trireme I had read about. The actual trials would take place in the Aegean Sea, near Athens. I made a phone call; and yes, I joined the ancient Athenian Navy over the phone.
           The 50 members of the crew from the United States met in Boston Massachusetts to spend a couple of days training as a group with the ship’s boats of the U.S.S. Constitution, and to fly out together for Greece. This alone was quite the exercise in cultural adjustment as we were going from training and experimenting with 19th century technology while under the jurisdiction of the modern U.S. Navy to training and experimenting with the technology of 250 BC while under the direct jurisdiction of the modern Hellenic Navy.
           The arrival at the naval base where we were stationed in Greece was very exciting, particularly as we got our first look at our ship, the Olympias. At 120 feet long, she had the appearance of both a thoroughbred and a predator. Jet lag seemed to dissipate as our excitement grew and we wondered allowed how, and if, we could get 170 oars rowing together. What would be our flank speed? How long could we maintain a constant cruising speed and what would that speed be?

           As is the case with any large-scale expedition involving a ship, there was some friction between certain personalities, there were a few malcontents, and even a few sea lawyers. However, what I remember the most were men and women from a multitude of backgrounds who were willing to put aside personal likes and dislikes and who were also willing to endure heat, lack of space, lack of privacy, and physical exhaustion in order put the goals of this archaeological experiment first.
           That summer of 1988 was remarkable, the previous summer, two weeks sea trials following the launch of Olympias, had provides few answers and a longer list of questions. We, the 88′ crew, had arrived with a punch list of experiments to execute with the goal of collecting some hard data that could then be examined and analyzed. 
           Because of my background in boat building, I got to be part of the repair crew as well as a Thranite (rower on the third, or top tier). After taking the ship out, the repair team would meet to mend the numerous things that can break on a wooden ship. Being part of that team turned out to be a wonderful learning opportunity because it allowed me a first hand look at some of the problem solving that went on after each rowing session.    

           I could fill an entire web log with stories from this adventure to Greece, but I will limit myself to a few observations that made a lasting impression on me.
           First, as we set about tackling one problem after another, I was impressed by how often the best solutions came from totally unexpected directions and were often proposed by people who had no preconceived notions about how this “should” work.
           Second, by far the most interesting people, with the most interesting ideas, were consistently the most humble and the least interested in credit.
           Third, the part that, for me anyway, was the most impressive was the combination of sound and motion that defined the Trireme underway. The motion of 170 oars lifting and falling in unison matched by a rhythmic deep booming sound made by all those oars coming down against the gunnels and tholepins at the same time makes a terrifically powerful impression, one that I have never seen adequately captured on film or video.

           By the way, the concept of keeping the rowers in time using a drum is pure Hollywood. A drum cannot compete with the deep rumble of oars rubbing on gunnels and tholepins. Through trial and error, we found that a flute is about the only sound that could penetrate the din below decks, which should not come as a surprise because, as our archeologists pointed out (after the fact), “auletes”, or flute players, were mentioned in ancient texts as part of Trireme crews.  

           In the end, the information we gathered left me astonished at how much can be accomplished with wood, leather, rope, and teamwork. We were able get 170 rowers, all three tiers, working together with a coordinated skill. We achieved flank speeds of better than nine knots, a cruising speed of seven knots with two tiers rowing and one tier resting, and we were able to maintain this speed for hours. With practice, we could board an entire crew of over two hundred officers, rowers, coaches and sailors, and get under way in less than fifteen minutes. If you are interested in the technical data, or more information you should check out the site of the Trireme Trust.

Ship’s Wolf

My nearly constant companion for the last eight years has been a small wolf-hybrid named Saxon. Like any mix between a wild and a domesticated species, you never know what you are going to get. In this case, I think I won the lottery.
          Along with genetic inheritance from Canis Lupus, my familiar spent most of the first two years of her life with wolves or wolf-hybrids, so when she came to me she had almost no domestic traits. However, she also came to me with few, or no, aggressive traits. The only times I have seen her become at all aggressive were when she thought children in her care were being threatened.
          When I first introduced Saxon to sailing on the Friendship Sloop, she had some reservations. For wolves, however, being part of the pack and participating in the activities of the pack are a huge part of their identity, and if the pack is going sailing, then she is going sailing. It has been great fun to watch her apply her considerable powers of observation and assessment to cruising. She is now a tested sailor having sailed from Kittery, Maine to New Brunswick, Canada, and back four times, with many cruises in between.
          While sailing is still not one of her favorite things to do she has repeatedly demonstrated the ability to make herself comfortable and useful at sea, and has become quite the sea dog…ah, wolf. Some of what Saxon has learned about cruising makes up what plot there is to the children’s book I wrote (see the post: “The Children’s Book“), here are a few more things she has learned:  

        Take a nap whenever you can, you never know when you may have to get up in the middle of the night.

 When you are on watch, keep a good lookout.

  Learn new skills.

    And, a red sky at night, really is a sailor’s delight.

Of Kayaks and Snowshoes

The idea of taking skills learned from one craft and applying them to another is basic to creative thinking. One example of this cross-pollination of skills is the seat in my single hatch kayak,  Selkie.         
             Selkie has a removable seat that pivots, drains, and even allows wet shorts to dry. The idea for this, like many good ideas, is not new. I came up with it after making my first few sets of snowshoes. As I learned to weave different materials, rawhide, and then rope, and then quarter inch webbing, I was struck by the sheer ingenuity, and the variety of different weaving patterns. I began to wonder where else I could apply this newfound craft. Then I came across an old model of a folding camp chair that LL Bean and a few other companies used to make and sell before the advent of ubiquitous foam and plastics. The by-product of these to experiences was the seat for the Selkie. Made of bentwood with a woven seat surface, my kayak seat may be more elaborate than need be, but is comfortable and dry.

       

        I emphasize the word dry because of all of the hopelessly befuddled, poorly thought out examples of shoddy design; the solid molded kayak seat has to rank as one of the shoddiest.
             It is virtually impossible to get into a sea kayak without dripping water onto the seat, if the seat has no way to drain, then the paddler has no choice but to sit in a puddle every time he or she enters their boat. One might think that this piece of knowledge would be so basic that designing a modern sea kayak without a self-draining seat would be as rare as designing a modern automobile with no reverse gear. Not so, too many boats I have seen have a solid piece of plastic or fiberglass shaped to conform to the anatomy of the human posterior-with no drain. A perfect birdbath, only you get to sit in it.
             The consequence of sitting in a continual puddle is more than just a little uncomfortable. There is even a condition called in the common vernacular “kayak but”, basically it is trench foot, only it is not on your feet. If you don’t think that’s a big deal go to this excerpt (reprinted with permission) from the 2005 January/February issue of the Wilderness Medicine Newsletter.

             I spoke with Dr. Murray Hamlet who was one of the consulting editors for this article in the Wilderness Medicine Newsletter, he confirmed that “kayak but” is essentially the first stages of immersion foot (trench foot). I asked him if, like trench foot, this is a permanent injury. He said he had not followed enough cases to say definitively, but since this is a preventable injury, it was not something to test.
             Clearly, there is more than one possible solution; paddlers who always wear a full dry suit have a barrier between themselves and puddles. Another solution Dr. Hamlet suggested was to get a good piece of astro-turf and sit on that. The astro-turf allows air to circulate and water to drain. Sound strange? Perhaps, but then I built a terrific seat based on a snowshoe.

A New Page

Rather than add a couple of posts this week I have added a new page to this site. In it I have posted online versions of articles that first appeared in the newsletter of the Friendship Sloop Society, FRIENDSHIPS. Any one interested in wooden boat maintenance, gaff rigs, or traditional rigging, might want to check it out.

A Second Carved Doorway

While designing the doorway for SOLO I found that I was personally most drawn to the compositions of the Old Norse and those, which are lumped, into the category of Hiberno-Saxon Art. Two years later when I started to develop the design for the Celtic Wheelhouse, it was clear that another carved doorway was going to be central to the design.

           In the previous post, I said that part of what I find so intriguing about the creative process is how people react to your work. I think this becomes particularly fascinating when the work in question is architecture because there is the reaction to the exterior, and the reaction to the interior. This creates a terrific opportunity to have the viewer also react to the transition from exterior to interior space. Taking advantage of this opportunity is something that builders have been doing for centuries.
           In the case of the doorway for the Wheelhouse, I wanted to capitalize on the transitional element because there was yet another part to the equation: optical illusion. Because of the way the human eye perceives volume, a cylinder of a certain size looks larger from the inside than it does on the outside.

This is true with a structure the size of the Wheelhouse, and since the building is dug into the side of a hill, the exterior volume appears smaller still. The actual size of the building only becomes apparent from the inside, and comes as a surprise.
           What I wanted to do by creating an elaborately carved doorway was to place a visual distraction between that first assessment of the size of the building and the realization of the actual size of the building. A dramatic pause, if you will, between the deliberately misleading premise and the interior surprise. Other than stylistic influences, I wanted the carving to be deeper in relief than the carving than I had done on the doorjamb at SOLO, and I wanted some elements of the carving to overlap and extend into the actual opening of the door. My intention was to hold the eye longer in order to create that visual distraction.

           All this might sound quite complex and elaborate; in fact, it is nothing more than simple stagecraft designed to add to the drama of an already dramatic space.