Small Boats 2017!!! Woot!
YES! The yearly tradition here at Captain Callsign's House of Wonders is the unveiling and sniffing of the newest edition of Small Boats! This vintage is, in my very snobby and excellent opinion, quite exceptional and one of the best in years (at least two). A knock-out-of-the-park by Cunningham and Friends. Huzzah, et cetera.
First: A most awesome, dope, finastkind, groovy, retro cover shot of pure exuberance. I know this feeling that this gentleman voyageur conveys. I have felt it myself in other pursuits, and it is grand. Plus, the duct-tape on the bow of the canoe exudes panache and experience. This is a repair I can relate to. Great cover, it makes me want to get off the couch. The cover is important (remember 2013 and shudder).
Second: Murphy has a wonderfully worded preface/editorial that I don't necessarily remember right now except that I found it wonderful while commuting to work sitting on a bus stuck in Thanksgiving traffic.
Third: There is an diverse crowd of boats this year that really gets some imagination humming. I thought the balance of was just right, across the wide spectrum of small boat missions! A small quibble I could hypothetically construe is that between the Arctic Tern, Southwester Dory, Hvalsoe 18, and Calendar Islands Yawl there was some slight overlap, but since I am an aficionado and practitioner of the type of sailing these boats lend themselves to, I enjoyed the comparisons. Without doubt, I am quite partial to one and would rank the others on a hierarchical scale, but this is not the place for such talk.
Fourth, last but not least, finally, and YES: Monsieur Tom Jackson IS BACK! He deftly illustrates his nightly communion with the esteemed Admiral Nelson by describing how he beds with the said Admiral on a purely symbolic level. Jackson is chock full of insightful insights and persistently successful problem solving on so many topics that I wish I could bundle him up under my foredeck so he can bark some wonderful ideas as I cruise the Maine coast. Just great stuff, really. I missed him last year, and most enjoyed his Hylan Bowler article in WB253, and am glad to see his brilliance and great writing returned to Small Boats.
GO GET YOUR COPY
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