Patricia Gill, Denmark Bulletin
Denmark’s first St Ayles Skiff headed through the channel at the Rivermouth on Saturday marking the end of the 10-month community project to build the boat. Organiser David Cliff reflected on the project, quoting Ratty telling Mole in Kenneth Grahame’s classic children’s novel, Wind in the Willows: “Believe me my young friend there is nothing, absolutely nothing, half so much fun as simply messing about in boats”.
Twenty-seven volunteers had helped with the build in Kay and Harry White’s shed on South Coast Highway after the ‘incredible beauty’ of the craft had struck David at a Royal Freshwater Bay Yacht Club launch day.
The pride of the people involved in the building of the craft also impressed David. The boat building is based on the historical tradition of Fife miners’ rowing and sailing regattas which was revived in Scotland in 2009 to engage communities in the same way.
Single malt toast to team spirit
On Sunday, David said he could not believe what he and volunteers had achieved. After retiring from his job as a petroleum exploration geologist five years ago, he met Denmark shipwright Peter Wilson and went and “mucked around” with boats in his shed.
With the assistance of “wingman” John Sampson, he set out on the most interesting and probably the most challenging task he had taken on.
David, the self-proclaimed “smiling steamroller” faced the problem of financing the project which later had involved its “platinum sponsor”, St John Ambulance Association, after which the boat was named.
Gold sponsor was the Phillips Family’s Rivermouth Caravan Park and their conveniently-located Reminisce Cafe with many other local business pitching in.
“My wife thinks I had a nerve to go and ask for money for something that was a pipedream,” David said.
Community fundraising yielded $4000 and a Federal Government Building Stronger Communities grant $5000. Denmark Senior High School students had helped with the sanding of the boat and had built it footrests as a classroom project.
It is planned to row the boat, which will be based at the Denmark Riverside Club, primarily for fun and fitness and less for competition.
St John was launched with a dousing of highland malt whisky brought to the event by St Ayles skiff enthusiast Sally Ward who rows in the Moray Firth near Inverness, Scotland.
“Any excuse to get the whisky out and to anoint the boat with a cup of friendship,” Sally said.
“Our conditions are not quite as benign as these, particularly at this time of the year.”
St John regional manager Toni Melia recalled how two local St John volunteers had put forward an unusual community involvement idea, becoming involved in building a boat and naming it St John.
“In Denmark they think outside the box,” Toni said. “These are the same people who during Covid-19 put pink flamingos on their volunteers’ lawns to cheer them up. I thought this was just a giant-size flamingo of an idea.”
America’s Cup veteran John Longley said St John was the seventh St Ayles Skiff in WA a movement which had begun about six years ago when a group from Royal Freshwater Bay Yacht Club attended a Hobart boat show.
RFBYC members met a group of Melbourne retiree women, Women on Water, who had wanted to row but the men had “stolen” the boats.
“They thought, stuff it, we’ll build our own boats,” John said. They also met Iain Oughtred who designed boats which any “gifted amateur” could put together.
John said the motto, “communities build boats and boats build communities”, reflected the growth of the global St Ayles skiff movement.
They would proliferate like in Scotland where there were now 250 craft. David said Denmark Rowing Association members would be sorry to leave the Whites’ shed.
Harry had provided excellent tools and expertise while Kay had excelled in raffle ticket sales: “You want her on your team,” David said. A second St Ayles skiff will be launched in Denmark in coming weeks.
See all the pictures in the issue.
This article appeared in the Denmark Bulletin, 10 November 2022.
