Dutch Whaler by aliluke - Sergal

[aliluke]

Hi

I added this kit to my profile but have just found the photos.

 

This was my first wooden ship build and indicates my naivety. I wasn't on a forum then but took on a vicious hull shape for planking with a blunt bow and blunt stern. I had no idea what I was doing and that shows - planks spiking up to thin points.

 

The kit interested me as it was, more or less, equivalent to the two fluyt's that Abel Tasman sailed to New Zealand in 1642 - Heemskerck and Zeehaen which fascinated me. I suspect the original ships were more extreme in shape. I holiday in Abel Tasman National Park every summer - do not miss this place if you come to New Zealand! The fluyts are intriguing too. Their strange shape came into part because taxation in the Netherlands back then was based on deck area. So, they had bulbous hulls, for freight, and very small upper decks. Tax avoidance in the 17th century!

 

Tasman came into Golden Bay and was confronted by Maori warriors in waka (canoes) and several of his crew were killed. Tasman named it 'Murderers Bay' (now called 'Golden Bay') and they never touched the shore. By then they were in trouble anyway with rotten rigging, dwindling supplies and in fear of the locals. Tasman beat a track back to Batavia but, on his return to the Netherlands, his mission was deemed to be a complete failure. That's tough given what he and his crew had been through. Interestingly they have recently detected the launching platforms for the waka in Golden Bay and these are the now considered to be the oldest surviving structures in New Zealand. And, of course, Tasman gave his European name to 'Neuw Zeeland'. We see it here both ways - New Zealand and Aotearoa.

 

If you are interested in this subject, I can definitely recommend 'The Merchant of Zeehaen - Isaac Gilesmans and the voyages of Abel Tasman' by Grahame Anderson. I also recommend a novel, 'Tasman's Lay' by Peter Hawes, which really plants in you in the utter hell hole of 17th century ship board life - towing the last of their meat behind the stern to rid it of worms and weevils as they head north out of Murderers Bay...

 

I don't know if this kit is still available but it was quite good. But, in hindsight, all the parts are over scaled and it is far from being a beginners kit - the bow and stern are just evil. It did provide the challenge of triple planking the two whale boats! My efforts back then seem very clumsy and ill-informed. However the hull, as far as I finished it, and the wee whale boats have found a proud shelf in our living room for better or worse. I have no intention of taking it any further but it stands as a model...of some sort anyway.

 

Photos from way back when - 2005.

 

That's all for this mini log.

 

Cheers,

A

[sirdrake]

I'd be very proud if my first wooden ship would have looked like this...!

[Paryzek]

It looks very good for a first model.