The Thames punt is a simple, flat-bottomed good-time boat, memorialized by Cambridge and Oxford “punters” carrying cucumber-sandwich picnics in elegant hampers. We suppose there are powered punts, but the traditional locomotion is the sensible punting pole, often of bamboo. Oh, la, how jolly!
Bluewater sailors have bragging rights, and bully for them. But as you get started in boats your task is to avoid ordeals, cataclysms, and full gales. You will range farther and farther from your home dock, but you may discover that the most fascinating waters are shallow. As we consider the history of boatbuilding ingenuity, we leaf through the elegant solutions created for thin water.
Gargantuan tankers and container ships churn great-circle routes between oily commercial ports. Gilded yachts cut courses from one high-dollar marina slip to the next, sure of eager service and amenities. As a small-boat skipper, poking your bow into inlets, creeks, tiny harbors, unlikely anchorages, and bypassed coastal villages is your special prerogative. You aren’t driven by commercial mandates, and you probably aren’t expecting a limousine with iced bubbly on the quay. Your mandate is curiosity, the bubbliest and headiest vintage. You shape your course wondering what lies upstream a bit more, what the air is like in a pine-ringed cove, and what the people are like in East Overshoe Harbor. Lucky you.