siging in - hello all :)

A longish note to say HI to every one here on the forum.

I'm the proud owner of two mirrors a ply and a grp.

Many, many years ago, before I joined the Army, I worked if one could call it that in a leisure center boat yard, mainly collecting tickets from customers who had hired one of the dinghys etc. from the center. The whole place was a series of converted gravel pits that had been flooded, with work still going on around the site and silt being pumped into MY lake!!! Anyway, I digress, not only did we have some Toppers (new back then) but surf style canoes made out of grp and weighed a ton even out of the water, mix in half a dozen pram dinghys and a single Fleetwind and we had quite a bunch. The work was idyllic for a 16 year old, nothing to do but bum around, collect the occassion bit of cash and mess with boats. The summer ended all to fast and I was on my way to IJLB Shorncliffe in Kent for a years rigourous training - a horrible place that I choose to believe I 'survived' rather than Passed Out of!

15 years later I was still in the Army, having taken the decsion to make it a full career choice, when fate dealt me a loosing hand, I ended up loosing a leg which left me unfit for service :) Back out in civi street I cracked on and amongst other things joined British Limbless ExServicemens Association (BLESMA) and it has been through their good services that I have been able to re-engage with my youthful passion for sailing. At this point its probably worth explaining that I got all my initial sailing training from the books of Arthur Ransome................

Anyway, off I went to Erith sailing club on the Thames Esturary last August and took a modified RYA level one certificate, this in turn lead me to search for a mirror - the dinghy I had always wanted to build as a kid. My Grandfather had loving preserved the original published plans, and he and I on more than one occassion had pawed over them, discussing how we would go about it. I secretly think the old fella wanted to build the dinghy so he could follow his passion for fishing as well, saddly he passed away before either of us could realise the dream and the plans as far as I know were thrown out by my nan along with a lot of his other 'junk' as she refered to it :(

Returning to Devon from my trip, I joined the local sailing club, Topsham SC, and found a very aminable group of folks, very much into sailing Devon Yawls and Crusiers, not much action with dinghys except with the Cadets who had just started meeting again due to lack of leaders - the usual reason youth groups suffer from! I saw an oportunity to help and volunteered, it also gains me proffessional training from an RYA Instructor and loads of time out on the water in numerous different craft from a 16' diesel launch to a Topper!

I'm hoping to pass my ply Mirror onto a fellow club member, who is also a Cadet Asst Inst, so I won't be asking to much for her = the dinghy is bright yellow, and came with no name, so we called her the 'The Chip Shop Special' in hommage to Discovery Networks 'Chop Shop' with Leepo and Bernie! The GRP, currently blue, is called 'Nobodys Hero' a rather sombre reminder about my former life and how I haven't allowed my loss of limb to define how I live :) I'm hoping to return to Erith later this year and suprise my instructor, who will be expecting me to sign in for a Level 2 certification - by showing him my Asst Instructors certification!

As an aside, I'm not 'into' racing at all, I've had enough competition in my life and just wanna kick back and cruise around and enjoy the view! I have nothing against racing and have on occassion acted as ballast for other clubmembers :)

Best Regards to all.

Lin.