Which Boat?

Clearly no ordinary boat is going to be capable of a journey like this.

It needs to have a really shallow draft, be strong enough to deal with submerged obstacles, light enough to haul out and around the larger obstructions (whole trees, the sluice, weirs, and goodness knows what else), yet big enough to live eat and sleep on board for the four days I reckon the journey will take. Ideally it should be easy to paddle, and be able to sail where conditions permit.

Oh, and cheap and easy enough for me to build. I've never built a boat before, and it's more than fourty years since I've sailed anything - my last experience being capsising a Mirror dinghy whilst attempting a jibe at Denver Sluice.

Only one choice really - a West Mersea Duck Punt. The lightweight 'stitch-and-tape' variant of John Milgate's original design, kindly made available by Flo-Mo.

I have to thank an amazing chap called Dylan Winter who has championed the West Mersea Duck Punt and obtained permission to publish the plans for the John Milgate original and the Flo-Mo variant free of charge via his website. Dylan managed to build one of these in a single week, and even offered to lend it to me for this challenge! He is currently sailing anti-clockwise around Great Britain (though NOT in a duck punt), making some truly exquisite videos as he goes. If you haven't done so already, take a look at his utterly superb 'Keep Turning Left' website, and help him in any way that you can. He's worth it...