Tom Thumb

Tom Thumb sorry for the photo quality as it was water damaged.

The below photo was kindly send to me by the Maratime athority.

Tom Thumb was a metical creature a figment of ones   imagination if you like. The name travelled to Australia as a small three metre boat, and was bought to Australia by Bass and Flinders on board the Reliance.  They used this tiny boat to explore the east coast of Australia and to map the coastline.   

 Now the boat had a small sail similar to the ones I read about in the Texas 2oo. No GPS no rescuers just themselves with a bit of grub water and paper to make maps and the sextant to navigate with. 

If they were to do it today they would have been considered to have been totally unprepared.  Most likely they would have been locked up in a mental asylum.

The boat Tom Thumb also had a name sake in the form of a pilot vessel also called the PV Tom Thumb.  I have decided to call my little ship the Tom Thumb.... Mythically sticking my thumb up at the proverbial authority as to build such a boat today comes with heaps of restrictions..