Build it ... and good times will come

11:23 PM Wed 24 Aug 2011 GMT
There are four things a man should do in his lifetime - see an iceberg, watch Jimmy Buffett play live, have a one-night fling with a supermodel, and build a boat.

So far I'm batting at 50%. The iceberg and Elle will just have to wait.

Building a boat with my two bare hands still ranks as my proudest ever achievement - and something my woodwork teacher, Mr Wood, would've been most surprised to see.

It just takes patience to build your own wooden wonder. - Mark Rothfield

The launching ranked up there with the birth of my two kids and the Newcastle Knights' grand final win over Manly in 1997.

It's something everyone used to do, of course. Midnight oil burned brightly back in the 60s and 70s as folks toiled in tin sheds the length and breadth of suburbia.

The economy was flat, money was tight, but time was plentiful. Now, the economy is flat, money is tight, but we are working longer hours than ever despite having all this time-saving technology at our fingertips.

Perversely, it's computers and mobile phones that are to blame. Work inhabits and invades our lives 24/7 so we look for quick-and-easy, ready-made solutions. Rough and ready ain't cutting it.

I'd urge everyone to stop and smell the wood shavings. Either buy a kit, a bare hull or even just restore an old clunker. It'll cost you little but you'll have the time of your life.

Get it right and it could even be a supermodel magnet ...

by Mark Rothfield, Powerboat-World Editor

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