A Call to Action - The Nazaré Project

‘We are heading into one of those historical moments when the different facets of life come together – in a time of extreme physical, environmental, technological, social, economic, political, spiritual and, for each one of us, personal turmoil, crisis and transformation. To at once escape denial and to avoid falling into destructive violence or madness, it is imperative to find some way, however small and insignificant it may seem, of responding with creativity and love.’

This is me expressing my current state of  mind, that I hope will find a response in yours too, dear reader. For too long we have tended to keep our inner thoughts and feelings about such matters under wraps, afraid perhaps of raising issues that we just cannot cope with, as we struggle to keep our relationships together, rear our children and generally keep the show on the road.

I am back in Nazaré now, at its bright and sunny best, but I have been at home lately, while Alec and I were communicating closely nonetheless, across the 800 miles or so of this lot:-

The result is that we are ready to go with

The Nazaré Project

The key features of the Project are 3 S’s - sustainability, subsidiarity (local participation) and solidarity. These entail objectives such as meeting the challenge posed by the climate crisis, bringing new life to the entire European project by empowering people within their local communities and redefining the relationship between capital and regular people.

Dependence on oil, besides hastening us to self-destruction, is putting us in the hands of a shadowy and unaccountable elite. Not alone do we require a transition to electric power, but also to ‘power for the people’; and I do not mean merely some probably spurious political power, but the actual ability to participate in powering their own world, indeed to inherit their own lives.

The Project is developing with differing strands. It started in practical terms with the Anna M. Every sailor knows the sense of blessed relief that comes with stopping their engine, when the sails take over and once again the dominant sounds are those of nature and the way of their boat through the water. Now the whole world needs such a moment, leaving dependence on oil and internal combustion engines behind, and indeed this does seem to be coming to pass! Moreover, an ocean-going sailing boat is a very apt ‘entry point’ for addressing the challenge of making our world sustainable. She is a whole life-support and transport system, running on her own power.

Those of you who have followed this blog will also know - and the story is here for all to read - how I myself arrived at this point, aboard such a sailing boat, the 13.6m wooden schooner Anna M.  She was designed by the English designer John Illingworth and built in the South of France, 50 years ago. Fiona and I bought her 20 years ago, at Horta in the Azores.

I had just retired from 26 years as a commercial fisherman. I had embarked on that career partly in order to immerse myself in the problematic relationship between technology, capitalism and nature, in order to try to see the way out of that destructive phase of history that caused me to witness, for example, the reduction of a fine fishing ground off NW Ireland to a fish desert, and whose global consummation we are now about to witness. I meanwhile followed the fortunes of the Glencolmkille Cooperatives in Co. Donegal, and was subsequently Chairman of the West Clare Development Coop at Carrigaholt for several years.

Anna M leaving on IWDG cruise
 to the Cabo Verde Islands. 

I had been brought up sailing, and now wanted a boat big enough to take sailing trips, focussed on dolphin and whale watching. Besides doing so off SW Ireland, I went filming humpback whales with the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group in the Cape Verde Islands, and in the course of continuing around the North Atlantic, sailed 40km up the Orinoco River in the Venezuelan rain-forest. Anna M has sailed many, many miles in the company of whales and dolphins, and in a sense I now try to emulate them. It changes one, to look those creatures in the eyes and to hear their haunting songs beneath the waves.

Since 2012, with a welcome pension, Fiona and I have settled down to living on Sherkin Island and cruising the ‘Gannetsway’. This is what I call my ‘home ground’, where the gannets fly, from Scotland to the South of Spain. Anna M spent winters further and further south, and finally on the Rio Guadiana, between the Algarve and Andalusia.

In June 2016, I was sailing north up the Portuguese coast with two friends, but had to take the decision that it was unsafe to proceed, because despite considerable effort at remedy, the 50 year-old boat was leaking too much. I put her on the concrete at Nazaré, and there serious problems were found. Enter a remarkable boat-builder and marine engineer of 30 years’ experience called Alec Lammas.

Alec laminating a frame.

Alec and I soon found much in common, in particular a shared interest in electric drives. We cleaned out Anna M's hull, taking out the engine and fuel tanks, and discovered that many of her frames were cracked and rotten. Since I was now committed to a project way beyond my personal means, I decided we would somehow manage to 'go the whole hog', since the chance was there but would never come again, and fit a self-regenerative electric drive. Alec and I decided to set up a company in order to design, manufacture and install such systems, while Anna M will become a research vessel, test bed and demonstration ambassador for them. We are calling this company:-

Aston-Lammas Electric Propulsion Lda (ALEP).

As such, we have just agreed to rent a premises some 6 km inland from Nazaré in Portugal, just off the A8 motorway. It is in good working condition, with plenty of room for a fully equipped workshop, storage, office and design space and also for accommodation space. It only needs to be cleaned out and then we will be ready to go.

'Yellow Windows' - ALEP's premises.

We have also just submitted an application to the EU's Portugal 2020 scheme for 50% funding of our research and development program, and we have established a relationship with Professor Carlos Fereira of the I.P.L. de Leiria.

The motors will be supplied initially at least by Lynch Electric Motors, for which Alec has the concession for Portugal, Spain, France and Ireland. Our innovation will mainly lie in the systems’ abilities to recharge the vessels’ batteries, using the power generated by their propellers when the boat is sailing with sufficient force through the water.

There are already 3 boat-owners interested, and further installations are being planned, such as purely electric systems for locally built GRP dayboats that will be recharged with shore power. The company’s interests will not be confined to the marine industry, but applied also to transport on land. There is huge scope for the production of simple low-cost electric vehicles, which are essential to the rejuvenation of rural and urban communities alike. Flashy high-end electric vehicles are all very well, but are quite beyond the means of those trying to live simple lives in the country.

There is a beautiful village a little further inland from our premises, with a derelict ceramics factory for sale in it, which we would love to buy and use for our own purposes. Nearby there are several run-down old houses for sale and a closed-down school. It is a story replicated everywhere. With affordable vehicles and their own means of producing power, this community and countless others could be rejuvenated.

Nazaré itself provides a splendid opportunity for the application of electric vehicles. Near our workshop there is a new industrial estate that the local authority is currently equipping with services and access roads. It would be an ideal place to provide a ‘charge and ride’ facility, where drivers could pull in off the motorway and leave their car to be charged, preferably with solar panels that would also provide shade, while being left into Nazaré, thus relieving it of the traffic that gridlocks its narrow streets in busy times.

Immediately speaking, in the New Year, we intend to be able to provide accommodation and food to helpers, as we get the new workshop organised, complete with office and living quarters. Down the line, there will be opportunities to participate both at sea and on land, and your input on business or technical matters, as well as physical help, will be much appreciated. You will be able to follow what is happening on this blog. Email gannetsway@gmail.com to join our mailing list.

Our organisation is still very much in its infancy, and it should be emphasized that this is a personal blog rather than a mission statement. However, I think it best to be up front about where I am coming from. Of all things I deplore hidden agendas, that motivate people while they avoid engaging in honest, meaningful and robust ways with issues as they arise. However, it is not just that I am an old man in a hurry. Heaven knows it should be obvious by now that the Planet needs our haste. Sound and deeply rooted motivation is required if we are going to turn around this present, destructive way of going on, in which the usual flannel most often peddled by politicians and the media is proving woefully inadequate.

Unfortunately we cannot afford to delay in raising funds. We suddenly found that our application to Portugal 2020 had to be in by the end of November, or we would miss the chance to apply for a Research and Development grant for another whole year. It only went ahead thanks to a friend's generosity and that of Mierlog Consulting, who are still owed Eur2500. We also need to spend some money on rent and kitting out the new premises, though this will be done as simply and cheaply as possible. When we get an office to work in, we'll have some chance of organising ourselves properly.

Eventually your contributions will become formal shares in ALEPlda. If you let us know what you are most interested in, this will help us to shape our priorities. Of course you can always make smaller contributions too, and you do not need to be a shareholder to follow and participate.

Please lodge funds with the Gannetsway account -
BIC-BOFIIE2DXXX

IBAN-IE17BOFI90295239637885

The Madonna is for me right at the heart and foundation of European civilisation, and for my part, the Project is under the patronage of Nossa Senhora da Nazaré*. I count myself answerable to the ethos and values of the Catholic Church, without however excluding anyone for holding to a different tradition. Alec for instance is a Vegan. In the end we believe all genuine traditions and values point in one universal direction, whereof the implications for today are best worked out in practice. It is by working together that we learn to trust each other!

Joe Aston.


*https://www.roman-catholic-saints.com/our-lady-of-nazareth.html

In... Out.... Time for an Overview.

It was well over two years ago now, on the 16th July 2016 to be precise, that having, in the wake of the Brexit referendum, given off yards about ‘that extraordinary act of vandalism, self-harm and misplaced anger’, I wrote that I would ‘take a break from all that nonsense’ as far as commenting in this blog is concerned. I more or less kept to my word, yet it turned out to be a compelling psychodrama for anyone in any way tuned in. You will not have been short of reading material about it, nor discussion if you are any way so inclined, though it has become more and more difficult to communicate with those on the other side of the argument, if such it may be termed. Now that the process is theoretically coming to an end, I will attempt an overview.

What rational debate there has been has been mainly confined to the economic sphere. This has largely been a matter of rustling up whatever plausible arguments that one can muster to reinforce one’s own point of view; it is obvious that economics is very far from an exact science. For what it’s worth, I would have thought the economic factors overwhelmingly point to staying in, but since they are rehearsed ad nauseam elsewhere, by people who should be better qualified than me, I won’t bother with them here. Mind you, some of the leading Brexiteers seem to me totally in cloud cuckoo land as far as economics are concerned. One must seek to understand their motivation elsewhere.

If one should delve in very different spheres, and allude for example to the obvious parallel between Brexit and the English Reformation, again, the chances of deriving enlightenment are slim. Frankly most people have only the vaguest notions about history, prior to 1914, bar the odd raid in a film or something that imparts no meaningful context. Good King Harry and plucky Francis Drake no doubt contributed hugely to the sub-plot of Brave England standing up to them forriners, but again, one is really back to one’s own point of view. What dark paranoia led to Catholic priests being savagely butchered in the market squares of England is hard to fathom.

None of the above provides anything like an adequate narrative for Mrs May's 'different' England. A big part of our problem today is that we have been trying to manage on a very inadequate one; that of the Enlightenment, Progress and Democracy, with a purely individual idea of fulfilment allegedly empowered by technological wizardry, and it is finally proving inadequate, indeed unseaworthy, under present conditions. In their dismay, populists are trying to take us back to national myths, though these failed so catastrophically in the last century. When we consider the EU, to my mind it is in danger of falling apart because it has largely failed to have the courage of its own roots, settling instead for the EnDem narrative with all its limitations.

Just as Brexit clearly relates to the English Reformation, the EU, while it may not like to admit it, relates to the Roman Empire and its successor, the Holy Roman Empire, and finally the Roman Catholic Church. Moreover its symbol is the crown of twelve stars with which Mary was crowned Queen of Heaven and Earth in the book of the Apocalypse, and many of its founding fathers were Roman Catholics. It is based on catholic values of universality, solidarity, subsidiarity, community and dialogue rather than brute power. I do not wish at all to imply that such values are the prerogative of Catholics, nor to deny that all too frequently we have failed to live up to them. I note however that having been effectively taught all down the ages, they were particularly elaborated in the Second Vatican Council, around the time when the EU was taking off. The shock of the ensuing gale, that blew in when the gates and windows of the ‘fortress Church’ were opened, caused such havoc that it may go some way to explaining what to me is the bizarre reactionary stance of some Catholics, who are mostly of the post Vatican II generation, such as Messrs Bannon and Rees-Mogg.

A real catholic narrative has anyway to be rooted in that older narrative which Protestants share. One of the best stories in it is one of the oldest; I mean that of the Tower of Babel. Just a few lines in the Book of Genesis, when men tried to build themselves ‘a tower reaching to heaven’, but the Lord ‘confused their language so that they could not understand each other’, and that was the end of that! Here we still are, trying to secure Heaven on our own terms, finding ourselves at odds with each other, and rejecting the very idea that our only chance of peace on earth and a transcendent fulfilment lies in paying attention to God.

Immediately people will be jumping down my throat to ridicule this idea. How can I say such things after all the violence committed ‘in the name of God’? To which I can only reply that mankind has been violent ever since Cain killed Abel, but who has been showing us the way to peace? Who has even managed to find peace in their own hearts and families, and how do they do so? But to do so, we surely have to try to come to some kind of terms with the rest of the world. I have found that I cannot sit back and see out my days in peace, as best I may, unless I also do what I may to build harmony in the world.

When people argue about climate change, they frequently seem to think that the issue stands by itself. It doesn’t; it is merely one symptom of a massive collision between our contemporary technological version of civilisation and the natural order. Anyone who is at all close to nature realises that this is being rapidly degraded in multiple ways. That climate change is a very clear example of the imperative to achieve a new solidarity among the nations and humility too is presumably why the Duckie and his mates deny it and also loath the EU. At least they thereby acknowledge that the two of them are related.

Where do we begin? How can we make an effective contribution to ensuring that our grandchildren inherit a blessing from us? When all is said and done, is this not one deep desire that we all share? And yet, is there anyone who has a plausible and coherent strategy? It simply cannot happen without a compelling vision of human destiny, of where we are trying to go.

To elaborate such a vision is the business of religion, and as long as we start from the view that religion is hogwash, and mankind’s spiritual journey has proven to be a dead end, then clearly we havn’t the proverbial snowball’s chance in Hell of doing so. In practice all the great religions point in pretty much the same direction, although it seems to me that there is one preeminently thorough and effective expression of it. The narrative goes something like this:-

In our quest for knowledge and power, we became locked into our egos, unhinged and separated from our fellows and from nature. This condition is known as being in a state of original sin, and is inherently destructive. The only way to break out is through personal love; anything less cannot suffice, for to give oneself over to anything less than another person makes us into something less than a person.

Our quest remains that of the New Jerusalem, the City of God. Christ uniquely offers his very body as the locus of that City, continually, dynamically and presently. He is powerfully helped by his mother, who makes it abundantly clear that her son does not come into the world in power as the world understands it, but by humble attention to God’s Word, while the whole business is rooted in physical as well as spiritual reality.

Now, as has been repeatedly pointed out, the whole world has reached a pass where we must either break through into a new solidarity or perish. None of our efforts will be adequate, and sometimes they will be counterproductive and destructive. If their flaws are indeed such that we cannot overcome them, well that is a time of out. Like the rhythm of the seasons, the drumbeat of life goes yes... no..., in... out.... But our last word, if we are not to be finally cast out, must be yes, in, be it done unto me according to thy word!

Getting Going at Seventy-two?

Emile Ratelband, the 69-year-old Dutchman who has caused a stir by going to law in order to 'become' 20 years younger, is surely raising many smiles, not to say laughs, all around the world. We know that, whatever the Dutch court may decide (and despite the tendency of the law-courts and others these days not to let mere physical facts stand in the way of their decisions), de heer Ratelband will clock up the magic 'three score and ten' years shortly. That according to ancient if unfashionable authority is the time allotted us.

     After that, it is time for us to realise that life is a gift and a privilege even more than a right! Yet who among us oldies has not sometimes wished to be 20 years younger? I sometimes certainly have  done so myself lately, as I find myself launching into a project that has the potential to go far beyond me. What a pity it didn't happen 20 years ago! Meanwhile, I cannot but ask myself - why bother, and have I the energy for this?
     

     "There you go, you're on a whole new journey now!", said the lady in the social security office when I finalised my pension. "Yes, thank you,"  I replied, "with a one-way ticket!" Having one's basic cost of living handed out by the state is presumably an advantage of age that our Dutch friend can afford to do without. However I see it as a huge privilege, which has freed me up no end to give time to occupations that I rather enjoy, like working on my old wooden boat and writing this blog; but also, darn it,  look where it is all bringing me now!

     Yet this is one of the true advantages of 'living on borrowed time': one can allow oneself the luxury of being 'brought along'. If you delve into the archive of this blog, you may find a reference to a lovely remark that M. le Curé made in the parish newsletter when I was at Le Palais in Belle Isle about a decade ago; he wrote how he enjoyed being with old people 'qui osent, enfin, être eux-mêmes' - 'who dare at last to be themselves'. That saying has stayed with me ever since. It's not however just a matter of 'daring'. The fact is one is much more likely to be free to do it.

Fiona was shocked the other day by a Catholic priest who said in conversation that the idea of celibacy was 'dead in the water'. To both of us, it seems that the main reason for it given by Christ in the Gospels is as valid as ever it was, namely that it is extremely hard to combine following God's will down the road of freedom with the responsibility of rearing a family, 'especially in these end times!'.

There are other reasons besides financial freedom why the broad perspectives of the open road, indeed, I would rather say the open sea, are very likely to open out in one's seventies. Living on borrowed time, one should realise that being alive is more of a privilege than a right. Now is the time, at last, to give up being a control freak, both about oneself and about others. Indeed of course the two go together. But behold, it's when you lose your life that you win it!' Now you can truly let go and let God - let things happen.

'All very well for dreamers and mystics!' you may say. Well, how are the 'people of this world' getting on? Why did the idea of that humungus train rattling down the railroad completely out of control in Australia the other day resonate in the imagination? It made me think of a lot of things, but especially the British Government and its Brexit train. If only they find a way to derail it! I know that will be a mess, but it's likely to be a lot better than careering on to the end of the line. And meanwhile they think that they are 'taking back control'!

So what does 'winning one's life back' involve? Control does have to be in there. We do have to keep to the road, and we so easily deceive ourselves and make mistakes, though hopefully we are less likely to do so precisely insofar as we are able to get our heads around the fact that we are soon going to die anyway. The great thing, and the reason why I sometimes feel more in sympathy with myself as a child than as a 50 year-old man, is to rediscover life as gift. Then we are open to looking around and seeing what's about us.

In a sense this could hardly be worse. Normally sober boffins are telling us that we are destroying the very planet Earth, that if we don't rapidly change in the next 12 years it will become largely uninhabitable, that the oceans and many species of animal are dying, that human fertility itself is in danger of collapse.... Meanwhile people everywhere would rather look at flickering images of reality, with the illusion that they control it, than at the thing itself.

So how do we get to set sail on the sea of freedom, the sea of life? Catch on to any bit of reality, I say, and even if it disappears in your hand, it will have led you onwards into the Mystery! And that is how we are proceeding with O Projeto Nazareno. I sailed into Nazaré with the Anna M very much against my inclination in many ways, though not without asking Our Lady what I should do, and getting a clear reply. Here I find Alec who rips into the old boat, and we discover that, yes, it was a very good thing that we did so.

An old aunt whom I hardly knew died and left me a few quid to enable the work to proceed, but only as far as renovating the hull. Having emptied and cleaned the engine compartment and its filthy bilge, I would much rather not put diesel back in anyway. Alec and I find we have both been thinking about electric drives for boats for years. He looks around at electric motors on the internet, identifies the best one for the job, and finds that it is made just up the road from where he was at the time in his native Devon with his girlfriend. He wanders down there and comes away with the franchise to sell them in Portugal, Spain, France and Ireland.

It just happens that this is the same territory that I called the Gannetsway, when I was looking for a name for my website about 20 years ago, and achieved the freedom to sail it. When I dropped the subscription once, the name was promptly jumped on by some bright-spark in India trying to get money out of me. That's how this blog became gannetswaysailing. It's alright by me. But what prompted me to keep it going, with no commercial basis? Chatting to a wise friend I said, "I wish I could find a way to make money out of it, without resorting to ads or something". He said, "Don't worry about that, just keep writing!"

So now the blog is pretty valuable in giving some credibility for this Nazaré Project. We're applying for big money from the EU under the Portugal 2020 program to revitalise the Portuguese economy, to fund the research and development of regenerative electric drives. The right people to help us along the road seem to be showing up precisely when we need them.

The latest example was when we went looking for a premises yesterday. Alec had identified various places on the internet, and we happened to pull up in a lay-by to consult Google maps. While Alec was looking at his phone I eyed a place across the road, that wasn't advertised at all. I thought it looked the ticket and got out of the van to have a closer look. I was no sooner at the gate than a car pulled up with the owner in it. I asked could the place be rented, was told it could, and soon we were looking around it. It is ideal for our purposes. Now to see if we can put them into effect!

I am as cagey as ever about getting involved with serious financial commitments, and yes, I do wish I was 20 years younger; but it just didn't happen then the way it seems to be happening now. The world itself has changed. Twenty years ago I was that miserable codger going on about doom and gloom, but not so now. Funnily enough, now that the world is more recognizent of the doom and gloom, I am a lot happier in myself, and perhaps more so than I have been since childhood. I am feeling really whole, with all my faculties and gifts functioning together. In absolute terms, no doubt I had a lot more energy 20 years ago, but I wasted so much of it that probably I am able to actually apply more now, even if I am getting a little clapped out in some respects. The gifts of 70 years plus can far outweigh the drawbacks, friend Emile, and being truly positive does not involve any denial of the 'downside' of reality!

     

     

All Saints' Day, 2018.

October Dawn, by Fiona.

In contrast to the calm that prevailed as we looked out from our Sherkin retreat last week, rank on rank of shining but angry waves are marching on the beach in Nazaré, where the struggle to restore the Anna M goes on. When I arrived here yesterday the streets were wet with recent rain, and the wind had a winter chill. There was a waterspout out off a couple of days ago. Today, All Saints' Day, is however warm, and the afternoon sun, some 15 degrees higher than in Ireland, was almost hot.

This feast is still a national holiday in Portugal, thank God, and it was a great pleasure to celebrate it in the Santuario, with music, with down-to-earth people, and with the sun slanting through the incense to shine on all that gold paint. There was a time when I would have laughed at that. No more; today I truly had a sense of participating in that great eternal community which alone can satisfy our deepest needs and longings, and constitute a meaningful end to our troubled pilgrimage here on Earth; I know that sense would not have been so strong, even at Mass, in our dour northern cultures.

For years I tried to pretend that Heaven was merely a bonus, if it turned out to be true, and perhaps only a dream. But why 'only' a dream? Can anything be more important than our dreams? Are not dreams meant to be satisfied? Now I also vividly realise that humanity inevitably descends into gross darkness when the hope of that destiny is lost sight of. Silly modern Ireland, and all those who think that our poor efforts at work are more valuable than keeping that dream alive, especially now as we face into the winter.

It is not just the season that we face this day. It seems to me that our confidence in life itself, and the whole human project, is facing a time of most acute threat. It is not surprising in these circumstances that, to my profound distress, Ireland has recently voted to devalue marriage and human life itself, along with countenancing the cursing of God. Across the water in Blighty disintegration is seriously setting in, exacerbated by the decision to withdraw from the best ever opportunity for the nations of Europe to cooperate in attempting to bring our civilisation onto a new equilibrium.

Where does this leave those of us who opposed this whole agenda? Perhaps where in truth we always were, in a minority of 'nutters'! But we were able to compromise more agreeably with the world for too long, to pretend that there was not much difference really between those who kept the Faith and those who did not, that we were all much of muchness really, and most people were trying to do their best. Now 'trying to do one's best' in the same old way is not good enough. There are real, hard, difficult choices to be made if the human race is not going to destroy itself and the planet. It seems most unlikely that 'the demos' will take the right ones, on democracy's current form.

Yet in the Gospel that the Church reads today, the Sermon on the Mount, Christ lays out the path for us to take, if we are to partake in that feast with all the saints. It is not some holy war. It involves peacemaking and hungering and thirsting for justice. It commends patience and forbearance, especially when we run into persecution. So on we go, laying one stone of the Holy City on another, as best we can.

But why bother to seriously attempt to keep the roof on this our earthly home? Is it not blasphemous to equate our little struggles with building the Kingdom? What have sustainability, recycling, organic living and so on got to do with it anyway?

I say that reverence for life and for physical reality are inseparable from reverence for their Creator. I also fear that those who have no such reverence inevitably turn destructive; this is 'the other side' of the fact that he who does not love this Earth has no true love of God. Yet we may find, if we get down to work with them, that after all we can make common cause with people with whom we profoundly disagree; even if they do not know it, they too are children of God; let the falling out come from them if so it must be!

Rebuilding the fallen wall.

'A VERY BIG Political Agenda'

The 'Azores High' seems to have moved nearer Ireland this year, 

October siesta, Ireland 2018.

and the peachy weather goes on and on. It is delightful on Sherkin, and I am working through many little jobs about our place that between the Nazaré Project and the building work on the West Room have been left aside. It's hard to say it, especially after the IPCC report last weekend, but maybe there are some positive aspects to global warming for us here in Ireland.

     The Duckie reckons that those climate scientists have 'a Very Big political agenda'. Of course they do, if they have any care for the world; the question is whether the agenda comes from the science, or the science from the agenda? Anyway meanwhile yet another reason for divesting from fossil fuels is coming to the fore, namely not to be in hock to the likes of that crowd in Saudi Arabia. It is amazing that it has taken the murder of Jamal Khashoggi to force some serious rethinking in their regard, while the bombings in Yemen and all their other abuses have so far mainly elicited little public concern.

     Journalists of course are inclined to look after their own, but the cold-blooded torture and murder of one of them is particularly shocking, as an assault on the human attempt to achieve some kind of handle on truth itself. However, respect for truth derives from respect for the life on which it depends. When we assert truth, it is life itself that we are standing up for, even while 'the first victim of war is truth'. War indeed is a vortex of destructivity, a fire that destroys truth along with lives and every other genuine human value. 

     Before we in the West wax too self-righteous, it is worth recalling how blind we have become to truths not just of the suffering of Arabs in countries which we know little about, but even in our own countries to, for example, the dismembering of babies in their mother's womb. This goes to show that when truth contradicts a narrative that is important to us, we all have a tendency to suppress it. Anyway the Duckie has little difficulty in admitting the political baggage which he brings into his consideration of the facts which are being laid before us concerning Mr Khashoggi, and in such brazen admissions he manages to relieve his supporters of a load of guilt.
  
     It's a simple matter of those 'trillions and trillions of dollars' that he and his friends stand to lose, if indeed you can call that consideration 'political'. It seems to be just about the only kind of truth that he believes in anyway, though he bandies about the usual canard about Iran needing to be contained. As for his concerns about 'millions and millions of jobs', actually of course, if we get stuck into the transition to green energy rightly, it will create them. On the other hand, as long as we remain dependent on oil, we are going to see disastrous recessions every time there is a squeeze on the inexorably rising price of the stuff.

     It will be interesting to see if the Duckie manages to go on denying the truth about the Saudi regime; I wouldn't put it past him, considering the way he denies climate science. The fact is that the way the oil industry has of funnelling vast amounts of cash into the hands of elites is dangerous in itself. The transition to a sustainable future involves a transfer of power, in both the metaphorical and the literal sense, away from elites and into the hands of small groups. 

     For Fiona and me, the ideal way of living has always been in a home which is as self-sufficient as possible, within a community likewise orientated to self-sufficiency. This is why I am particularly interested in the concept of energy farms. I have dreams of facilitating a way of working whereby farmers in what is now desert may sell their crop of, say, hydrogen produced from water with solar power, in the same way as in temperate lands farmers sell their milk. First one would have to produce the water of course, but even that should not be a problem with enough electricity available to desalinate it. Given jobs and water, plus some useful shade under solar panels, life in the desert might become a whole lot more appealing for people whose only interest at present seems to be destruction.

     Hopefully, Jamal Khashoggi will achieve more in his demise than he ever could have dreamt of! God rest his soul.

'Going Global'

In the Iberian Peninsula the weather was still fine and hot, the land looking brown and parched, the sea out west calm, as I flew north on Saturday. Heavy white surf made its appearance on the coast of Galicia, and some scattered cloud. Flying on serenely above the weather, gale-force winds were whipping up the sea in that dodgy zone to the north of Spain, where two seas meet, and we even experienced some turbulence high above the clouds. Things settled down again as we approached Ireland, and although the cover was thicker over the land, the startling green landscape gleamed from Kinsale to Kerry's Reeks, as we came into land at Cork.

     Fiona was there to meet me, on our 51st wedding anniversary, and soon we were enjoying the peace of our island home together again. What a carry-on that decision to put the 'Anna M' on the concrete at Nazaré, in June last year, has turned out to entail! Yet it had to be done, and while it threatened to put an end to the whole Gannetswaysailing saga, I'm now hopeful it will prove merely the end of the beginning. We have become much more engaged in really doing something, in the challenge of putting our lives on a sustainable basis.

     This process of engagement is something that can only come about in its own time. I am tempted to think it a great pity that it did not kick in for me twenty years ago, but it turns out that my early 70s may be a very good time for it. Of course, the fact of having a pension, as long as the old body hangs in, frees one up a lot; and also in a sense one has more freedom in the mind. I had pretty well given up on having ambitions and plans for myself, which is a great way to be, genuinely throwing oneself on the will of God.  But He has a way of returning, with much interest, all the fruits of one's experience and indeed of one's care down the years. Now to apply them as best I can, in the serene awareness that I may well not be around to see much of what becomes of them!

     What hopes we have of something becoming of them are very much bound up with the European Union, primarily of course because of the funds we hope to access, but also in the light of the aspiration, still lacking in clarity and confidence, of developing an alternative to the kind of socio-political set-up propagated by the, dare I say, 'Neo-liberal nations of the Anglo-sphere'? I do not relish throwing such labels around, especially being aware that there are very many people in both Britain and the USA who would strongly wish to dis-associate themselves from such a one as this. The fact remains however that Europe, and especially Ireland, is very much subject to their economic and cultural hegemony, not to say 'neo-colonialism'. This largely accounts for my obsession with building up our relationships with our continental neighbours to the south.

     That neocolonialism is not without its advantages, I have to admit. God alone knows where Ireland would be at this stage without American and British multi-national companies and so on, economically speaking! In this interlinked world of ours, all economic activity depends on its context; however, that favoured by les Anglo-Saxons is showing every sign of exhaustion; for everyone's sake, not least their own, a new direction needs to be found. In Blighty one crowd seems to want to go in the general direction of Singapore, and the other of Cuba, while I suppose a majority know that they want something different, but have not the foggiest notions of what it might be.

     For them theological may very well be a term of abuse, which hardly helps them find that new way; they just don't realise that it is in terms of God that they might find the new language which they need so urgently, and in fairly simple terms actually. Take the work 'ecumenism'; high as it has been for years on theological agendas, rather few would think of it as I tend to myself, in terms of that vital reconciliation that is needed between the aspiration for individual responsibility, freedom and fulfilment on one hand, and the demands of sustainability and solidarity on the other. Broadly speaking the former comes more naturally to those of  a Protestant mindset, for whom salvation tends to be a transaction between the individual and God, and the latter to those of a Catholic one, who seek their place within the Body of Christ. Both are impoverished in this divided state; somehow they need to be reconciled, if our civilisation is to have any future.

     In practical terms of how people live, it helps a lot if we at least acknowledge with gratitude that God made us, and what's more did not just leave us to our own devices, without guidance. It's not that I cannot see my way to working with those who deny this, but I do take Jesus' advice on the matter, going on the basis of 'those who are not against us are with us'! Unfortunately there sometimes comes a parting of company; with Jesus, there can be no working just to make money, nor setting the pursuit of our own interests up as the main priority of our lives. We have to work on the basis of justice and the common good, while bearing in mind also William Blake's famous dictum, the 'the General Good is the Cry of the Scoundrel, Hypocrite and Liar'.

     Among the more absurd gambits of the Brexiteers is to make out that they stand for a 'global Britain'. In practice this seems to mean that they entertain the forlorn hope of squeezing a little more mileage out of the Imperial British heritage; Mrs May for example seems to think she is being generous in seeking to attract the brightest and best from impoverished countries  where they are desperately needed, so that apparently there are more Sudanese doctors in London than there are in the Sudan. However on the whole former subjects would rather bury the memory of Britannia's rule, would stay at home if the opportunities were there, and are much more likely to be impressed by a new British mind-set that is prepared to be a team player in Europe, and help the old continent rise to the world's needs. All of Europe's nations have their own lines of communication with the rest of the world, with their own possibilities, and those raised by sharing them are massive.

     Is Britain going to be able to do anything about global warming, or Syria or Palestine by itself? Is it going to help Europe find ways of doing so with this stupid Brexit? Where is the plan to create jobs in all those sun-baked countries, which could be developing energy farms in the deserts, using all that sunshine to produce electricity and so for instance water from the sea or hydrogen for powering fuel cells? This is where, if it is to succeed, the right balance needs to be struck between building on local culture and promoting development. The neo-liberal Anglosphere has failed dismally. Can old Europe still learn and do better?
     

Light's Coming, Slowly.

Every sailor knows the sense of blessed relief that comes with stopping their engine, when the sails take over and once again the dominant sounds are those of nature and the way of their boat through the water. Now the whole world needs such a moment, leaving dependence on oil and internal combustion engines behind, and indeed this does seem to be coming; 2018 looks like being the year when 'society' is at last getting around to think in terms of electricity for cars and transport in general.

‘Better late than never’! Why it took so long is a good question, considering that electric motors were on the scene before internal combustion ones in the mid nineteenth century. There was indeed a problem with regard to range, but realistically it would not have been such a problem were it not for a certain precious myth of limitless freedom, which advertisers take much 'mileage' out of but which most of the time does not correspond with people's actual usage.

As to the vital development of batteries, much is made of lithium-ion ones, and indeed they are excellent for laptop computers and the rest of things where weight is critical; however, if they get to be required for cars and so on, we are back into a problem of supply. For the Anna M, I am thinking of AGM lead-acid, because they are about a third of the price and anyway, being a displacement boat, if we put lithium-ion ones in, I should probably need to add lead ballast!

With regard to the big picture, I realise that there seems to be a lot of lithium in the ground especially in central Africa, just as there is still a lot of oil, but apart from the little difficulty of actually getting it out, dependence on a limited resource is not good. Future generations have surely a right to a share of them, and it is much better for them to be exploited gradually and carefully, with respect to the environment and also without distorting society by putting too much money into the hands of what is pretty much bound to be a dodgy and bloated elite, who will spend a lot of it on arms in order to consolidate their position. This way, we all find ourselves having to contribute to war!

It likewise distresses me that the hype about electric cars and yachts tends to concentrate on what one might term the 'Bond' class - very flashy things aimed at the small minority who can afford them. All the violence in the world actually does have its roots in our minds, our priorities and indeed our very souls. The company that Alec and I are setting up will be orientated not to the tiny minority in the market for super-yachts, but to people who want to sail or fish, to cruise and sometimes live aboard on a low budget, to be as autonomous as possible while 'treading lightly' on our planet; to people who would actually be very happy to slow down, slipping gently through the waters rather than churning them up, as well as everyone else in their vicinity!

Streets for what?

If we get to land vehicles, personally I would like them to be more in the line of a donkey cart or a pony and trap than a sports car: rugged load carriers for the country or people carriers for cities. It would be great to get back to transporting on sea and land by natural power, with the powerful help of electric motors. The steel schooner that Alec built for himself actually has a cargo hold, and it will be great to see how she works with an electric drive. He has for a while been already at work on how to maximise the regenerative effectiveness of electric drives in sailing boats.

Alec's 'Whirled'.

Where the cockpit was.

On the Anna M, the work of laminating and riveting in new ribs is almost complete, and I am starting to prepare the hull for the final treatment of caulking, plugging nail holes and painting. It should be possible to have the electric drive installed and functioning by the Spring, so that we shall be able to set about testing, demonstrating and selling it.

By then we also intend to have a company incorporated and a premises, and then we shall be in a position to formally issue shares, but in the meantime the age-old problem of getting going is getting us down, and if anyone out there would like to come aboard and invest at this stage, you would be more than welcome, giving us a very valuable leg-up, and the terms would be good!

From Dreaming to Doing.

In this age when computers have made it so easy to churn words out, we are suffering from a veritable blizzard of them. Many of them actually do more to obscure our vision than to enlighten us. To have the opportunity to do more than give them a cursory glance is something of a luxury; serious, joined-up thinking, and the listening and reading that might go with it and which might be expected of anyone exercising any serious judgement, is rare indeed. We all tend to fall back on glancing at our usual sources, rather than trying to wrestle with the very disparate voices that sometimes crop up very near to us, even within us.

Most people allow dodgy press barons or others with murky agendas to tell them what to think, even as they delude themselves that they are thinking for themselves. Hence my extreme distrust of this rule by plebiscite that has somehow crept into politics in some places lately. What kind of democracy is it, as proposed both by Mrs May and Mr Corbyn, which ignoring all precedent, sets up the result of a thoroughly bad and largely dishonest public debate as an immutable decision, which may not be revisited after two roiling years and billions of words have at least surely nudged quite a significant number of people into trying a spot of thinking for themselves and of seriously imagining the kind of a world which they are going to pass on? Still they are not being offered a coherent vision, nor even a viable concept, of where they are being led to. 

However, with the genie out of the bottle, for all its divisive and unsatisfactory nature, it seems that we shall have to go with this type of politics, and that the only hope must be to make the debates more informed and genuinely free. It is encouraging to see young people get stuck into efforts such as:  https://www.wewantthefinalsay.com/ . We can only expect to turn the corner into a more hopeful world when, not content with dispensing more and more words, we find ways of acting them out in positive ways, in our way of living.

This is easier said than done, of course. Practical types rightly tend to be suspicious of idealists, even of ideas and ideals themselves, and actually 'putting one's money where one's mouth is' is a dangerous business. It is not in fact something that one can do from mere intellectual conviction, or as a result of a simple decision. Let us say there has to be an element of serendipity, or if you prefer, plain old luck; and also realise we shall have to overcome a lot of scepticism with patience. It is one thing to deplore cynicism, and another to convince people of viable alternatives. In fact the only way to do so is to demonstrate them, and I suppose it is really only in relation to attempts to do so that the spouting of yet more words by people like me is acceptable.

I wish it had happened twenty years ago, but better late than never I am really enjoying at present the sense of 'firing on all cylinders'. This is surely what a creative and healthy culture bestows on its fortunate children, when the spiritual and physical, the idealist and practical, the social and personal dimensions of life start working together instead of being at odds. The media of our lives, in which term I very much include the means by which for example we get around and power our technology, are indeed the massage. I am showing my age perhaps with this reference to Marshall Mcluhan, but anyway, I want to make the old Anna M into one powerful little messenger with which to massage the folk of the Gannetsway. Away with the separately firing cylinders and struggling to get them to work together; let's get into the Electric Age!  

'Anna M' learning from dolphins that autonomy with solidarity equals freedom. 

Brainstorming Electric Drives.

The renovation of the 'Anna M' has escalated into an undertaking which is frankly beyond my means. I tried a bit of crowd-funding on the basis of offering trips, as I used to do, in exchange for participating in the renovation of this classic wooden boat, but we did not raise enough to make it work. This leaves the way clear however for an even more exciting project, a way that will not alone see the boat through to a new lease of life, but a highly significant and productive one at that.

A felicitous meeting of minds, between myself and Alec Lammas, who is directing the renovation, finds both of us keen on the idea of installing a self-regenerative electric drive in the now empty hull, soon however to be stronger than ever, and using the 'Anna M' as a research and development platform for same, while also sailing round the Gannetsway (predominantly Portugal, Spain, France and Ireland, where Alec has the franchise for selling Lynch Electric Motors) to demonstrate and sell them.

Our John invited us to a brainstorming session in the old cow shed that he has brilliantly adapted to this purpose at his place in Co Clare*, and Alec flew from Portugal to participate. John kicked off by asking us both to write up on the boards our answers to the questions Why? What? & Who?  Off we went to work in the stalls on each side of the shed, and this was the result:-

(Joe) WHY?

Boat

1. Finish ‘Anna M’ (Worthwhile keeping classic boat afloat).
2. Install electric drive because it’s quiet, smooth, cheap to run, instantaneous power, little servicing, puts emphasis back on sailing.
3. More interesting and more FUN than steaming along under power in the noisy little bubble of one’s own intention.

Family /personal

1. Need to spread responsibility and justify spending when this old man is on the way out.
2. Instead of being a mere ‘hole in the water for pouring money into’, the boat will create work and business opportunities for the new generation.
3. Been dreaming about it these last 10 years or so - it’s now or never!
4. This Gannetsway project builds on my long interest in Ireland, France, Spain and Portugal and the relationship between them.

General

1. Transition to sustainable post-Oil Age extremely urgent.
2. Many possibilities in both leisure use and fishing.
3. Developing a whole new culture and relationship with nature, especially for seafarers and fishermen, particularly between the Atlantic nations of Europe.

WHAT?

Phase I - Install self-regenerating electric drive in ‘Anna M’, monitor performance, modify/improve. The propeller will charge the batteries through the motor, when the boat is sailing well. The direction of the power, to or from the prop, will change easily as appropriate. There will also be as many solar panels as practical, and of course it will be possible to recharge with shore power.
Phase II - demonstrate, sell and install more drives, make money.

Phase III - if possible move on to manufacturing, with preference for cooperation with small artisanal outfits rather than big business.

WHO?

The Electrosail Project stems from a meeting of minds between Alec Lammas and Joe Aston. Alec will be Managing Director - see his Who? section. Joe will be focussed primarily on the Anna M and promotion of the equipment, as well as overall strategy.

(Alec)WHY?

• It’s something positive to pass the time with.
• It’s a collection of subjects I’m already linked to.
• I’m at a place in life where I need to lighten up the work I do (physically - clarify priorities - lighter mind).
• Money isn’t about to go out of fashion (i.e. need income).
• I trust the people and products I’ll be involved with.
• The potential for success of project is limitless.
• It’s something I’ve had on the backburner for years and the time is right now.

WHAT?

• Replacing internal combustion engines in both commercial and pleasure boats with electric propulsion units, principally ‘LYNCH’ marine drive systems.
• Developing, improving, conceiving, producing and researching new technologies such as battery management systems, regenerative charging systems, revised versions of ‘LYNCH’ motors.

WHO?

• Joe / Alec - communication, testing/researching, demonstrating, selling, promoting.
• Alec / Joe - ideas, technical improvements/ R&D, installing, selling.
• Secretary T.B.A. - paperwork, billing, accounting etc
• Investors welcome.

Heads together in the cow stalls - Ger Kavanagh,
Joe, Steve Morris and Alec Lammas.

The brainstorming session was brilliant and we have a clear idea where we want to go. One might ask also Where? Alec is based in Nazaré, Portugal, which is strategically placed between Northern and Southern Europe, and there we hope to open a premises with workshop, store and office. Conversion jobs would preferably be undertaken there, but Alec hopes to put a lorry with a crane on the road that will be able to transport small boats by road. If there proves to be the demand, we may look for premises elsewhere also, in Ireland for example. Now for the hard part - we have to set about seeing what capital we can raise! Any potential share-holders out there?

In the Party Shed at Astoneco.

*see https://www.astoneco.com/en/homepage