We have bought one to play with -

Actually its an old Cherub - Peanuts by name and K2350 by number. No that's not it in the colour photo (in one's dreams). That one's called Stoned Longer and is one of the newer assymetric types. I think it might even be an Australian Cherub. Peanuts is a very old Cherub with a conventional if quite large spinnaker on an hilariously long pole. We don't get out in Peanuts much but it's a hoot. The boat was stripped down externally for some necessary restoration and has had a few outings, the first of which was the Lochcarron Dinghy Regatta in Wester Ross on 29/30th June and once or twice at Largs.

We have more or less sorted out the spinnaker - we use a single ended pole which is retracted back along the boom but keep getting in a mess with the uphaul and downhaul. An asymmetric (just a little one would do for our purposes) would be a lot easier but and I have wonderd if this is possible using a pole attached to the foot of the mast. If anyone has tried this I'd be pleased to hear from them. I definitely do not intend to perform the kind of irreversible surgery on Peanuts as you would be required for a proper assymetric conversion and I think that would be a shame in what is a quite well known survivor. Also I think the ancient structure couldn't cope with the stresses and the boat might break too.

This is Peanuts long ago

The Cherub is actually a fascinating development class. I have no intention of reiterating the history - for that you should look up the excellent Cherub web site - one of, if not the best dinghy websites there is. Basically the Cherub is a 12 foot skiff which is popular with those who want to build things and develop their own go-fast ideas. (Cherub enthusiasts are into carbon-epoxy vacuum bagging and all sorts of sticky pursuits not recommended for your living room.) Most recently the class has increased sail area even more and gone for twin trapezes - presumably to retain the Cherub's reputation as a boat that is blisteringly fast for a very short time until it falls over (or a bit breaks off).The absolute latest wheeze is to investigate foiling as has been demonstrated by Rohan Veal in his Moth. For that to be possible you need an ultralight dinghy and a ridiculous amount of sail neither of which is a problem for the current Cherubs.

This picture was taken at the Lochcarron regatta in 2005

back to main page