What's in a name?

[jez1954]

Our little boat was called Jennifer when we bought her last year (her or it?? I'm not the sentimental type) - but I didn't think it right when the wife's called Shirley. She wasn't keen on being immortalised, so we (I) named her after our adopted pussy (Rowdy) who's getting a bit of an old lass......hence RowdyKat.

She (the cat that is) received such an odd name because her orignal servants were American and we were taken onto the staff when they returned Stateside and couldn't be arsed to take her with them!

 

Jez

[Yamanx]

Wow! when I posted in this thread five or more years ago the boat I had then was called Joey, after the late great Joey Dunlop.

 

My current boat, I wanted to call it Joey, again! but figured it should be something different. Couldn't think of anything, so I rushed it, I was a big fan of David Bowie years ago and settled for Hunky Dory I always planned to come up with something better, but its still Hunky Dory

[Naughty Cal]

Wow! when I posted in this thread five or more years ago the boat I had then was called Joey, after the late great Joey Dunlop.

 

My current boat, I wanted to call it Joey, again! but figured it should be something different. Couldn't think of anything, so I rushed it, I was a big fan of David Bowie years ago and settled for Hunky Dory I always planned to come up with something better, but its still Hunky Dory

 

The Bayliner next door to ours is called Hunky Dory as well.

[Timleech]

I planned to call my work boat, being converted from a burnt out shell, 'Barnabas Hedley' after an ancestor, it has a certain 'ring' to it.

He was a railwayman, stationmaster at the first Tynemouth station among other things, and claimed a direct connection with William Hedley of Wylam (he came from the same neck of the woods). My wife has done a fair bit of research and so far been unable to prove a connection so it's become a bit of an irritation

My daughter is determined it should be called 'Bob' instead, for no special reason, and if the name ever gets to be painted on the side it'll be my wife who gets the job so she's in favour of the short name

 

Tim

Edited February 24, 2010 by Timleech

[sharky]

I named my GRP Dawncraft cruiser 'Laikin Aht' cos thats what we do on a boat

 

former name was The Rita Deere

 

 

 

Sharky

[Odana]

If I had the balls I'll call my boat "The rust bucket" as with my limited budget thats whats shes likely to be.

 

Why not? I did see a boat named 'Mr Rusty' once - had a marvellous rubbed-down patchwork paint job.

 

Odana was the name that came with the boat. For years, thanks to a bit of googling early on, I thought it was a Hungarian girl's name, and had associations with gipsy maidens etc in my head. I was devastated to eventually be told that Odana was some princess in Star Trek - she's NOT a trekkie boat! She's not! But anyway, I like the name and it's been part of the boat far too long to be changed now.

[Purple Fairie]

'Fairies Wear Boots' by Black Sabbath

When we were searching for names we looked at list after list of boat names, then we realised we weren't going to end up with anything original doing that so we looked through the record collection. Smudge and Beth (our youngest) are both huge Ozzy fans and I like my fairies so when we came to Fairies Wear Boots it was really a no-brainer! Plus I got to paint a fairy on the boat which I was never allowed to do at the house!

We have two responses to the Fairy - 'where does the name come from?' or 'SABBATH' (usually middle aged men! )

[Ynot]

My wife wouldn't let me have a boat with sails.

[Gunna Do]

We have owned a few yachts in our past and one (a Jaguar) came with the name 'Macavity', from T S Elliots 'book of cats'. We loved the name and called the next couple of boats the same however we were always 'going to do' the canal thing, so when the time came it just had to be 'GUNNA DO'!

Regarding the changing of a boat's name supposedly being unlucky, so far it doesn't seem to have done us any harm. According to the old sailors, boats must never be painted green or have any women on board either........ Oh cripes, what have we done!!

[Québec]

Spent a night also in the luxurious Chateau Frontenac Hotel in Quebec City - in the car park in the back of an old Volvo!

The kids, when they were toddlers, could never say it properly. So, for us, it's always been the Chateau FrontandBack!

[mykaskin]

My parents boat was going to be called Yorkshire Rose - but since there were hundreds of them (well maybe not that bad) they decided to call it "Rose of Yorkshire"

 

The boat I used to share with my Dad was called Kismet when we bought it, and since we couldn't come up with something we could both agree on it was kept.

 

Shoestring was also called that before I got her. I'm not sure if it was "Living on a..." or "Built on a..."

 

Victoria was built as part of a large order, built under Royalty class specifications. Butty was Albert. When she was sold out of waterways she had no name. ST Brant - a coal merchant in Birmingham - bought her, and as with all their other boats named her after a family member, in this case Linda (which I believe was his daughter?). Birmingham and Midland also kept the name, but the first private owner took her back to her original name.

 

Cheers, Mike

 

... not a bad thread to bring back up.

[billS]

Sea Vixen - bit of a funny name for a narrowboat.

 

the original owner was an ex Fleet Air Arm pilot, and he named it after the De Havilland Sea Vixen - his favourite aircraft.

 

So that good enough for me!

Edited February 24, 2010 by billS

[MoominPapa]

Melaleuca is the botanical name for a family of plants native to Australia, the most well-known of which is the Ti tree, which produces Tea tree oil.

 

Melaleuca was built by an Australian couple, starting with a Jonathan Wilson shell, and they chose the name, presumably for the Australian connection. It was 17 years old when we bought it, and after that length of time we couldn't rename, even if we wanted to.

 

MP.

[abfab]

This is the topic of conversation with us at the moment ...trying to think of a name for our soon to be built nb.

 

We asked our son and daughter for input. Now taking into consideration that I am a continence advisor.

 

Our son said' The Floater'

and our daughter said 'Motion in the Ocean'

 

Knew it was a mistake to ask!!!

[Québec]

This is the topic of conversation with us at the moment ...trying to think of a name for our soon to be built nb.

 

We asked our son and daughter for input. Now taking into consideration that I am a continence advisor.

 

Our son said' The Floater'

and our daughter said 'Motion in the Ocean'

 

Knew it was a mistake to ask!!!

 

 

sounds like you're still waiting for your 'Ureter!' moment

[Canalfreak]

My wife wouldn't let me have a boat with sails.

 

My wife wouldn't let me call our boat "Blogless".

 

On the grounds that "everybody else" seems to write one and there's no way I can be bothered to broadcast to the nation every day.

 

Bob.

[NBMike]

sounds like you're still waiting for your 'Ureter!' moment

Having spent 3 years in Montréal, P.Q. back in the 70's I'm curious to know if you named your boat and why - or was it already named Québec?

Mike

 

I had a ride on a recumbent bike called a Peer Gynt a few years ago. It was great. One day I'll build one. But, there was this boat that got in the way. So , thinking along the same theme - Solveig's song - from Greig's 'Peer Gynt Suite.'

Edited February 24, 2010 by NBMike

[Québec]

Having spent 3 years in Montréal, P.Q. back in the 70's I'm curious to know if you named your boat and why - or was it already named Québec?

Mike

Hi Mike,

See link to previous posting #67 on this thread.

Link

[NBMike]

Hi Mike,

See link to previous posting #67 on this thread.

Link

 

I have many happy memories of the time I spent in province of Québec. I actually did an evening class in Québec City, hitch-hiking up on Wednesday late afternoon, and am now the proud owner of a Calêche Driver Licence. I never did take up the post though!

Mike

[magnetman]

We have owned a few yachts in our past and one (a Jaguar) came with the name 'Macavity', from T S Elliots 'book of cats'. We loved the name and called the next couple of boats the same however we were always 'going to do' the canal thing, so when the time came it just had to be 'GUNNA DO'!

Regarding the changing of a boat's name supposedly being unlucky, so far it doesn't seem to have done us any harm. According to the old sailors, boats must never be painted green or have any women on board either........ Oh cripes, what have we done!!

 

I believe that this rule is actually due to a strange occurence when health and safety insisted on putting signage all over boats. These signs were intended to prevent accidents at sea. Some of them got badly weathered over the years with letters gradually fading and eventually a combination of illiteracy and misunderstanding caused the common belief that there was an official ban on members of the fairer sex being allowed on boats. Its a long and complicated story but sort of makes sense.

 

 

NO SWIMMING

 

[Guest]

This is the topic of conversation with us at the moment ...trying to think of a name for our soon to be built nb.

 

We asked our son and daughter for input. Now taking into consideration that I am a continence advisor.

 

Our son said' The Floater'

and our daughter said 'Motion in the Ocean'

 

Knew it was a mistake to ask!!!

 

'Pelvic floor'

 

surely???

[GRPCruiserman]

'Pelvic floor'

 

surely???

 

You could 'nauticalise' this and call it 'Pelvic Sole'

[eightpot]

Boudica - so named after Queen of the Iceni. Not in deferance to her leading an uprising against the occupying Romans, rather in recognition of her town planning skills in dispatching London from the face of the earth. Unfortunately they rebuilt the place.

[Mrs Humdinger]

Our first boat, a little red 35 ft narrowboat, was called Bill's Boat - yes, because husband's name is Bill. Not very original I know, but best we could manage at the time. Our second narrowboat was called Kaos when we bought it, because the woman who owned it previously was called Kay. You can spot a bit of a theme emerging, I know. We changed that to Chaos, which wasn't strictly changing the name in my view, but seemed to suit us better.

 

Our new boat, nearly finished, will be called Humdinger, after a bottle of beer! Again, probably very appropriate.

[Phil Ambrose]

Oh I just remembered, we once owned a 18ft GRP cruiser called "Pillage" yes we changed the name, as she was green we called her The Good Elf.

 

Phil