How Moonraker got her name!

I know I said I'd post on the lights but having a little trouble with those and I got sidetracked with building a fireplace mantle and working in my gardens!

So instead, this is the story of how Moonraker got her name.   I thought long and hard about an appropriate name, but in the end tradition won out.   The 1963 Overlander has now been officially named "Moonraker"   Not after the 007 Bond movie  (which actually would be time appropriate because the James Bond book was written in 1955),  but after the sailing term.

According to Wikipedia -  A moonraker, also known as a moonsail, hope-in-heaven, or hopesail, is a sail flown immediately above the skysail on the very top of the royal mast on large square rigged sailing ships of the Clipper era. None of the four- and five-masted square rigged ships carried a moonsail.  This is a relatively unusual sail only used on ships built primarily for speed.   See the one in the picture way at the tippy tippity top?  :)



This term also has special meaning in my family.  Growing up, my Dad always had a boat named Moonraker, as was the sailboat he built when we were kids. 

When he retired,  he built a 20 foot mahogany gaff-rigged yawl that was his pride and joy (and a source of many hours of fun sailing for our family!  You can't really see it in the picture but it was built of strips of mahogany glued together.  Absolutely stunning!   He liked nothing better than to put up the racing jib and FLY!  The funny thing was whenever we took it out on the lake,  all the boats would come close trying to get a better look at it.  Quite often we got the "Thumbs-up"!   In a way, it was a lot like owning an Airstream!!!!!

  I think that he (and Wally) would approve of me naming my Airstream after the boats!   Somewhere I read about Wally naming all the Airstream models after boats (and one of them was captained by the first female captain).  but I can't find it again.  Anyone know where I saw that????