Bob's Identity Management Blog

"Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm." – Syrus Publilius

Ok, so I decided I should pickup a knife to take along on outings on the boat. (I know it is winter now, but I’m going stir crazy) …so I started shopping around.

First stop was my local West Marine store where I ordered a US Navy sailing knife. From the blurry picture in the catalog it looked like it had a blade, marlin spike for breaking knots and a shackel key built in. After three weeks of waiting it finally arrive and I stopped by to pick it up. My first impression was that this was probably World War II surplus as I remember my grandfather having the same knife from his tour of duty in the pacific. I figured that not much has changed in knife technology, so I took it home. I ended up returning it as it didn’t have the shackel key and I’ve become used to having one handy and I don’t particularly want to carry two items.

Before I began searching and to reduce the posibility of returning another purchase I set down some must-haves for the next purchase. Stainless-Steel, locking blade(to prevent accidents), serrated blade, shakle key, marlin spike and a loop for a lanyard. So of course like any modern day sailer I went to Google and started my research. In the end I looked at several dozen knives. I finally settled on a Wichard knife from Fawcett’s in Annapolis that seems to have everything I was looking for… the bottle opener may be a bit much but it could come in handy someday.