In defence of portholes

Reading all the Twenty Answers that are coming out of the blog-work, it does appear that portholes are not everyone’s aperture of choice. For some, they are little better than the devil’s spawn, small, cheerless holes into evil shadowlands. We want windows, we want light, we want to see out, they all chant. Well, I have light, I can see out and I have portholes. When we were on display at the Huddersfield National I can always remember one chap coming in and shutting the front doors behind him. Oh my gawd, it’s a stick-up, thinks me. I just wanted to see how dark it was inside, says he. It’s surprisingly light, isn’t it? Well done, that man. Yes, it is light. The windows in the front doors, the side-hatch either side, the plentiful but in proportion ports and the airy beech linings all combine to make it a perfectly pleasant interior, which I can enjoy without being gawped at. It’s also arguably safer as the only thing that can climb through them is an octopus and how many cases of octo-tentacled breaking and entering have you heard about? If I want to look out (and for most of the day I am either at the stern or in the well-deck) then I lean out of the side-hatch for a 180 degree butchers. Now I have no issue with windows, none at all, and indeed I’m a firm believer in freedom of fenestration but please don’t tell me that ports equate to pokey. Or I’ll poke you.