Another Navigator nearing completion Down Under

Lester Searle is nearing completion of his Navigator yawl Leighton.  Lester is building his Navigator in Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, which is on the East coast of Australia - about midway between Sydney and Brisbane.

Lester named his Navigator in honor of his father and his service during World War II.

"Shes called Leighton which was the name of the British merchantman out of Liverpool my Dad was serving on in WW2 when he met my Mum in Fremantle West Australia."

 

Lester tells me hes "given the plastic a workout at Duckworks" and has "got to the really scary bit for me - the rigging."

"Still no rub rails  but think I will get her in the water sometime in the next few weeks."

"I am not an experienced sailor so this is the most mysterious part of the whole thing.  I am not an experienced boat builder either - gardener by trade and latter day pen pusher - so the building thing has been great fun."

 

Looks like fine workmanship to me, Lester!

"...sometimes I just go down to the shed (4th one so far in a seven year build) and look at her and feel happy. "

For his yawl rigged Navigator, Lester rigged his mainsail as a sliding Gunter main, but with a sprit boom in lieu of the conventional boom.  Ive seen this rig many times on other Navigators, but I havent heard much discussion from those who have used this setup.  Im very interested in hearing how he likes it.

Congratulations, Lester, on your accomplishments thus far.  We are all looking forward to your upcoming "splash", and wish you many, many years of joy and adventure aboard Leighton.

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A Fall Float Down the Yaquina River

Saturday last was the date set for the annual fall Yaquina River float. For Doryman, this been a Halloween tradition for eight years, on this beautiful coastal Oregon river. For others, (all comers welcome) it depends on the weather.

This year, the prognosticators said a big Pacific front was coming in and there would be rain, wind and more rain. Those of us who live on the coast tend to take the forecasts with a grain of salt. The most reliable prediction method is to look out the window.

The crowd was small and dedicated. As you can see in the photos, everyone was dressed for the worst. Which, of course meant that we were over dressed for a delightfully warm and mostly sunny day. Sorry those slackers less dedicated missed it.

This was the first time on the water for the completed Doryman Melonseed. Ive christened her Aria. We left the sailing gear at home and loaded up the oars for the trial run. My good friend Jim Ballou dropped by the Doryman boatyard early Saturday with a smart little skiff needing some attention so, for the river run, he didnt have a ride of his own.

It was an excellent opportunity to see how the melonseed performed with a payload. Jim and I shifted our weight around to test for stability and Im happy to say the melonseed is a wonderful little boat. She rows like a dream, cant wait to set up a sail rig and see how she flies.....

,

Bob, deep in conversation with Chuck and Shalline:

Jim taking it easy while Michael does all the work. (Just teasing you, Jim.)


Thanks to Shalline for the photos of Aria.





And a short video of Jim R, with Lucy the Dog, in the Lazy Duck skiff. Commentary by Jim B.


Fall 2013 on the Yaquina River from doryman on Vimeo.

If you havent had enough, heres the rest of the pictures.

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Down But Not Out

News travels fast so many of you already know, Belle Starr went on the rocks. That sounds a bit like one of my sly jokes, but its not.

A winter force gale swept through the Pacific Northwest the last hours of August, leaving thousands of homes without power. Belle Starr rode high and secure through the first heavy gusts but chaffed her solitary anchor line as the storm crested.

Two hours after wed made a positive visual check on her position from shore, the Coast Guard called and said she was on the beach. At an extreme low tide, thats where I found her, in sand pocked with barnacle encrusted rocks and only a couple boat lengths from a rip-rap jetty.

After watching the tide come back and the surf rise while assessing all options, I called Vessel Assist. In most cases I would much prefer a self-rescue but it was clear I didnt have the resources this time.




Vessel Assist at first told me the seas were too high and they couldnt approach the wreck. We must wait for the wind to die down, possibly another six hours according to predictions. But barely had I digested this news than their boat appeared just 100 yards off shore. They deployed an inflatable and a diver swam a hawser in-shore. With the boat leaping in the surf, the diver lassoed the bow bits and Belle was towed carefully off the beach. Id been told she was breached, though she made a mighty effort to float, so soon she lowered herself in thirty five feet of water to spend the night on the calm sand below.

The salvage crew told me that while they were working, gusts had been clocked on their boat at 80mph.

Break of dawn the following morning in a calm, flat sea, divers wrapped Belle in a cocoon of air bags until her cabin deck was above water and she was towed to the travel-lift in the boatyard.

Shes on her trailer now. My very good friend, the superlative shipwright Paul Miller from Cowichan Bay, BC,  drove south Wednesday to help me cut away the damaged portions of Belle and prep for repairs. Hes started a thread on his favorite social media, lumberjocks:
http://lumberjocks.com/shipwright/blog/65362

Paul is having way too much fun.

Belle Starr now looks like a cut-away view of herself. There is a very good chance she will be back together and weather tight in a month.

Please stay tuned..........

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