This blog is devoted to my John Welsford designed 15' Navigator yawl Ellie. I built her in my garage over a period of 18 months and launched her in 2011. She sports a sliding gunter main, roller furled jib and sprit-boomed mizzen. Her construction is glued-lapstrake over permanent bulkheads and stringers. This blog is a record of her construction and her voyages here in the Puget Sound area and (hopefully) a useful resource for fellow Welsford boat builders.
80 million years ago, near what is now Baja California, an Ammonite met an unfortunate end. Life in the late Cretaceous was tough. Dinosaurs like the duck bills, the ankylosaurs, and horned dinosaurs were enjoying a period of great success. Tyrannosaurs were the dominant large predator. Birds were becoming increasingly common and diverse, replacing the pterosaurs. Even primitive placental mammals were becoming common. In the seas, modern sharks appeared and elasmosaurs diversified. But perhaps it was the sudden appearance of the mosasaurs and their spectacular evolutionary radiation that contributed to the decline and eventual extinction of our unfortunate ammonite.
Let's hope our friend didn't fall prey to this Mosasaur
The shell of our Ammonite friend settled in a clam bed of a shallow marine sea. Over millions of years, sedimentary layers were laid down upon him. Collision of the oceanic and north American continental plates caused the region to inch its way 1500 miles north, one earthquake jolt at a time. It also caused the seabed to fold into a U-shape, tilt, and uplift forming Sucia island, which geologists call a classic example of a "plunging marine syncline". Wind and wave erosion has continually eaten away Sucia's shoreline exposing the fossils buried there.
Including that of our Ammonite friend, the shape of which seems oddly familiar.
The fossilized remains of an Ammonite
Fossils riddle the cliff face
After my early morning fossil expedition it was time for Tim and I to explore Patos Island. I've been to the San Juans many times, but I've never been to Patos. Sailing to, and exploring a place for the first time is something we enjoy immensely.
The seas were like glass, so we had to motor the 6 miles from Sucia's Fossil Bay to Active Cove on Patos.
We had some difficulty setting anchor in Active cove. The bay is rocky and full of dense seaweed. After several attempts we were able to find a small patch of sand and drop the anchor on it.
Patos is a beautiful island. The campsites at Active Cove have stunning, sweeping views of Boundary Pass. I was always under the impression that Patos was a wild, undeveloped place, so I was quite surprised to find a sidewalk leading from the Cove to the lighthouse. Tim and I walked out to the Patos lighthouse, which is similar, but larger than our Mukilteo lighthouse. We bought some souvenirs. Tim got a coffee mug with nice photos of the lighthouse and I bought the 50th anniversary of the book The Light on the Island.
We returned to Ellie and continued our circumnavigaton of Patos. We spotted about 30 seals on the rocky beaches on the North East point of the island.
Time to head back to Fossil Bay. We didn't want to miss out on the traditional "Wine and Cheese" night.
After what seemed like an interminably wet Spring, the weather finally broke just in time for this year's Sucia Small Boat Rendezvous. My Son and I met up with Marty Loken at Sandy Point marina early Friday morning, arriving almost simultaneously. After rigging, launching, and puttering a rather long way through Sandy Point, we finally reached the Strait of Georgia, or the "Salish Sea" which some people now call it, but most of us don't, only to discover ... No Wind. Drats!
Marty rowed his beautiful Whilly Boat for a while. We motored for a bit.
Then we towed Marty for another bit until finally, we started to feel a breeze.
The breeze steadily increased until whitecaps began forming, so we stopped to put in a reef.
Shortly after we tied in the reef, naturally the breeze started to die off again, so we shook out the reefs. Argh!
Then, up ahead, we saw three Pelicans! I don't think I've ever seen pelicans around here before, so this was a real treat for us. I even managed to capture them on video as they flew away.
The wind was now almost completely calm, so we started up the outboard again. Then we saw dolphins! I believe these are Harbor Porpoises. We spotted them frequently over the course of the weekend.
When we arrived at Fossil Bay we faced this little problem. I had to wait for the tide to come in so I could move Ellie close enough to the beach to set up my clothesline anchor. Note the seaweed. This is the nasty stuff that nearly killed my outboard motor last year. The motor sucked some of it into the cooling intake, plugging it, which caused the motor to overheat. The engine block got so hot it melted the insulation on the wire to the kill switch, grounding it and shutting off the motor. If that hadn't happened, the motor would have surely seized up.
While waiting for the tide to come in, some of the other boats began to arrive. This gorgeous boat is a Connecticut River Shad boat. After talking to the owners for a while, I finally realized that they weren't a part of our Rendezvous. They lived on Orcas Island and were just there for the day. I told them about our yearly Rendezvous and they said maybe they would join us next year.
Others continued to arrive. Directly behind Ellie you can see Doryman Mike standing in his Valgerda and fellow Shopsmith owner and master woodworker Paul Miller in his Friendship.
Is this tide ever gonna finish coming in??? It did (finally).
We set up camp, did a little hiking, planned our next day's trip to Patos Island, and enjoyed this beautiful sunset.
With over 50 boats signed up, there was quite a variety to see. Here are some examples. My apologies for the brief descriptions and for all the ones I neglected to include.
This is Roger's restoration project, the 16' Nooka Rose featuring a 55 sq ft sprit rig. A work in progress aquired 3 years ago, Roger's objective is to simply catch up on 15 years or so of deferred maintenance, then replace the rub rails and breasthook. The boat features an experimental and interesting Cullar inspired rudder fashioned from a salvaged door, but Roger hung on to the original higher aspect rudder just in case.
This is Bob's boat "Duck", a Jim Michalak designed Scram Pram, featuring 300 pounds of water ballast in 3 tanks which makes it very stiff in a breeze. The birdwatcher style cabin keeps the crew dry in a chop and makes the boat self righting.
Next is Michael's Iain Oughtred designed 14'-6" Whilly Boat "L' Hirondelle"
Tom's 15'-8" Jonesport Peapod has a 65 sq ft spritsail and gets its lines from Am. Small Sailing Craft. The original of this Peapod was built in 1975 in cold-molded cedar. This boat came from a mold of the original.
This is Roger's 11'-2" Joel White designed dinghy built by Roger in 2010.
This 11' 150 lb Rich Kolin designed Heidi Skiff was built by the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding.
This is Richard's "SASe", a 12' B&B yacht Amanda. SASe stands for Solar Assisted Sail and Electric. The bimini top is actually two Solar panels that provide 45watts at 44 volts to power two torqeedo outboards and charge three 680 watt lithium ion batteries giving the boat unlimited range possibilities. The boat is also equipped with sail and oars.
A coolidge centerboard daysailor built and for sale by the NW School of Wooden Boatbuilding.
Nik & Elizabeth's Ian Oughtred designed caledonia yawl "Sutil" built by Grapeview Point Boat Works in 2009. Glued lapstrake construction, sapele plywood, spruce spars, white oak floors and sales, Alaska yellow cedar floorboards and benches. Powered by oar, sail and Torqeedo electric outboard.
Chelcie's charming 11'-1" dinghy "Puff", inspired by George Holmes' 1888 Ethel from Sail and Oar, scaled down to make her a shorter and lighter boat.
Randy's Core Sound 17 should be familiar to many of you by now. Built by Jan Nikolaisen and featured in Small Craft Advisor magazine 2007-2008, issues 47, 49, 51-53.
Beautiful community-built Redfish Kayak (for sale - $5900)
John built this 17'-6" adirondack guideboat in 2009, extended from the usual 15'-16' for racing. Strip built from patterns of a design that was built by William McCaffery, a hunting guide and hotel owner during the early 1900's in the Adirondack region of upstate New York.
Happy Scampers!
Andrew's Bolger designed Bobcat "Bob's Cat", converted to a cruiser with a cabin and other modifications, recently purchased from Bob by Andrew to learn to sail.
Several others were on display on the beach and there for the Small Craft Skills Academy.
James McMullen demonstrating his new boom tent for Rowan
The first ever Pocket Yacht Palooza was a great success and I'm sure it will become an annual event!
Yesterday's TSCA Hood Canal Oyster Messabout at Twanoh State Park was absolutely wonderful, with good friends, perfect weather, a variety of boats, and five dozen enormous, delicious oysters.
Marty Loken and Marjiann (Mojo) Moss who operate Island Boatshop, debuted their 1955 Bill Garden-designed Port Madison Pram, recently refinished and ready for its first sail in a few decades. Port Madison Prams, Marty explained, were designed by William Garden for members of the sail-only Port Madison Yacht Club, whose members wanted a sail-training boat for youngsters and a boat adults could race on weekends. The prams are 13'-6" and resemble an El Toro on steroids, with tons of volume-per-foot.
Tom and Susanne Regan who operate Grapeview Point boat works brought their shellback dinghy. This dinghy is fast! We spent a good part of the day trying to catch up with them.
Doryman Mike Bogoger brought his Ken Basset Firefly Finesse. Finesse is a beautiful boat, but unfortunately Mike had some technical difficulty with his oarlocks (he, uh, sorta forgot 'em). Mike had some limited success with a borrowed set of oars and oarlocks but unfortunately we were not able to witness Finesse's full potential. I pounced on the opportunity and invited Doryman to come sail Ellie with me, and he accepted much to my delight.
Randy Jones brought his Core Sound 17, which he later loaded up with a crowd of TSCA members.
Bob Hancock brought the fiberglass sloop that he's been working on over the winter.
Boats were rigged and launched by 11:00 and we all enjoyed a lively sail.
Then it was time to get down to business. Time for some serious oyster shucking. These oysters were huge and they put up one helluva fight..
We eventually won and let me tell you, these were the most delicious raw and pan fried oysters ever!
After the oyster feed, it was time for another terrific sail. Conditions had improved even more, if that's even possible, from the morning's sail with a bit more wind and sunshine. With Doryman at the helm, we set out to find Marty in his Port Madison pram to get some action shots. We couldn't find them, so we tried instead to catch Tom and Suzanne in their speedy shellback.
I sure hope we can do this messabout again next year!
Stayed home from work today because I wasn't feeling well. Took advantage of the day off to try and teach myself some basic video editing skills. I'm still terrible at it, but it feels like I made a little progress. Have a look and tell me what you think. At least the music is good. I'm a big BMG fan. I love the sweet sound of PVC.
Saturday was our second sail of the year, and it was, shall we say, very interesting.
The forecast was 5-10 mph winds with temperatures in the low 50's (12c). Since the winds were forecast to be light, I decided to take Nina, our cocker spaniel, along. Nina loves to sail, although it's been a few years since her last one. Turns out she's lost her sea legs, but more on that later.
We arrived at the Port of Everett ramp around noon. The winds were light, just as forecasted, and the sun was warm in the gentle breeze. I parked a short distance away from a family that was rigging a Macgregor 26. Maybe it's just me, but I still have trouble embracing the concept of having a 60 HP outboard on a sailboat, towing a water skier. To each his own. The owner gave me a thumbs up and a "Nice boat" on his way to the ramp, and I returned the compliment.
We launched Ellie about 45 minutes later, but struck up a long conversation with a very friendly fellow boatbuilder at the dock. He was genuinely impressed with Ellie and had quite a few questions. There could be another Navigator plying the waters of Puget Sound someday soon.
By the time we finally departed I noticed that the wind had picked up. A lot, in fact. Flags were blowing horizontal so it had to be up to 10-15.
We raised all sail and headed south, inside the jetty, towards the sound with Nina on her leash in one hand and the tiller in the other. Nina was excited to be at sea again. She's very curious so she had to explore every square inch of the boat. A couple times she would put her paws on the side decks and I told her to get down. The third time she did, the boat hit a wave, Nina lost her balance, and overboard she went!
Steve, over at Arwen's Meanderings, has recently written several very interesting blogs about safety gear. One of the many items he has written about are life lines. Fortunately for Nina, she essentially had a life line and I was able to use it to reel her back on board. It all happened so fast. I don't think she was in the water more than 10 seconds, but it was frightening to see her being towed through the water at 6 knots until I could grab her. It would have been more frightening had she not had a lifeline. Would I have been able to drop sail, fire up the outboard, and been able to find her? How do lifelines work? If I had one, would I clip myself up near the bow, so I'd function like a sea anchor, or near the stern where I'd probably get towed along like a giant crankbait?
Nina was fine. She was cold and wet, but didn't appear to have inhaled any water. She shivered for a little while but dried out pretty quickly.
By the time we finally got out to Possession sound the wind had really picked up. Whitecaps everywhere and the water was like the inside of a washing machine. This was not in the forecast! I stopped and put in a double reef in the main. We sailed around for a little while. Ellie handled the conditions just fine, but it was too rough to get any videos, I was getting uncomfortable and I was worried about Nina falling in again so we headed back to safety inside jetty island. Conditions there were great. Calm water and loads of wind, so we had a blast sailing back and forth for a couple of hours.
A sailboat race had just finished and the boats were all returning to the Everett marina. Several of them sailed up to us to give us compliments. "Nice boat!" and "What kind of boat is that?". One of the crew members was a fellow I work with, and another fellow invited me to join the dinghy races that they have on Fridays that I didn't know about.
The wind seemed to be calming down so we headed back toward Possession sound again, but kept the double reef in to be safe. Conditions had improved enough so that I could get out the cameras. I attached one to the mizzen mast and filmed a bit with the other. Nina was completely warm and dry by now so we headed out towards Gedney island.
The wind dropped a bit more, and the sky cleared up so we shook out the reefs and sailed on.
By the time we got about halfway to Gedney, the wind completely died! The GPS said we were moving 0.0 knots, occasionally 1.5 knots, with all sails up.
We waited for a while, but still no wind so we dropped all sail, fired up the outboard, and headed back.
