Summer action

The Granville Island Wooden Boat Festival is coming up next weekend, August 22nd to 25th.  We’ll be hosting the dinghy races there, on Saturday the 24th at 11am at Alder Bay.  Georgina and the festival committee have done a great job in organizing and promoting the event, and we should have better participation than last year – and hopefully the weather will be more cooperative!  Please get in touch with Georgina if you’re interested in helping out at the races or our booth (although now that I think of it, she’s off on the west coast of Vancouver Island for a bit – just show up if you can!).

We’ll be moving the Button Swan over on Thursday, and then on Saturday morning a flotilla of boats is getting towed from Heritage Harbour to Granville Island for the races – should be fun!

Despite the slower pace of summer, we’ve made good progress on the Davidson dinghy repair – new ash rub strips have been installed, a bit bigger and more durable than the original, and the hole in the bottom is pretty much finished getting patched, and looking good!  Some creative ‘spring board’ clamping was used while gluing in the layers.

With all the use and enjoyment our boats are getting these days, some repairs have become necessary, the most extreme of which is a new mast for Ragna!  A severe jolt from the wake of a large boat crossing too close in front of her caused the mast to snap at deck level.  Arnt glued up and milled the replacement, and shaping has begun – we should have her ready to sail again in a week or two.

Other work at the shed and on the dock – a tiller extension for Button Swan is nearly finished, with 6 coats of varnish (thanks Ingrid!), and over at North Star, Bruce has been busy carving the name in the new transom planks, which involved him making a chisel from an old file.

Through some serendipity, we’ve learned of Enke’s origin – she was built by David Philips in south Vancouver, from a design by Charles Mower.  David recognized her here on our site, and provided some information – we’ll be getting in touch with him for more info, including some photos from when he was building her!