Restoring Reverie

: The Art of Restoring & Sailing a Classic Wooden Sailboat

Tag Archives: Sailing


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On the Death of Old Boats

March has arrived like a lion and we have entered meteorological spring!  While the Great Lakes saw some unusually springlike weather in February, we are now back to a decidedly wintertime feel. Michigan is known for it’s  changing weather but this spate of fluctuating, roller coaster mayhem leaves us scratching our heads.  It has been a season of extremes.

The gales of November and December gave us a run for our money and were a major factor in how to proceed with boat work.  Accompanying those relentless gales were lake effect snow showers that dumped on us for days.  Swirling ice pellets burned my cheeks in the hours it took to shovel out around Reverie to create some semblance of a work area.

Intersperse the death grip of Old Man Winter with unseasonably warm spells of total melt and torrential rain and you had a muddy mess of a work area. Take this cycle, repeat several times and you have our winter, in a nutshell. On a positive note, the warmer end of the cycle allowed me to clamber about the sheltered boat judiciously applying duct tape to Reverie’s tarp which survived another season.

Whenever it’s been too nasty to work outside (quite often), the indoor work has taken up the slack and kept us busy.  Capricious weather aside, winter projects have proceeded at a good pace with some long overlooked tasks checked off the list. Work on Reverie is proceeding and there is much to tell but I must first get something on the table in order to move along.

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How and why we took on this restoration project is a bit cloudy now that we are several years along.  It happened and it is happening.  There are distinct moments  when things align and click; moments when you have to make a decision and act or that decision will be made for you. I suppose it’s all sequences and ratios but it’s also somewhat poetic.

As difficult as it can be sometimes, it has been important to focus on the tasks at hand.  We didn’t know exactly where this restoration would take us, but we knew it would be interesting.   When the portal of opportunity  began to open, it revealed the unexpected and unexplained. Things went from weird to wyrd.  We’re just along for the ride.

“The greatest loss of time is delay and expectation, which depend upon the future. We let go the present, which we have in our power, and look forward to that which depends upon chance, and so relinquish a certainty for an uncertainty.”

–  Lucius Annaeus Seneca

Once we began work on Reverie and accepted the task at hand, other boats began to appear in our periphery. It seems that looking at boats begets looking at even more boats.  One was sitting in Douglas, Michigan at a marina along the Blue Star Highway.

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It’s too late for this little cutter.

We drove by, one rainy day in April and saw this lone, lorn cutter isolated from the rest of the yard, rigging and sails still on; water from the downpour was gushing from her tired seams.   We got out and looked her over.  She was in worse shape than Reverie and certainly an uphill battle to get back into sailing condition.

There in the deluge,  I saw a much younger man with needs and desires that have trailed off like bubbles swirling in a rudder’s wake. I could see myself singlehanding this fine little cutter that measured somewhere around 28′ without the bowsprit and boomkin.  Even in her sorry condition, she exuded youth.  She was  a young person’s boat. She was a nimble courser waiting under rot and peeling paint to once again prove her worth.

She would have been ideal for the younger, single me. In days of yore, I would have been a happy otter content to recline and read books in a cozy bunk  in some quiet, out of the way anchorage. I would drink rum and wine and eat heartily only to weigh anchor on the next misty dawn setting sail for somewhere new.  She would take me to where I am now but I got here some other way.

For some reason, every  boat I come in contact with is a bit wanting for cabin space. Maybe, it’s through rationalization that I’ve prescribed to the Uffa Fox suggestion that, “if you want to stand up, go on deck”. Maybe, it’s because most people shop for boats by how much space and amenities are below deck and all these boats are throwaways.

I felt the “been there, done that” effect.  As seaworthy as her lines appeared, there simply was not enough of this little cutter for the two of us, a parrot and a dog to exist comfortably for any length of time.  I’m about 6’3″ and Julia’s close to 6′ so, we need a bit more elbow room.  Then, there was the nagging fact that we were already  restoring our own wooden boat.

Regardless,  I called the marina and talked to the son, who is the yacht broker there. He seemed politely surprised that I was showing an interest in such a derelict boat.  He said it was yard owned and gave the go ahead to climb aboard and have a better look.

Several days after that, the rain subsided.   Julia and I took a ladder and had a look inside. It was a sad sight, indeed!  It looked as if someone had walked away from the boat and never came back.  It was an overturned mess and felt desecrated like a sacked tomb.   Ports were smashed out, a dorade box was completely missing, the canvas deck and coachroof were completely shot.  This and more was allowing mother nature full access to the interior but still, there seemed a glimmer of hope.  This boat could have been restored.

 

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What a mess.

 

Nevertheless, I called the marina back and talked to the son letting him know how desperate I thought the situation was.  We talked about price and I told him it was only fair they get something for it  but that in essence, it was a “free boat”.  He switched from amicable, to petulant, to contentious  as I described what I thought.  All of the sudden, “the cradle was not included”, “there was a fortune in bronze hardware” (most of it was actually old school galvanized iron and steel), etc… .  I ended the conversation as politely as I could and left it at that.  About six months later, I heard the boat had been scrapped.

I thought there was more I could have done and I still believe that to be true.  I was so caught up in our own project, it would have been detrimental to the overall outcome to start taking on derelict, orphan boats with no place to store them. Then, there was the Anne Gail.

Anne Gail was  a beautiful yawl (or ketch) we found in a yard in South Haven.  Whenever we were in town, we would take a drive through the section of the marina yard where all the lost causes are kept to admire her fine lines and, there,  was another dream.

Anne Gail was actually of the size and design that would have been perfect for Julia and I to sail and cruise in comfort. Certainly not roomy by today’s standards but functional.  Like Reverie and other designs of that era, she had a narrow beam and deep keel.  She looked seaworthy. I did some searching of the name and found reference to her and that she had been sailed over from Ireland some time in the 50’s or early 60’s.

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She was a gorgeous boat and needed considerable work, as well.  Immediately, it was clear she needed a new stem.  Someone had halfheartedly  begun work on her and given up.  From the outside, she looked like a project but not beyond the realm of possibility.  For over a year, we would drive by to check up on her until one day, we found her in a most horrible state.

Julia and I were dumbstruck to see that this fine boat was in the process of being cut up and thrown into a dumpster.  What a horrible fate.  Looking at the cut up pieces, I saw nothing that showed she deserved this end.  There was simply nobody interested in saving her. Or, was there?  That’s the nagging question I keep asking myself as I come to terms with the loss of these relics from the past.

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The sad fate of Anne Gail as we found her, one November day.

 

Both those boats could have been saved.  Both those boats are gone.  I know it wasn’t us that would have been able to restore them because of our own commitment to Reverie.  Still,  I look back and think I could have have done more.  I could have posted their plight online and attracted somebody with the desire to save them. Why didn’t someone closer to the situation do that?

There’s a part of me that has to move past these losses and I have resolved to make any further discoveries such as these public.  I will make sure to spread the word and make as many people aware of the impending fate of any more boats we might encounter in our journeys. I won’t be lulled into the belief that every one else is admiring the fine lines and hidden potential; that everyone else is interested.  That is how old boats die.

The loss of these boats seems to me to be a loss for us all.  Their beauty will no longer grace the waters where they had surely turned many a head in their day.  In 2017, where slip after slip is filled with boats that were mass-produced by the thousands, it’s hard to imagine that that boat may be the only one of its kind in existence. For now, I can only focus on the restoration of our good ship, Reverie, and make sure she doesn’t come to the same end; at least, not in my lifetime!

“It is,  unfortunately, only too clear that if the individual is not truly regenerated in spirit, society cannot be either, for society is the sum total of individuals in need of redemption.” -C.G. Jung, The Undiscovered Self

 


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‘Tis The Season For Boat Work

Winter is here!  That means different things to different people.  For us, here at Camp Reverie,  it’s a busy time accentuated by the lengthening of each day. Today, we have sunset 9 minutes later than on the Dec. 21 solstice.   That means we’re packing up just a little bit later every day and getting more done with each passing week.

Winter has always been the time for boat work.  It was a time to take care of some of the large projects while the boat is out of the water and sailing is not a distraction. Endless projects  pile up during the warmer months that need to be addressed in the off-season. Projects, projects, projects; we sailors love our projects.

One of the reasons I look forward to winter is the fact that I can get outside and perform some of the heavy labor without heat and humidity getting in the way.  In the winter, you can always take off a layer if you’re too hot.  I haven’t been cold once this season. Keep it moving.

Thankfully,  we were able to take care of everything that needed to get done before the snow flew and have a formidable list to knock out before spring. Getting under the weather wire on the topsides project felt like a real victory as it left a clearer path to getting some other projects finished by spring.  There’s no hibernation going on here at Camp Reverie.  Well, maybe a little.

We can now get back to the removal of the deck and deck framing along with new sheer clamps and shelf, for good measure. Instead of hiding out from 90° F and 90% humidity, it’s lake effect rain showers,  lake effect snow showers and blistering cold winter gales.  I have had to shovel out a work area multiple times already and expect it to happen repeatedly over the winter.   Holland is in the Lake Michigan snow belt so we are no strangers to a stray flake or two.

One of this winter’s first projects was to measure out the  deck framing and sheer clamps to get a materials requirement for the new deck framing, sheer clamps and shelf.  I did that on a day when the wind was gusting up to 60 mph which shook and rattled poor Reverie.  It felt a bit surreal as I measured in the darkness with the aid of a shop light illuminating a small ring wherever I moved it.  With her interior removed, Reverie picks up vibrations from without and sounds sympathetic tones much like a stringed instrument.  On a good day, it’s pleasant and interesting.  In a gale, it’s a bit unsettling.

When the weather allows, I’ve been outside running rough lumber through the planer.  Last year, I picked up a nice 2″x 8″ x 12′ piece of white oak from Armstrong Millworks in Highland, Michigan. In late November, I paid a visit to L.L Johnson Lumber, in Charlotte, Michigan, where I picked out some nice 5/4″ x 12″ x 14′ southern yellow pine and some nice yellow birch for a furniture project.  The yellow pine will be used to replace the bad planks and , possibly, for the sheer clamps. Add to the mix about 100 board feet of rough red oak that was just sitting around and you have some work on your hands.

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There was 100 board feet of red oak and 50 board feet of  yellow birch on top of the boat wood.  No sense just moving it.  Let’s make it useful.

 

 

As soon as all the wood is processed, we can resume deck removal.  When I was on board measuring deck beams, I had a chance to look over the construction of the deck  framing and do not think the original builder of the hull and the builder of the deck/ interior are the same.  The hull is sturdy and overbuilt.  I am impressed by how well it has held together. The heavy frames with intermittent steam-bent frames is reminiscent of old work boat construction.

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Sturdy hull with lightly built deck framing and sheer clamp.  Part of the mystery.

Conversely, the interior and deck-beam construction leave something to be desired, in the way of craftsmanship.  The deck framing and interior won’t be copied from what was found.  Both the deck and the interior will be rebuilt as sturdily as the hull.  Instead of ash for the deck beams, there will be white oak.  The sheer clamp will either be of white oak or yellow pine with a shelf added to the sheer. More on that once the deck framing commences.

Winter shall proceed as such:  it’s outside whenever possible and lots to do inside when being inside’s a good thing.  Our front bathroom has become the varnish booth.  The fan works great for exhaust and we haven’t had any issues with fumes while I varnish up Reverie’s wooden blocks.

Stripping down the blocks and soaking them in hot oil was one of the first projects we did when we got the boat. The oil had over a year to dry so I gave them a sanding and have been dipping them in a can of spar varnish diluted with about 30% turpentine.  As I write, they have 5 coats on them.  They will get their sixth and final coat tomorrow and reassembled shortly after that.  All said and done, there will be close to 40 hours devoted to the block restoration project alone.

“O God! methinks it were a happy life,
To be no better than a homely swain;
To sit upon a hill, as I do now,
To carve out dials quaintly, point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run,
How many make the hour full complete;
How many hours bring about the day;
How many days will finish up the year;
How many years a mortal man may live.”
~William Shakespeare – King Henry Vl

Along with the varnishing, there is always a bit more organizing and sorting of everything from boat hardware, to tools, to wood, to lp records, to books and to all the other things that get piled around and in the way.  We are removing the clutter and making a streamlined restoration machine.  I will leave you with a shot of some fine, vintage power tools that got new cords and cleaning as part of the indoor winter work.

Happy 2017 from Julia and Roger!  Thanks for following our project.

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Tools that are as old as Reverie!  Quality never goes out of style.

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What’s Done Is Done

“To come to the end of a time of anxiety and fear!  To feel the cloud that hung over us lift and disperse- the cloud that dulled the heart and made happiness no more than a memory!  This at least is one joy that must have been known by almost every living creature.”

-Richard Adams, Watership Down

 

Last night, a task was put to rest that has plagued the restoration project for some time.  Last night, as twilight fell, I wrestled the 20 x 30 ft tarp over it’s frame and  drove away knowing I was done stripping, sanding and oiling the entire topsides of the good ship, Reverie.  A November Gale was kicking into high gear on the entire Upper Great Lakes with our Lake Michigan seeing 50 mph gusts before midnight.  It had begun to spit and gust earlier in the day but I had to finish leveling and blocking the trailer before another Winter set in.  With Reverie buttoned up for the storm, level and covered, I felt like I finally had some good news to share.

The stripping, sanding and oiling of the topsides is now complete.  I started the port-side last year and finished about this time last November, thinking I would be able to get the starboard-side done in the Spring and move along.  I jumped into it last April with renewed enthusiasm and resolve to finish this most unpleasant task.  What was it about this task, this minor detail (on paper), that made me want to do anything and everything but what needed to be done?

There was, first and foremost, the mess.  Everything about the job involved a mess.  Large piles of scraped paint and toxic sawdust required constant vigilance and tidiness. In April I got about six feet working on the starboard side from the bow back.  Last Summer, we were in the grips of one of the most humid summers I can remember.  Wearing coveralls, gloves, hat, goggles and respirator was like some form of Medieval  torture .  Eventually, I  succumbed to heat exhaustion and decided to put the project on hold.

While the planning went on, the actual work on Reverie came to a quiet halt, for the summer.  Instead, we got out on the water and had some sailing days aboard our little Com-Pac 16, Prudence; 85° F with 85-90% humidity is bearable when you are 10 miles offshore.  We sailed and sailed until the weeds clogged our boat launch to the point of us almost getting stuck in invasive Eurasian Watermilfoil.  Keels and milfoil don’t mix.

Click to access Eurasian_Watermilfoil_521353_7.pdf

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Just one of the brilliant days on Lake Michigan

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Invasive plants at Port Sheldon

By the time the weed situation shut down our sailing, we made time to get a thing or two done aboard Reverie.  Julia started removing the rest of the interior cabinetry while I did various odd jobs that needed to be done sooner than later.  She eventually removed enough of the galley to expose the engine which made it easier to get it ready for removal.

I ended up getting the last of the interior out with a hammer and pry bar, preserving only what would go back on board.  A lot of the wood had experienced some effect of leaking rainwater and had to be taken out of the equation.  We put everything into storage to be used as templates, if needed. The interior is so much easier to assess with all of the cabinetry removed.

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Reverie. happy to have all the rotting wood removed

By the time all this work was done, the weather had cooled down enough for me to buck up and get back to the scraping.  On a relatively large project, such as this,  it is a good idea to stick to tasks as distractions lurk at every turn.  Look, a bird!  Checking something off the list allows the mind to be released from further thought on the subject and proceed toward the end.  There’s a lot of that to come.

The starboard topsides proved to be a bit more of a challenge than the port-sides.  It seems a good deal of Reverie’s life was spent taking the hard knocks on the starboard side.  There, I found replaced planks (More on that later…  Much more).  There were areas that had been faired with what appeared to be an epoxy-based filler.  Oh yes, someone used 5200 for caulking the plank seams. I have seen 5200 recommended, in various online forums where free advice is handed out like champagne on New Years Eve; copiously and carelessly.  Dear reader, if you are ever thinking of restoring or maintaining a wooden boat and you choose to use 5200 to caulk seams, let me tell you, Old Nick has a special task in hell for you: eternity cleaning 5200 from plank seams.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you. 5200 will be used in this project to great effect, later on down the road but not here.

I had to modify my heat gun/scraping technique and managed to get the brunt of it done by sharpening a flat scraper and using it much like a cabinet scraper.  This produced a better surface than the method I used on the port, side reducing sanding time significantly.  It took 60 hours to scrape, sand and oil the port topside compared to about 80 hours for the starboard.

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Starboard Topsides scraped, sanded and oiled

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Port Topsides scraped, sanded and oiled. Trailer looks spiffy with some fresh primer.

The past few days were near record highs for November with temps around 70° F.  Both sides got two coats of piping hot tung oil and turpentine.  The boat smells wonderful! Reverie looks so different without the layers of cracked, peeling paint and exposed wood.

As the air pressure began to fall and the breeze became a gale, I put a quart of primer on the trailer.  It to looks happier.  I took a 12 ton bottle jack and it all rests  on cement blocks instead of the trailer tires. After I got the trailer leveled, I got the boat leveled a bit more.   It really helped to stabilize the whole thing and get the tires off the ground.  I gave the lug nuts a good soak of penetrant and plan put the tires out of the elements for the duration of the project.  With the wheels off, the brakes will be begging for an overhaul… .

Scraping, sanding and oiling below the waterline will go much better as there won’t be scaffolding involved and the paint seems to come off easier.  We’ll see.  For now, we can move forward and I no longer have that messy job to mess up my day. Today, my aches were a little less achy.  My step, a little more peppy. There’s a little vim in my vigor.   I even had to raise the rear view mirror in the car from so much slouching.  Yes, the world was a kinder place, now that that is done.  Onward!


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Tung Oil and Turpentine

We are well into November and the weather has been good to Reverie’s restoration project.  The leaves were late to turn this year due to a warm Fall but they have now fallen  rapidly and carpet the earth in all shades of red, yellow and brown.  Still, the mild weather persists.   The birds aren’t quite so convinced of an eternal Autumn.  They know what’s about to happen and are acting accordingly.  We saw our first dark eyed junco the other day while working on Reverie; a sure sign of the change in seasons.  The shoreline of the Great Lakes is, well, a great place to watch migrating birds.  We were even  lucky enough to see 4 endangered whooping cranes the other day on a back road drive from Holland to Grand Rapids. Their size is impressive.

On a somber note, today is the 40th anniversary of the sinking of the Great Lakes freighter, Edmund Fitzgerald. It vanished without a trace in a massive storm on Lake Superior and has since been found lying at the bottom of the lake broken in half by the mighty waves.  http://www.shipwreckmuseum.com/the-fateful-journey-62/

102 years ago, the Great Lakes Storm of 1913 sank 19 ships with over 250 lives  lost on the open waters of these inland seas.  http://www.nws.noaa.gov/com/weatherreadynation/news/131107_white.html#.VkH8LdKrTwc

Today, is nothing like those days.  It is calm and mild and I’m going off to work on Reverie for a while thankful for this weather as I solemnly recall those who lost their lives on the Great Lakes.

Yesterday, we passed a waypoint in the restoration project.  After 60 hours of scraping, sanding, and the cleaning of every single fastener hole on the port topside, I was able to apply a coat of tung oil and turpentine!  This was a process that took a lot longer than expected but we are pleased with the results.  The mixture, consisting of 50% tung oil and 50% turpentine, was heated to near boiling to facilitate its penetration into the thirsty yellow pine planking.  I could see it immediately expanding some of the surface cracks that had begun in the parts of the topside that had been without paint for an undetermined amount of time.  I worked this delightful smelling mixture into all the exposed fastener holes with a 3 inch chip brush.  You could see the hot oil and turpentine being sucked into the holes. It made all the time consuming work worth it.  There are certainly faster ways to strip the hull down and sand it but I would rather spend 2 or 3 or 4 times the amount of time to get it the way I wanted it and err on the side of safety.

The frames, which are basically the ribs of the skeleton, are laid out in a pattern of one very heavy white oak frame fastened with heavy galvanized nails and then two smaller frames fastened with copper rivets.   These smaller oak frames are steam bent and still fastened tight.   We will most likely add bronze screws to the heavy frames but that’s going to require some investigation of the existing nails.  For now, I’m guessing they have run their course in usefulness.  When white oak and steel get together, oak wins.  I removed the flat-head steel screws to the engine exhaust flange that was backed up with an oak block and there was barely any thread left.  The use of quality, hot dipped galvanized fasteners is a money saver and they served well for over 60 years but we’re going with silicon bronze.  The oil filling the fastener holes is a good thing.  It  expands the wood and seals it from the oxygen needed to create rot.

 The whole port topside consumed a little less than a half gallon of the tung oil/turpentine mixture.  The tung oil is 100% pure tung oil and costs about $70 dollars a gallon.  Tung oil cannot be allowed access to oxygen as this begins the curing process.  I poured off half the gallon of pure tung oil into a half gallon cider jug leaving no room for air and will save it for a later date.  That will keep for quite some time, as is.  I expected to use more of the 50/50 mixture but was happy to have used less, seeing we’re approaching $100 a gallon for this elixir, once the cost of the turpentine is factored in.  “Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.”  Last night, I had to scramble around for another half gallon container to put the rest of the 50/50 mixture in and came up with an empty half gallon bottle of Scotch in our recycling bin(now how did that happen?).   It was almost spot on one half gallon with a glass vitamin bottle to spare. Now I have to find some wood that needs treating today so as not to waste those precious fluids in the vitamin bottle.  That shouldn’t be difficult.   So, dear reader, I must be off and begin the next phase of the project which is to do the same thing to the forlorn  starboard side that now looks even more desperate compared to the freshly oiled port-side.  I will leave you with some pics of the progress.

Best Regards,

Roger

60 hours of scraping, sanding and oiling. Done!

60 hours of scraping, sanding and oiling. Done!

Reverie's lovely overhang. The one small plank is a former repair made of dissimilar wood and will most likely be replaced.

Reverie’s lovely overhang. The one small plank is a former repair made of dissimilar wood and will most likely be replaced.

Starboard topside looking forlorn and in need of help.

Starboard topside looking forlorn and in need of help.

Yikes!

Yikes!

Shakedown

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Our “shakedown” sail aboard Prudence.

 

Work on Reverie slowed down in July as we took some much needed time to get out on Prudence, our “new” little Com-Pac 16.  July ended up being warm and humid.   At times, when we were working on Reverie, it was almost unbearable.  Luckily, we are in a fairly shaded area that gets decent breeze off Lake Michigan so we did accomplish a thing or two on Reverie.    All work and no play does indeed make Jack a dull boy and I was starting to feel my batteries were depleted.

We get kidded about the fact that we own multiple boats and that’s fine.  The reason for having Prudence is to maintain some connection with what’s truly important in our lives: Sailing.  The restoration work on Reverie is coming along nicely and my next post will get back to that but for now, a little sailing sure goes a long way in recharging those batteries.

By the time I was to pick up Prudence at her previous owner’s, all the ducks were in a row except for one small detail: we had not found a place to keep her. “No problem”, I thought.  “The storage place just down the road looks like it has a spot or two open.” Sorry, my friends, every storage facility within a 100 mile radius was full.   It seems everyone and his brother keep their boats in outdoor storage near the lake and, it being July,  we were a bit late on the take.  A trailerable sailboat is something new to me.  I’ve only dealt with travel lifts and cradles.  I imagined us driving around in this trailering limbo, parking on the streets, moving constantly, never welcomed, scorned by all.  It was starting to seem hopeless.

I was a bit occupied with all the details of getting the boat registered (my two Kafkaesque trips to the Secretary of State is a story itself), making sure the trailer was ok to drive across the state and such so Julia took over the search for a place to keep Prudence.  She got back to me with several updates: “Nothing to be had”and, “Nothing to be had”.  It seemed we had exhausted our options when I got a voicemail from Julia saying she called a marina right near the public launch on Lake Macatawa that leads to Lake Michigan.  We could park the boat anywhere out back and, as there were no power lines, could drive the boat- rig up, right to the launch.  Excellent!

Our eleventh hour reprieve seemed almost too good to be true.  Luckily, it wasn’t.  We leave the mast and boom up and have everything in totes which we bring every time.  It takes us about 15 minutes to be ready for launching.  The public launch at Lake Macatawa is a veritable hive of activity on weekends as hundreds of boats launch and retrieve. It’s 99% power boaters and jet skis at the launch.  It’s quite amusing to see their expressions as we drive out of the launch mast up and head on down the road.  Little do they know we’re less than 100 yards away.

I must say that Prudence sails like she looks, lovely.  She’s a lot of boat for a 16 footer and will keep us sane during the time it takes to get Reverie back in the water.   There are some things to be done on Prudence (don’t get me started on the main sheet) but she’s in sailing condition and that’s work for another time.

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Prudence

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I would like to introduce you to  Prudence, our little Compac 16.  Prudence is the result of my innocent perusal of Craigslist last October.  I like to look at boats and this little beauty caught my eye as I scrolled down the gallery of photos .  The ad was 24 days old when I saw it but it was mid-October, not a time when most people get boat fever.  Mine runs 365 days a year so I took the chance and shot an email to the seller.  I simply said, “Is this boat still available?”  I got and equally simple reply, “Yes, it is.”
I talked it over with Julia and she agreed that it was a nice looking boat and it would be great to have something to trailer around.  Once it was paid for, it would be relatively cheap to own.  We discussed all the places we could tuck into with a little keel boat that only draws 18 inches.  It really would open up a lot of Great Lakes destinations previously off limits for Persistence which draws 4-1/2 feet.  It sleeps 2, has an ample cockpit and, as our friend Terrence put it, “She looks shippy”.  Her graceful cruiser bow hearkens back to many classic designs and somewhat resembles Reverie’s spoon bow.  Prudence looked good and had a reasonable asking price so, I was off for the first look at her.
 It was a blustery October day when I first drove out and met Jack.  The first thing I noticed when I pulled into his driveway was the several campers (one being an old Airstream) and the plethora of boats sitting here and there.  I liked this guy before I even met him.  He turned out to be an older guy in his late 60’s or early 70’s.  I’m not good with ages as we all show our years differently.  We talked boats, campers, life in general and then, he showed me the boat.  She was dirty and had not been in the water for several years.  I gave her a quick look over and asked Jack if he minded if I paid him off bit by bit over the Winter.  He said, “Aw, I don’t need the money.  Sure”  I think he knew just how much I wanted this little boat.
The next step was to report back to Julia with my findings and arrange for the both of us to go out and have a look.  A few days later, the Great Lakes weather had changed and we had a warm up accompanied by a serious thunderstorm system pushing yet another cold front through.  This all occurred on our way out to look at the boat.  When we arrived, there was  a magnificent double rainbow framing Prudence!  Jack was there with his wife and we all laughed about it being a sign that we were to get the boat.  Maybe so.  We shook hands and that was that.
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I’m not a fan of many pocket cruiser designs.  There are ones with grotesque cabins that look like they fell from a waterspout. Some have little or no working room to sail.  Others have garish tumblehome or way too much sheer for my liking.  Many have insufficient construction making them little more than day sailors with bunks. Then, there are those that possess all of these undesirable characteristics.  I’ve found the old saying to be true that, “a boat sails like she looks”. There’s no way I would go for some  little mess no matter how good a deal it was.  Yes, there are a lot of ugly babies out there and parents who think their children are geniuses so please bear with me, gentle reader, and know that Prudence is above criticism.
She wasn’t named Prudence when we looked at her.  She had no name at all.  This could not stand as we were to be heading off to new adventures aboard this vessel. I don’t have names for other things in my life except for my old Coleman stove, Trusty and it’s triple burner, Trey (sometimes referred to as Trip).   This little Compac-16  needed a name and Prudence seemed to fit.  Prudence is a key element of a mariner’s skills and our Prudence is a key element of this stage in our lives.
Merriam-Webster’s definition of Prudence:
1:  the ability to govern and discipline oneself by the use of reason
2:  sagacity or shrewdness in the management of affairs
 3:  skill and good judgment in the use of resources
 4:  caution or circumspection as to danger or risk
While it works well for me on the water, I do need to be reminded, from time to time, that prudence is a valuable asset in every day life as well.
Winter held a lot of twists and turns and, somehow, we wound up with a 31 foot wooden sloop named Reverie and the little Compac 16 sat at Jack’s awaiting our return.  It wasn’t until a few weeks ago that I was able to return with more cash.  We sat and talked for over an hour and I left with the little Johnson 4.5 horse motor she came with so as to have it up and running by the time we pick her up in the next few weeks.  While we still have our hands full with the restoration of Reverie, we now have a little boat to get out on Lake Michigan and wherever else we choose to go.  It takes the edge off of the restoration work by reminding us both what it’s all about.


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Under wraps while the snow flies.

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