Landing School Boat Launching

A great week of learning, teaching and boat launching last week at The Landing School where I instruct in the Wooden Boatbuilding Program. These students just launched a Joel White designed Maine Coast Peapod. It performed great at the launch last Friday. We enjoyed a jaunt in the Kennebunk River during a small craft advisory. We ducked out into some of the swell, three of us aboard, to see how mannerly a Peapod is in these conditions. Even I was struck -- again -- by how well behaved a sea boat the 'pod can be, whether bow to or stern to the waves. We turned around and rushed in with the swell and tide as the regular Fall start students watched on and snapped photos.

With most of my work in plywood, CNC cutting and making boat kits, it is a joy to help students learn to build a boat in solid wood and one that does not depend on epoxy for holding it all together or fairing over mistakes!

Finer points of final assembly.

Check out the Programs at The Landing School on the Rocky Coast of Maine.

This year has been a crazy one and we will be unable to attend the Waterfowl Festival as we usually do...

...However...

 ...there is another new, and for true enthusiasts of model boats, perhaps more interesting, show being held in Oxford, Maryland on Saturday, November 9^th. You may or may not know their names, but the lineup of talented model makers is quite impressive, thanks to Master Model Maker Ed Thieler who organized the event.

I don't know the whole list of model makers that will be in attendance, but I do know that in addition to Ed Thieler (Chesapeake vessel expert noted for the precision and beauty of his boats and dioramas), Capt. Eddie Somers (Smith Island native and Chesapeake boat expert), Capt. Don Willey (specializes in Chesapeake and various other craft and is a Marlinespike expert), Capt. Ron Fortucci (Half-hulls, Pond Yachts, professional cabinet maker and sailor), Jim Wortman ( model maker and historian from New York's famous South Street Seaport Museum)  and others will be there, many of whom will be talking about their models and/or the history of the boats they've replicated of the Chesapeake Bay. We'll be there too, with our models and books and we will be discussing “photogrammetry”.

Whether you know their names or not, their works are among the finest in the region and the models that will be there will be something to behold. It will be a rare assembly of such highly talented artists of the type. Some models will be for sale (if you're looking for something different for Christmas), while other models, for display only, will make you say “Wow!”

As great as the Waterfowl Festival is, it's worth taking the side trip to Oxford. You won't find anything like this at The Waterfowl Festival and if you like fine carvings and art, you are certain to love the model boats that will be at this show. After all, the heritage that makes the Waterfowl Festival what it is could not have been without the boats.

Come to the Model Show at the Oxford Community Center, in Oxford, Maryland, from 10:00am to 4:00pm on Saturday, November 9^th, 2012.