Launching day at Viking Boatyard on the Hudson.
We got the Coaster in New Jersey, during our year living in New York. Unfortunately, we never named it, and our friend Neil got to calling it the ____. Whatever it was called, that was a wonderful boat. It took us on some great vacations: twice to Georgian Bay on Lake Huron, and Christmas down to Florida Bay. Here we are pulled up on a beautiful beach. We sold the boat after Elizabeth was born because it was barely big enough for two, much less a family of three.
The Drascombes are built
in England. They are designed by John Watkinson and are great sea boats,
especially given their small size. If you're interested in more information,
check out the Drascombe
Owner's Association and Drascombe Boats Australia.
The Coaster is 21 feet long
and has a tiny cabin, just big enough for two, if they're very friendly and not
very big. A big advantage is that the Coaster draws just a foot with the
centerboard up.
Launching day at Viking Boatyard on the
Hudson.
Mary in New York. Check out the fuzzy hair.
We launched from, and left the car and trailer at, the Wye Heritage Marina.
Two
books proved very useful. One is a government publication called "Small Craft
Guide Georgian Bay". It's meant as a companion to the charts. The other book we
used was "The Sweet Water Sea", by Marjorie Chan Brazer. The Great Lakes Cruising Club
seems to have links to some good information. Of course, none of that was
available when we were last up there.
Lots of great places to tie up.
Tied up a Beausoleil Island, This is part of the Georgian
Bay Islands National Park, very well kept as are all Canadian parks. They
have a rare pigmy rattlesnake. We made its acquaintance, so can testify that
it's tiny and rattles.
There was a gale coming, so we found ourselves this tiny harbor out of the way. We sat out the stormy day and could hardly tell the wind was blowing in here.
The lighthouse at the entrace to Parry Sound (if I remember right -- maybe it was a little farther north). We used two ways to get in and out of the sound. There's a narrow channel called the South Channel, with a swinging bridge and the mail channel. The municipal dock is very good and gives convenient access to downtown for shopping. The Canadians only sell beer from government stores, closed on Sunday, so you have to be careful to keep stocked up!
This place is gorgeous. There's are so many beautiful places to anchor that you could spend a lifetime and never stay in the same place twice. Well, at least it seemed that way.
A Georgian Bay sunset. Time to button up and fasten the mosquito screening. As soon as it gets dark, the sky is filled with swarms of them. Heaven help you if you had to go out!
Going Home.
The boat tied up at the marina in Flamingo, the end of the road in the Everglades. We launched the boat in record time just to get away from the mosquitoes.
This guy decided to hitch a ride as we were sailing along the Florida coast.
We anchored off a bird sanctuary in what we thought was plenty of water. It turned out that there was a once-a-decade low low tide and we ended up aground. That's OK, because the Drascombe is designed to take to the ground with two small side keels. The underwater critters were pretty surprised, though!
We decided to get the anchor
because we wanted to get back to Flamingo before the forecast thundersquall hit.
We got moving as soon as the tide came in enough to float the boat.
We ran into a little more shallow water on the way back...
We also had porpoises swimming around the boat but unfortunately didn't get a picture.
A beautiful Florida
sunset.