We thought you'd appreciate one of OffCenterHarbor.com's most popular videos below, and the story behind the making of this remarkable short film.
Epic boats are part of the regular scene along the coast of Maine, and the filmmaking team at OffCenterHarbor.com(OCH) loves putting you aboard these beautiful, legendary boats. We do this with the power of video—bringing you aboard for up-close experiences with sailors, designers and craftsman who've spent their lives studying the skills and techniques that keep these boats afloat and at their finest.
While these iconic boats are easy to love, we like to point out that the communities of shipwrights and sailors that get built up around their use and their care are just as remarkable.
Take our recent video about the restoration of the 83' Fife schooner ADVENTURESS included below. On the one hand, she is an astonishingly beautiful boat. But just as important to all the guys at OCH is the exceptional team of skilled and dedicated shipwrights her restoration brought together. Showing details of their workmanship became just as enticing as seeing the final product sailing across the bay.
The same goes for our videos about smaller, more accessible boats as well. Last year, we released a 23-part video series showing how to build a stitch-and-glue double paddle canoe. The boat's designer-builder Bill Thomas shows us every step in how to build a spacious family-friendly kayak, and watching his talent and craftsmanship first-hand is just as appealing as paddling the finished boat in the famed North Woods of Maine.
This year we're putting the finishing touches on a 42-part series on how to build an Ian Oughtred-designed epoxy-plywood Caledonia Yawl, featuring boat builder Geoff Kerr of Two Daughters Boat Works (who's built about 20 of these boats).
In the crazy hubbub that passes for modern life, we all need a quiet spot to get away to: a place full of lovely boats, useful skills, and the satisfactions of hands-on work. Learning to build and repair things is a magical thing, and we feel honored to be able to pass the skills of these exceptional craftspeople along to others.
In this spirit, we are guided by the immortal words of L. Francis Herreshoff who wrote many years ago in The Rudder, that, "Simplicity afloat is the surest guarantee of happiness." In everything we do on the water and on the OCH website we try to keep it simple.
We know that boats like Adventuress can be achingly beautiful. But just as surely we know that taking a row along the shore at dawn in a small hand-built skiff can be just as beautiful. Maybe even more so.
|
To comment on Duckworks articles, please visit one of the following:
|
