Would you like to share this newsletter with friends and family?
Plenty of breeze this winter; we're saving some for next summer.
Cruise News
Don't be discouraged; there's still space on at least half of our
cruise adventures this coming season. March is a good time to give us a call and chat; April and May, not so much as we ready the American Eagle for her 32nd season windjamming.
Crew's News
Rainy/snowy day project on the old rowboat progresses: outside has been scraped, sanded, faired and fussed with and finally shuttered in with the use of a portable steambox in the form of this piece of pvc pipe hooked up to a gas burner/water can/heater hose set up. Tyler got out this plank tight enough it fit without clamping.
Sarah filled the mahogany sheer strake and stern, and gave them three coats
of varnish. Some more rainy days and the rowboat will be ready for summer.
Sarah completely refinished the wheelbox inside and out while I overhauled
the steering gear in the shop. We put it all back together and it still works.
This is a Lunenburg Foundry gear #9 I had built in 1986.
Tyler meanwhile took up the windlass motor plate and caulked under it. No more leaks in Cabin B , Carol-Ann!
N
Not to be outdone. Tyl;er took up the windlass motor plate
N
Pictures From Near Here
February school vacation for Kathy and me has usually been spent on not so far away but quiet Cape Cod. While we both walk the beaches and catch up on reading, I can't not go look for boats. CG 36500 in her winter slip at Nauset Marine East is ready to go, 65 years to the day February 18, 1952, when she and her crew rescued the survivors of the Pendleton, wrecked in a northeast storm. The movie The Finest Hour is their story.
CG 36500 was built at the Coast Guard Yard in Curtis Bay, Maryland, in 1946, the last model
of the
motor surfboat evolved from the first of her type from the 1920's. These were incredibly well built and expensive, with bronze ballast keels and were able to put up with more abuse than most of their crews. Retired from service in 1968, she was exhibited by the National Park Service until being turned over to the Orleans Historical Society and put in first class shape.
Note the salty bow pudding and ice sheathing; either sheet copper or monel metal.
Divided into watertight compartments and with good sized scuppers to drain flooded
weather
decks in a matter of seconds.
The first compartment has a kayak-like coaming for standing room.
Note the scupper under the "G".
Running lights are built into the rounded bow shelter with grab rails all around.
There's a stock anchor secured to the forward end of the engine compartment.
The bronze lifeline stanchions swivel so they can be lowered to the deck when the after pelican hook is released. Hard to see but there's a lifeline strung fore and aft from the towing bitt to an eye just above the instrument panel. Most of her life CG36500 has had a General Motors 4-71 diesel for power, a smaller model of the 6v-71 that has been in the American Eagle since 1986.
The after compartment has heavy bronze dogs to secure the access door, a strong towing bitt and varnished quarter bitts.
And there's also a neat hay barge from the mid 1800's preserved at the National Seashore Visitors Center.
Cards From Away
built on the Clyde in 1869
Her last employment improved the perfume in her hold.
Orkney, Scotland
March is going to be busy for us to haul out on schedule April first; no fooling!
