Dilemas & Revalations

So, as you may remember from the post below, my boat project has halted due to lack of expendable funds. Now that I have way way too much time on my hands I found myself thinking and reading about other small crafts that would fit my needs the way the 6-hour canoe would.

In my reading of "Instant Boatbuilding" by Dynamite Payson (which is a collection of the late Phil Bolger's plywood boat designs) lies Payson's Pirogue, a stitch and glue 13' open kayak. After reading about the boat, and it's instructions about three times, I picked up my 6-Hour Canoe book and started making a list of pros and cons for each craft. Given my size and my intentions for the craft I'd made a desicion that Payson's Pirogue is a better fit for my needs and ambitions. The constructions is relativly simple (as is the 6-Hour Canoe) with a few more challenging aspects to its construction, including a full sheathing of fiberglass on the outside of the hull, and the stitch & glue process as well as far less detailed instructions leaving more for me to suss out on my own.

The two black and white pictures are from the "Instant Boatbuilding" Book of the Pirogue and the fiberglass step. The color picture is of a finished Pirgoue at the Wooden Boat Show in Mystic, CT courtesy of my brother Tristan. I have no idea who the fat guy in the background is....although he doesn't seem to pleased with Tris.

Anyway, enough about that grumpy bastard. The Pirogue project is penciled in to start this winter, it should be a good project to fill the dreary winter months for a Spring time launch. I will continue to write (poorly) about the Pirogue process and plans. All in all maybe having no money is a blessing in the end...

p.s.
In addition to this small craft being better suited and all that jazz I wrote above there is another reason for wanting to build this model rather than my previous plan. Phil Bolger took his own life recently due his slip into dementia and his desire to end his life before having it be ruined, and as I searched for people like me who have the drive to build a small craft, and more specifically the passion to build Payson's Pirogue I was stunned to find nothing. I could find no pictures or accounts of someone building the boat. So, I will thoroughly document and share the process of building Payson's Pirogue: A Phil Bolger Design.