Adventures - Small Boats Magazine

It took more than sixty years to build the Boyard fortress, and it was never used for the military purpose it was intended for.

December 2016

The Sailing Light Challenge

Cruising France's Charente Maritime

The French love sailing, but the big and expensive racing and cruising yachts often get all of the attention. A group of friends got together and organized a new event, called Sailing Light Challenge, an unsupported, 100-mile tour along the Bay of Biscay coast in small boats under sail and oar. This year's participants arrived at the Corps de Garde harbor near Charron, and waited with gear-laden boats for the ebb to provide a favorable current down the Sevre River to its mouth at Aiguillon Bay.

In a light breeze Rob row-sailed toward Pumpkin Island and the top of the Eggemogin Reach. Sail-assisted rowing made it possible to cover mileage more effectively when sail alone would have been too slow to keep the pair on schedule to make good use of the tidal currents around Penobscot Bay.

November 2016

A Maine Island Idyll

Circumnavigating Deer Isle

It was a very gentle bump. I’d been sleeping comfortably at anchor after a long day on the water, but I was wide awake in an instant. A few seconds later, it came again—a firm nudge from below interrupting the soft, easy motion of my boat—and this time WAXWING stopped moving. I was aground. I checked my watch—3:30 in the morning, still an hour and a half to go before low tide.

July, 2016. With a lid covering the outboard hole and the outboard itself providing ballast forward, the skiff rows better than ever. Just outside Dartmouth we usually see ten or twelve seals whenever we go to the Mew Stone.

October 2016

A Man’s Best Friend

No, it's not the dog

While big boats would come and go, Nic Compton’s little plywood skiff was the one boat that stayed with him through thick and thin. He tells the story of how a kit-built Western Skiff wove itself into the fabric of his life and family.

September 2016

Building on Tradition

An American geitbåt

Jay Smith earned a bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and English but realized the life of a man of letters was not his calling. He left North Dakota and moved to Norway, the land of his ancestors, and apprenticed himself to a master boatbuilder.

After steam bending and scarf-jointing a full length chine log, Andy and I finished the precise compound angle end-cuts to fit it tightly into the hull.

August 2016

Dories Down Under

From the Grand Canyon to the Whanganui River

When a New Zealand guide wanted to offer his clients better boats for rowing the revered Whanganui River, he had two American boatbuilders set up shop in a sheep shed and build a pair of Grand Canyon dories.

July 2016

The Race to Alaska

High Hopes, Dogged Determination

In a race as long and as arduous as the 2015 R2AK, coming in last can be counted as a victory. The weather took a heavy toll on the race fleet—many of the boats withdrew and a few needed to be rescued.

June 2016

Rowing the North Atlantic

Two friends, one old boat

When Australians Peter Fletcher and Tom Hudson decided to row across the North Atlantic, they chose an old wooden boat for the voyage. It had already made the crossing three times and the duo spent 15 months on repairs to make the boat seaworthy enough to get them from New York to England.

Small Boats Annual 2017May 2016

The Isles of Finland

Solo cruising in a Herreshoff Coquina

The Finnish coast is speckled with small forested islands rimmed with glacier-worn granite. A modified Herreshoff Coquina is quite at home here, an ocean away from its native waters.

Black Bar Rapid is a Class III and normally, only the top of this rock in the middle is exposed. At low water, it becomes a big obstacle that must be missed.

April 2016

Rogue River

Low water, high risk

With water levels on the Oregon’s Rogue River at record lows, rapids were more dangerous than ever and rocks that are normally under several feet of water were poised to take their toll on a wooden drift boat.

March 2016

Taking Refuge

Rowing among the Islands of the Columbia River Estuary

Winter brought the birds to the islands and with a break in the cold weather brought an opportunity to row along the edge of the Lewis & Clark National Wildlife Refuge.

Raquette River, Adirondacks. Lining, like portaging and upstream hauling, became comfort measures. When paddling simply wasn’t working, I fell back on what would. Progress was slow, but anything that kept me moving was enough to boost my spirits.

Small Boats Annual 2017February 2016

Crossing the Northeast by Canoe

Paddling the Northern Forest Canoe Trail

The Northern Forest Canoe Trail stitches together 740 miles of lakes, streams, rivers, and portages that lie along the boreal fringes of New York and New England. Donnie Mullen was the first to paddle the full length of the trail he and his wood-and-canvas canoe survived the trip, both a bit worse for the wear.

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At home, Merry's no fan of cooking; but in camp and near the water, he's happy to oblige. Isobutane canister stoves nicely balance convenience and safety on shorter trips.

January 2016

Handing Over the Helm

A father and son take to the South Salish Sea

Bruce Bateau takes his teenage son on a weekend sail among the islands in Washington’s South Puget Sound and watches his love of boats and water take hold in the next generation.

Rann backs the ELSIE MAE from the ramp with his mother, ELsie Mae, and Art Arpin aboard. Rann's daughter Heidi, aboard his ARCUS with her fiancé Sean, records the moment.

December 2015

The Power Dory and the Pilot

Bringing history back to life

In a garage in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, an all-but-forgotten design and moment in history come back to life when an eccentric neighbor volunteers to help build a Hammond power dory.

Adam, Bryan, and Mike braced for a big hit at Lava Falls. Moments later, their boat disappeared into a hole and resurfaced with only Bryan and Mike still aboard.

November 2015

Whitehalls on the Colorado

Following John Wesley Powell through the Grand Canyon

John Wesley Powell is well remembered for his daring descent of the Colorado River through the entire length of the Grand Canyon. The run is challenging enough in modern whitewater rafts; confronting the rapids, rocks and bus-sized standing waves in Whitehalls, boats once used as New York harbor taxis, made even experienced river guides nervous.

Furling sail after riding the surf in on our first day out, I looked at the wind driven waves and wondered what conditions were to come. We had scheduled the voyage around our outside lives and responsibilities rather than weather patterns, but later locals all agreed that December was notoriously windy in the Sea of Cortez.

October 2015

The Boat, the Boy, and Baja

Rowing and sailing the Sea of Cortez

Bands go on the road; mom/artist types with a kid in tow usually do not. Hannah Viano sorely needed to look at life from a different vantage point, and to reconnect with beau and babe in a not so 9-to-5 way. So they cut through all of the excuses not to, trailered their skiff 2,000 miles to Baja, and went off adventuring on the Sea of Cortez.

The put-in on Lobster Stream is just upstream of its confluence with the West Branch of the Penobscot River. We were all excited, a tad anxious, and already tired following the long journey from home. The 2-mile paddle up to Lobster Lake is, strictly speaking, upstream but in practice it’s an easy flat water trip. TINTIN, in the foreground, carries gear for a family of four.

September 2015

Investing in Memories

Canoe camping in northern Maine

Donnie and Erin Mullen were seasoned wilderness travelers, trained at Outward Bound and hardened by long forays into remote regions, but how would they hold up on a northern Maine’s canoe trip that required carrying toys and diapers?

Small Boats Annual 2016August 2015

Made in Vermont

The journey of a dory from logging to launching

Charles Johnson’s adventure begins with harvesting trees that have grown in the woodlands in his home state of Vermont, and in the years that follow, he gathers both wood and wisdom from friends who help him on his way to launching NONA BELLE.

OBADIAH and SLIP JIG arrive at the canoe dock in Ewell.

July 2015

American Venice

Chesapeake Bay's Smith Island

Five boats set sail for Smith Island: two Joel White Marsh Cats, an Iain Oughtred Sooty Tern, a Howard Haven 12 ½, and a John Welsford Navigator, all hand-made, mostly owner built. Heading due west, they follow smudges of the island that come and go and when in doubt, aim for buoys, lights, and day markers.

June 2015

A San Juan Islands Solo

At home away from home

I’ve cruised small boats thousands of miles and in some miserable conditions, but I never had a Scarlett O’Hara moment—“As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.” I was slow to catch on, and the adventures that predictably made me hungry, cold, wet, tired only gradually lost their appeal. With each new boat I built for cruising, I incrementally eliminated sources of discomfort and displeasure.

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Near the village of Sassegnies, France, the Sambre meanders through farmlands and forests. The lock here was closed and we had to portage around it.

May 2015

In Stevenson’s Wake

The Rivers and Canals of Belgium and France

Two aspects of Robert Louis Stevenson’s book touched me immediately: first, the course, which I found wonderful and even exotic despite its geographic proximity to my home in Bordeaux; and, second, its vagabond spirit, which struck me as reawakening an ethic of leaving much to chance, a dance with luck, relying on unplanned encounters and unfolding episodes.

With the wind blowing out of the east, the sheetless two-meter sail provided little help. For Wally, still sporting his Los Humungos attire, and Rod lightweight canoe paddles are the best choice for the long haul in the kayak.

April 2015

The 2015 Everglades Challenge

A race that wasn't

After rescuing a dozen WaterTribers in distress, the Coast Guard canceled the race and requested that racers proceed to Cape Haze Marina and make arrangements to be picked up. I felt bad for him. He’d paid the entry fee, took time off from work, and traveled to Florida, only to have the race canceled. We pulled into Cape Haze Marina about 8:30 p.m. and over dinner decided to continue to Key Largo.

ZEPHYR's shallow draft allowed her to explore water too thin for most boats.

March 2015

Two Nights on ZEPHYR

A Spring Solo Cruise in a Garvey Box

Only when you've devoted over two decades to kayaks is a boat shy of 12' a step up to posh accommodations. Harvey Golden, a long-time kayaker, built Chapelle's smallest garvey as his first camp-cruiser and thoroughly enjoyed his shakedown cruise, even though he spent his days and nights in a cockpit not much bigger than a bathtub.

With summer rains and high water levels drowning the beaches at many of the official crown land campsites, the ability to live comfortably at anchor—or nosed into a reed bed—was a big advantage.

February 2015

Lake Nipigon

Sailing solo in the Ontario wilderness

The morning on Lake Nipigon brought cool air, clear skies, and a few faint wisps of cloud to color the sunrise. I unzipped the tent and saw a line of fresh moose tracks between me and the water’s edge, barely three feet from my front door. So much for thinking of myself as a light sleeper.

Greg Hatten races his PORTOLA down the tongue, hitting his line in Soap Rapid. Eleven miles below launch, this second major rapid has a 17' drop and gave the rowers a feel for the river and their newly built boats.

January 2015

Dories in the Canyon

Honoring the boats and the men who saved the Grand Canyon

In the early 1960s Martin Litton came to the McKenzie River in Oregon to write a story. The wooden drift boats he saw there would change his profession, his life, and river running on the Colorado River forever.

A bend in the river surrounded by farmland and forests provided me a place to camp. With little current and minor tides in the Mutlnomah Channel I could leave MAC overnight only slightly aground. A line from her bow to my wrist as I slept was all I needed to assure me that she'd not leave without me.

December 2014

Rowing the Columbia

Seeking serenity on a busy river

At Cathedral Park in Portland, Oregon, the Willamette River was flowing gently, leaving barely discernible eddies around submerged pilings a few yards from the beach. Skamakowa was 75 miles downstream and I had five days to get there relying on the current and a pair of oars. As I swung into the Willamette's current under the long shadow of St. Johns Bridge, I pulled hard to get away from diesel and car exhaust, ski boats, and boom boxes, and headed to the other side of the river.