Built here at the WoodenBoat School, our Iain Oughtred-designed Caledonia Yawl, SWIFTY is a handsome and versatile double-ender, guaranteed to turn heads on any waterfront. She’s comfortable to sail in a stiff breeze and dazzles in light air and to windward.
With well-balanced, relatively high ends, this lean and long yawl shows considerable reserve buoyancy above the waterline throughout her length.
In steady winds she’ll safely sail heeled over, her crew central and sitting up to windward.
The push/pull tiller may take some time to get used to but it works perfectly. Pulling the tiller forward will turn the boat to port.
To assure positive tacking, simply back the mizzen to the inside of the turn as you come about.
Plans for Iain Oughtred’s Caledonia Yawl are available from The WoodenBoat Store.
Sailed aboard her a few summers ago with Milo for WBS Coastal Cruising course. Great construction and beautiful color choices! So impressed with how she sailed, I now own a gunter-rigged Caledonia, STORMY!
Can one sleep aboard the Caledonia Yawl?
There’s plenty of room for sleeping aboard a Caledonia yawl; you just need to make platforms for bunks. The centerboard trunk takes up a lot of room in the middle of the boat and would make sleeping on the floorboards to cramped to be comfortable. The layout in the plan shows three thwarts and side benches between them. The seating arrangements provide an ample sleeping area for two. Making the floorboards as flat removable panels that can be set on the thwarts would be a good start for an elevated platform. While raising your weight makes a boat less stable, the Caledonia has more than enough stability to provide a stable base for a thwart-level bed.
I built my Caledonia with cruising in mind and designed the interior to provide comfortable sleeping for four. You can see photographs of my arrangement in “Slip Thwarts and Side Benches” in the January 2020 issue of Small Boats.
I love my CY deeply, but to be fair I would not say “dazzles to windward” with the lug yawl rig, perhaps with the gunter, but maybe it depends on expectations. My CY has respectable boat speed upwind but I have found from dinghy racing that she just does not point as high as most sloop rigs and modern dinghies. But it might just be me. I’m curious what tacking angles others achieve. But downwind, boy does she fly with that big lugsail.
Fun boat to sail. The push-pull takes some getting used to. As long as there is a load on the tiller it is pretty natural, but in light airs you may have to think about it.