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Never mind that until grounding on a mudflat less than 30 miles from the finish line, SCAMP #4 breezed through a difficult year in the 300-mile Everglades Challenge adventure race a few years ago, pressing on comfortably when many bigger boats had to quit. Never mind that during the inaugural Race to Alaska earlier this year, SCAMP #11 completed a very rough 40-mile open-water crossing of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, taking its solo skipper safely from Port Townsend, Washington, to Victoria, British Columbia. And never mind that yet another SCAMP (extensively modified for the venture by its builder) may attempt to round Cape Horn—yes, that Cape Horn—this year and, if successful, will be the smallest sailboat ever to do so. Despite all that, the overwhelming impression I get when Dave Ender drives up with his newly built SCAMP to take me sailing is: What a cute little boat.

photographs and video by the author

The buoyancy of the blunt pram bow resists digging in while running downwind and reduces the likelihood of broaching.

SCAMP is short, curvy, beamy, and high-sided, with a well-rockered flat bottom and a distinctive pram bow—a cross between a bulldog, a basketball, and an angry rubber duck. It’s also one of the easiest-launching boats I’ve ever encountered. I barely had time to grab my gear before Ender had the boat rigged and ready: mast stepped, sail hoisted, and rudder hung on the transom. He backed the trailer into the water and shoved SCAMP off. Less than 10 minutes from arrival and it was time to sail.

Josh Colvin, who commissioned SCAMP—an acronym for Small Craft Advisor Magazine Project—wasn’t looking for an ultimate adventure boat when he approached New Zealand designer John Welsford (see WB No. 225 for a profile on Welsford and his design work). “My initial goals for the boat were based largely on a 150-mile sail down the Columbia River, from Beacon Rock to Astoria,” Colvin says. “I kept coming across backwaters and shallow estuarine areas and thinking, That’s where I really want to go, but my 16-footer was too deep, wasn’t easy to row, and if I wanted to overnight up among the reeds, wouldn’t dry out level if the tide left. So the idea I eventually took to John Welsford was for the smallest possible boat that would be able to do all of these things, but still be seaworthy enough to cope with something like the middle of the Columbia River on a breezy afternoon.”

Judging by SCAMP’s popularity among amateur builders—roughly 340 kits or plan sets have been sold since 2011, with about 60 boats launched—plenty of other people are interested, too. Designer John Welsford sees SCAMP as a sort of 21st-century version of a much-loved classic, the Mirror dinghy. “While we don’t expect to do anywhere near as many boats,” Welsford says, “it’s hitting a similar, but older market.” Along the way, SCAMP has fostered an enthusiastic and supportive community of builders and owners, encouraging new builders to take the plunge.

The SCAMPS’s 100-sq-ft sail is set high for good visibility under the boom and is easily reefed.

To bring the new design to life, Welsford was able to make good use of his previous experimentation with similar boats. “SCAMP is number six in a series of very beamy, shallow-bodied boats with that distinctive high-positioned pram bow,” Welsford says. “Tender Behind, Tread Lightly, and Sherpa are the other designs that made it to plans. All work really well, can carry huge loads for their size, sail well, and are well balanced. I learned something from each of them, and SCAMP is a result of that learning.” Besides Welsford, boatbuilder/designer Kees Prins of Port Townsend, Brandon Davis of Turnpoint Design, and adventurer/prototype tester Howard Rice all contributed to final design details and kit elements for SCAMP.

SCAMP is built upright on its flat bottom, which serves as the base for an egg-crate arrangement of plywood that forms the boat’s furniture and structural members. No temporary molds or frames are used. It’s a method that makes for an exceptionally stiff hull, and a safe one—the completed “boxes” create six entirely separate buoyancy chambers within the glued-plywood lapstrake hull. Welsford reports that one SCAMP was able to remain comfortably afloat despite suffering “a hole in the side that you could put your head through” after hitting a snag. And although there are plenty of parts to assemble when building a SCAMP, no single step requires more than moderate woodworking skills and a selection of basic tools.

SCAMP is rigged with a single balanced lugsail, an excellent choice for a cruising rig that’s simple to handle and easy to reef. With 100 sq ft of sail and the stability to stand up to it, the boat also performs well. On my second sail in a SCAMP, working to windward on a gusty day, I was able to keep ahead of a 21′ Sea Pearl for several miles. SCAMP’s shallow draft and flat bottom make it a perfect gunkholer, and 173 lbs of water ballast (roughly 40 percent of the total hull weight) make it capable of much more. It’s no pulling boat, but SCAMP won’t be too difficult to move under oars when necessary. Some builders have considered experimenting with a single sculling oar at the transom; Dave Ender plans to try a yuloh. There’s room to mount a small outboard on the transom for backup propulsion.

Builders have the choice of building from plans or from a kit, with custom sails and hardware available for purchase. Another popular option for builders is the SCAMP Camp, a two-week intensive class in which participants come together to assemble their own SCAMP kits under the direction of designer John Welsford and prototype tester Howard Rice.

One unintended feature of the design deserves mention: several SCAMP builders I have met describe the boat as “a chick magnet,” and from my own observations at various messabouts and festivals, I’d say that such a claim is closer to reality than to hype. For potential builders with wives or girlfriends reluctant to take up sailing, this might be the single biggest advantage SCAMP has to offer.

A kick-up rudder allows sailing in shallow water and twin skegs help the SCAMP sit solidly upright when grounded.

Back aboard Dave Ender’s Scamp, we were away from the dock with an easy shove, heading across Lake Pepin, a wide stretch of the Mississippi that’s often subject to strong winds sweeping down between tall bluffs. Dave filled the ballast tank under the cockpit sole. With the drain holes open, the tank floods itself almost completely; the top of the tank is a few inches above the waterline, so must be topped off by replacing the plugs and pouring water in with a bucket from the cockpit before sealing. He could pour water in quickly without worrying about spilling or overflowing: The excess water drains out of the cockpit’s scuppers. With the water ballast in, we soon shook out the reef we started with, and Dave put me at the tiller. It was a windy day, but even under full sail we continued on in perfect comfort. SCAMP may be a small boat, but it’s the biggest small boat I’ve ever sailed. In fact, it’s almost impossible to categorize SCAMP by size. It weighs just over 400 lbs empty, but has the cockpit and freeboard of a 20′ keelboat (in fact, the freeboard is so high that reboarding the boat without a pre-rigged foot stirrup or rudder step would be problematic). It’s easy to drag up a SCAMP onto a beach for a quick stop ashore, yet filling the ballast tank adds stability well beyond the reach of a typical small boat. The self-draining cockpit sits high enough above the water that you feel like you’re aboard a much bigger boat—yet SCAMP is extremely maneuverable, tacking easily and spinning around within its own length like the smallest dinghy.

While it performs well enough to keep experienced sailors interested—Dave and I kept pace with several much bigger keelboats without much trouble—SCAMP would also be a great boat for beginners to learn on. The balanced lug makes tacking or jibing very simple and stress-free; lazyjacks hold the sail and boom securely in place, making reefing easy once the lines and cleats are set up; the boat is stable and comfortable. And it’s pure fun to sail. The only thing that I needed some time to get used to was being so far from the water compared to the sail-and-oar boats I usually sail. Of course, that higher freeboard and greater volume help make it easy to recover from a capsize (see the video below). By the time Dave and I returned to the dock, I was reminded again of just how much I like this design, and how much it can do.

The diminutive SCAMP is easily trailered, rigged, and launched.

With its quick launching capabilities, SCAMP would work well as a family-friendly daysailer. There is space enough for four adults in relative comfort (three is better; two is luxurious), and the boat’s stability makes it a comfortable ride even for the elderly and infirm, young children, or passengers who might simply be a bit nervous around boats. The boom is high overhead, minimizing the risk of hitting an inexperienced passenger, and the seats are wide and comfortable.

Cruising solo or two-up is where SCAMP really shines. The 8′3″ x 29″ cockpit sole provides ample space for one person to sleep aboard very comfortably (the offset centerboard is hidden in the starboard seat face), and filler planks between seats can be used to create a double bunk. The benches themselves (6′8″ by 17.5″) offer a place to stretch out but aren’t quite wide enough for sleeping. There is plenty of stowage space under the seats and cockpit. The “veranda” (a small cuddy/locker at the forward end of the cockpit) provides additional stowage, sitting headroom, and shelter from the wind, as well as a convenient place to anchor the forward edge of a cockpit tent. Forward of the veranda’s bulkhead there are 8.5 cubic feet of sealed stowage that provide extra buoyancy well above the waterline, just where it would be most useful in a knockdown. And of course, like all small boats, a SCAMP can easily travel to windward at 60 mph, pulled on a small lightweight trailer by a small four-cylinder car.

All in all, SCAMP is an unusual boat—an odd duck, both in appearance, and in its strange synthesis of big and small. It’s part keelboat, part dinghy, and part semi-eccentric fashion statement. Make no mistake, though; SCAMP is plenty of boat, wherever your interests lie. Anyone who builds one will definitely find plenty of ways to use it, and plenty of people to use it with. And that, after all, is the point of having a boat in the first place.

Tom Pamperin (www.tompamperin.com) is a frequent contributor to Small Boats Monthly and WoodenBoat.

Plans and information are available from Small Craft Advisor. Their YouTube channel has several videos featuring the SCAMP, including a capsize trial with Howard Rice, below.

Is there a boat you’d like to know more about? Have you built one that you think other Small Boats Monthly readers would enjoy? Please email us!

Arey’s Pond is a green, bowl-shaped jewel, one of several ponds in Orleans, Massachusetts, that give access, through narrow, winding waterways, to Little Pleasant Bay and, just to the south, Pleasant Bay itself. The pond is covered with various examples of that boat type most indigenous to Cape Cod, the catboat. There are good reasons for this. A wise adage worth remembering when boat shopping admonishes: “Get a boat suitable for your local waters.” On Cape Cod, that means shallow waters, sand bars, and, often enough in the afternoon, a brisk southwesterly wind. Catboats were born for this environment.

Tony Davis, proprietor of Arey’s Pond Boat Yard, has been building well-regarded catboats since the late 1990s. Today, his offerings range in size from 12′ to 22′, and there are enough models that one might think every potential customer’s needs would be met. But that assumption would be incorrect. “The couple who commissioned the Caracal’s design,” Davis said, “wanted a boat suitable for themselves and a crowd of kids. But they found nothing available that combined the really big cockpit necessary with a small cuddy that provided space for a portable toilet and room to take a nap.”

all photographs by the author

The head, a portable toilet, is concealed by a fabric cover and topped with a cushion.

Thus was born a new model that Davis named for the caracal, a small, fleet-of-foot wildcat native to Africa and points east. As Davis probed the buyers’ preferences, a number of requirements emerged that would influence the design. “I asked if the boat would be primarily a daysailer for Pleasant Bay or whether it would also be going to the Vineyard.” The “Vineyard” is Martha’s Vineyard, the popular Massachusetts offshore island, and getting there would require a higher level of seakeeping ability than would Pleasant Bay. “The answer,” said Davis, “was ‘Pleasant Bay.’ I asked if they might sometime want to start racing. The answer was ‘yes.’ I asked how many people the cockpit must seat. The answer was ‘six to eight.’”

The long cockpit provides ample seating for up to eight adults.

With those questions answered, Davis began the design process in September 2013. As it happened, he’d been thinking about just such a boat—a daysailer for Pleasant Bay—for quite some time. Years earlier, he had “sharpened up the bow” on the popular Arey’s Pond 14, and that experience would be reflected now. In catboat terms, “sharpening up” the bow means reducing the traditionally full shape of the forward-most hull sections. That fullness had long been necessary to provide the structure to support a heavy wooden mast. But, knowing the Caracal would doubtless find itself racing against several catboats with comparatively fine, hollow bow sections and an aluminum mast, Davis made a water-slicing, sharp entry a key element of the new model.

There were, of course, other considerations. The owners wanted their new boat to have a varnished transom unencumbered by an outboard motor. “I pushed for an inboard electric,” Davis said. The 2 ½-hp Mastervolt motor’s compact dimensions and aft location allowed him to include an appropriately sized—that means big—centerboard. Such a centerboard is key to a catboat’s windward performance. “We got the board the right size and located it exactly where we wanted,” said Davis. “Especially when reefing, which moves the sail’s center-of-effort forward, the board needs plenty of surface area to help maintain performance and balance.” (The boat’s 24-volt lithium-ion battery, incidentally, is located in a sealed, portside cockpit locker just forward of amidships.)

The big centerboard would work hand-in-hand with the Caracal’s comparatively large 290-sq-ft sail. “I asked the owners if they would be okay with having a big sail to drive the boat well in light air, even if it meant putting in the first reef at around 8 to 10 knots of wind. They agreed.”

Although a 290-sq-ft sail on a 19′ catboat might impress sailors today as large and daunting to handle, it would have seemed quite normal or even a bit small to catboat sailors of the late 19^th and early 20^th century. That said, Caracal’s 12-degree angle of the fully peaked gaff, though comparable to many modern catboats, would have been unusual in the past. Then, gaffs were peaked noticeably lower.

The 290-sq-ft sail provides good performance in light air; the first reef goes in at 8 to 10 knots of wind.

The result of a high-peaked gaff is improved windward ability. However, such gaffs impose challenges when it comes to how well they function as the boat moves from one tack to another. Caracal meets the challenge with a nicely crafted gaff saddle rather than jaws. It lies flush—some saddles may occasionally tip and bind—and functions smoothly as the boat comes about. A custom bronze gooseneck serves as the mount for the halyard and topping-lift blocks, and locates them well away from the mast. This means that the throat and peak halyards and topping lift don’t cause friction on the mast hoops as the sail is raised and lowered. These are all small but important matters vital to the satisfaction and even safety of catboat sailing.

While the Caracal’s rudder looks like a typical catboat rudder, it has a horizontal plate along its bottom edge to keep it performing well when the boat is heeled.

Caracal is equipped with the transom-hung “barn door” rudder typical of most catboats, then or now. “Rudder design is so critical,” said Davis. “Too small and the boat gets squirrelly. Too big and it drags.” Caracal’s rudder has an endplate along its bottom, a feature long advocated by designer Phil Bolger as a way to add area and maintain good steering performance as a boat heels. Davis has found the end plate effective in terms of steering performance while also reducing turbulence.

Davis’s design process begins with hand-drawn hull lines that are later transferred to a computer-aided design program for final development. Although Caracal was initially anticipated to be an 18-footer, as Davis worked on his drawings, he found it necessary to extend the hull by a foot in order to gain the flowing underwater lines he desired. In addition to performance considerations, Davis had aesthetics very much in mind as he developed the boat’s shape. “The hull was totally an artistic adventure,” he said. “I didn’t want the boat to look similar to the competition, for one thing.”

In fact, Caracal is quite distinctive. Unlike the near-vertical stems most commonly seen on catboats, Caracal’s stem curves aft, forming a canoe-like shape evocative of many 19^th-century catboats. With much refinement, Davis came up with a handsome sheer line that sweeps from the not overly high bow to the transom. The cockpit coaming is high without looking awkward. Combined with the deep cockpit, the coaming affords a great sense of security, whether for adults or kids. The little cabin’s top has a generous crown to maximize headroom.

Caracal is built of interlocking pine strips over laminated fir frames spaced on 2′ centers with additional frames installed in the forward and aft hull sections for extra strength. Once the hull is planked, it receives a layer of fiberglass inside and out. Finally, two layers of Dynel fabric are applied to the bottom for extra protection in case of grounding. An Awlcraft paint finish is applied; it offers the durability of Awlgrip but is applied by roller rather than by spraying.

Although about half of Arey’s Pond catboats have carbon-fiber masts to minimize weight at the bow, Caracal’s owners opted for a hollow spruce mast. That said, Davis reports that material prices and labor costs are approaching the point where carbon fiber is becoming competitive with a hollow wooden spar.

The spacious cockpit is equipped with hinged tables on both sides of the centerboard trunk, a chart table topping the housing for the electric motor, and drink holders sewn into the cushions.

While one would expect the cockpit of a 19′ catboat with a minimal cabin to be large, one really needs to go aboard Caracal to see just how much room there is. It’s a comfy place and there is ample storage beneath the long seats. There’s a centerboard trunk-mounted table and cup holders. A cup holder is also built into the cockpit cushions on either side of the helm. What a concept!

A convenient chart holder was fashioned atop the motor hatch. The coaming’s interior is sheathed in vertical staving reminiscent of catboats of yore, and adds a very definite “wow factor” to the boat. A full cockpit cover keeps out rain—the cockpit isn’t self-bailing—while protecting the varnished woodwork. Bronze cleats and a stout tiller complete the sense of having a boat with strong ties to a storied past.

Typical of catboats, Caracal feels substantial when one steps aboard. A first and lasting impression at the tiller is that the boat feels bigger than its actual length. On the day of our test sail, the wind, alas, fell light. However, this 2,400-lb catboat can make progress in light air thanks in large part to her fine bow sections and big sail.

Perhaps the most revealing display of the boat’s potential came at the 2014 Arey’s Pond Catboat Gathering, an event that attracted an impressive 102-boat field. The race was sailed in a 10-knot wind, a perfect whole-sail breeze for Caracal. The boat placed first overall against some very competently handled, fast catboats.

“Well,” Davis said, “it was a good test but not the same as an around-the-buoys race because there was more chance for a boat to get into bad air while others did not.” Still, for those considering a Caracal who might be interested in racing, it was a result—like the boat itself—to be reckoned with.

Arey’s Pond Boat Yard builds the Caracal , priced at $97,000 (as of 10/2022).

Included on their web page devoted to the Caracal is the video below, showing the Caracal under construction and under sail:

Is there a boat you’d like to know more about? Have you built one that you think other Small Boats Monthly readers would enjoy? Please email us!