Welcome! This is our first web newsletter. We are trying out this format to see if it helps us let our customers know what we are up to. Long time customers can see that we have had a lot of improvements to our website. We are putting up more information about our boats and the work we do to help folks decide what options to have built on their boats. We had considered an email format, but we get enough spam as it is and we sure don't want to bug you with our version of it. Be sure and drop us a line and let us know if this is helpful to you.

We intend for this newsletter to be relatively informal. We will share our customers stories if you send them, and our own if we think they would be interesting to our boat owners. Plus we may put advance notices about our boats here as well.

First, we'd like to introduce the newest member of our fleet, The 17' Melonseed! This boat has been a long time in planning. Last year we went looking for a boat that would handle the open water as well as our New England Dory yet would sail more easily and be a little larger. As you all know the result of that search was our wildly successful Jersey Skiff. The Jersey Skiff has has proven to be a very popular boat for family cruising and extended voyaging. It rows very well, but we knew that -- being a sailboat -- some aspects of the skiff (full deck, high freeboard) made it less of an ultimate rowing machine.

This year we set out to fill the gap in our lineup. The 14'ft Whitehall has been a popular rowboat for exercise but it was too short to install dual sliding seats. The boat is fast with dual rowers, but we knew that a longer hull and waterline would improve the speed, and low freeboard gives the oars a nice angle on the water. But we didn't want to go to the expense and cumbersomeness of always having to have a rowing rig.

We first considered building a longer Whitehall. They are nice boats, fast, and easy to row. But they are narrow, and for speed with a sliding seat its really nice to use a longer set of oars, and for that a Whitehall needs a set of expensive outriggers. A 17' Whitehall with its full keel goes straight really well. The disadvantage is that if you are rowing it alone in a harbor you have to really stroke hard on one side to turn the boat to avoid mooring balls, other boats etc. And pulled up on a beach sitting on its keel, the boat tends to pound on the hard rather than sit flat.

Dave discovered that there was a longer version of the Jersey Melonseed in a beautiful lap strake hull. The boat has the same stem, stern and box keel as the East Coast Melonseed, but had been stretched from 14' to nearly 17'. And the deck had been removed to lighten the boat and allow us to put the oarlocks out at the gunnel. This longer hull gives us plenty of room to install a set of our own custom-designed tandem sliding seats. Infinitely adjustable seat positions and three oarlock positions allow different size rowers and passengers while still maintaining correct fore and aft trim.

Of course once we got the hull ready we had to take it out on the water for photos (you can see the result on the boats page) Most importantly, was it fast and fun to row? You bet!

Next we did some stability tests so that folks could see that you can have a fast hull that isn't tippy.

Here Falk is looking for crabs... The best way to pull a crab pot is over the stern.

And Wow! This boat is great!

Now, we are not dull folks who just build boats, we love to use them too. So when the Tall ships came to Tacoma, we had to go look for ourselves. Since we have plenty of friends whenever we go out on the water we took one of our Jersey Skiffs and you can see how much the sailors on the larger boats envied our crew!

So that's all the news for now. We hope to see you out on the water this summer. Be safe! Wear your lifejacket, it does you no good in the bottom of the boat. And look for our up and coming newsletters!