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Big Little Boat Festival 2022 - Part 3
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2022 marked a return to our 20+ year tradition of awarding prizes for craftsmanship. As usual, we had tough decisions to make! Here are photos of this year's home-built boat winners.
For the 20-mile "Deale or No Deal" and the paddling race results, click here.
Craftsmanship Awards!
John Harris and Nick Schade appointed themselves the judges. Here they are looking over Jim Black's Petrel, which won Best Kayak at the Big Little Boat Festival this year.
Jim's care in his joinery and light touch with the details really stand out. Note the delicate-but-functional wooden edge-banding on the knee braces.
A brilliant treatment for the hatch hold-downs on Jim's Petrel.
Howard Spira brought this outstanding strip-planked Petrel Play with an unusual white stain on the deck. This one really stood out, and Howard was awarded runner-up Best Kayak.
We're sorry we weren't able to catch any on-water photos of this okoume plywood Farr 3.7, built by Steve Harrington and Carla Millar. They drove down from Canada to race the boat in the Deale or No Deal. Despite being just over 12 feet long, the boat's a real flyer and they nabbed 2nd place in the race against a number of larger sailboats.
Look at that maple leaf onlay!
Steve & Carla's detailing on the Farr 3.7 made them a shoo-in for Runner-Up Best Smallcraft this year. We loved this control line organizer, just stitched-and-glued from 4mm okoume.
The rudder mount on the Farr 3.7 is an intricate but elegant space-frame of wood and carbon fiber struts. This was designed and fabricated entirely by Steve and Carla. Steve has an interest in remote control aircraft (like CLC's John Harris) and applied aeromodeling technique in some features of the boat.
Another view of the rudder "cassette" on the Farr 3.7, through which the foil-shaped rudder blade is dropped.
Best Smallcraft went to Doug Braun's newly launched PocketShip. As boatbuilding projects go this is a substantial undertaking, and Doug did a glittering job of Little Dumpling.
Doug's PocketShip was inspiring to watch, boiling along at flank speed.
Close-up of the PocketShip Little Dumpling. Note the single footstep on the transom. Someone climbing aboard can use the endplate on the bottom of the rudder as the first step, the step Doug has added as the second, and like that they're back onboard. Getting back into a small boat from the water—whether by choice or in an emergency—is something that should always be given thought.
"Best in Show" at CLC's annual rendezvous is given to the project that demonstrates a consistent quality of execution, from the largest to the smallest details. Dave Dawson's Autumn Leaves, Terrapin, is a great example. Dave is both an experienced sailor and builder, and this shows in the care he took to make Terrapin easy to handle solo. His choices for the boat's finish really suit this canoe yawl's lines.
(We didn't grab as many great photos of Dave at the Big Little Boat Festival, so these are from a couple of years back.)
Dave and Terrapin powering along under full sail on the Miles River.
Dave and Terrapin in the Deale or No Deal race at the Big Little Boat Festival. Congrats, Dave! I know how much time and energy went into this project!
One last look at BLBF 2022: PocketShip #1 at anchor on the Rhode River.
See you next year!
