Bring Out Another Thousand

B.O.A. T -bring out another thousand. Once bitten by the boat building bug, there's no cure for it. I was talking to my dad's neighbor the other day. He had his little fishing boat behind his house, doing some work on it. It drew me like a moth to a flame. The old guy pointed out that no matter what you start out to do with a boat, before long you've spent another thousand dollars. That's pretty much it.

Never mind what a boat repair or even a cheap plywood dinghy is supposed to cost, plan on at least a thousand dollars. There's a sort of mission creep going on. Materials get upgraded, projects expand, and before you know, there goes the money. My dad's neighbor says he thinks he's got about nine boats. Sounds about right to me. Currently he's building a lapstrake double ended rowing canoe. My guess is that he's building it just because it's pretty.

The more boats I look at, the more I want to build one exactly for the way I travel. Some sort of shallow draft sailboat with a rig that can easily be lowered to pass under bridges. After days requesting bridge openings it sure would be nice to just scoot under them.

I've been following Dave Z's latest thoughts on boat building. He's doing the skull sweat for his next boat and it's an interesting process to follow. Now his needs are not exactly the same as mine, but there is significant overlap.

Of course, I've a boat half built sitting in my driveway back home. That project awaits my arrival in the spring. When you've got the boat building disease, it's only normal to think a couple projects ahead.

The sensible thing would be to find a decent used boat that satisfies 85 – 90 percent of my needs and call it good enough. As much as building boats is fun, I'd much rather use them than build them. Waiting to build the perfect boat can keep a person from ever actually leaving. There's much to be said for good enough. Of course, good enough will still cost the occasional thousand dollars. Oh well, I'd rather a boat in the water than money in the bank.

-Sixbears