Blog & Articles

As of mid-November, 2015 the planking was finished, the seams were being corked and puttied and the interior decking was installed, sanded and finished. By late-November we finally began building bulkheads and finishing the plumbing rough-in. Our engineer Randy Good is, among other things, a very accomplished furniture builder, and had accepted responsibility to build…

A piece of Southeast history By Mary Catharine Martin | Capital City Weekly Once upon a 90-year distant time, the M/V Westward carried cruise ships passengers hunting humpback whales, mountain goats and brown bears through Alaska’s waters. Almost 100 years later, the 86’ vessel is captained by owner Bill Bailey, and it no longer has harpoon…

Like any major project this one continued to grow and morph until the final accounting of what was done has only a superficial similarity to what was originally planned. The sole reliable element is that it will take longer and cost more than anyone, regardless of their experience and background, has predicted. Some of these…

The gentleman who sold me the boat had no idea that the recent work done prior to his Pacific voyage would be in this condition. He and I both assumed that this area of the boat was the one place I didn’t need to worry about, so I could focus on upgrading systems and dealing…

Obviously monies tentatively budgeted for new upholstery, a sun shade, and possibly replacing the historically inappropriate interior furniture installed in the 1970’s with something more Herreshoff-ian are now, and probably forever, reallocated to getting the boat structurally rebuilt and back in the water. Everything else isn’t just secondary, it has dropped off of the list….

Westward’s Big Boatyard Adventure Part I There comes in the life of every antique boat owner a moment of reckoning. The moment typically arrives when we have lifted our treasured vessel onto the work area of a boat yard with the intention of replacing that one fastening, plank or window frame that represents the final step…

I grew up in a small Southern California beach town, my street ended at the cliff above the ocean. I never really noticed the sunsets while growing up, probably the unending sameness of smog-hazed twilights wasn’t enough to distract me from whatever job I had to finish if I wanted permission to go surfing the…

Westward is now less than 40 miles south of Ketchikan where we will clear into the US, make a quick pass at the accumulative shopping list and eat lunch with friends. Then it is back out on the afternoon flood with a course laid in for Petersburg. Moving toward Sitka to begin Westward’s first Pacific…

Among the wonders of owning antique boats is the multi-generational connections that the boats carry with them. I recently had out of town visitors, friends who had traveled with us last summer aboard Catalyst. Catalyst was built by the University of Washington in 1932 to serve as their first purpose-built oceanographic research vessel. She spent…

Twenty miles up a rough dirt road we passed through our last gate. Checho, our guide, opened the fence and waited for us to drive through before closing it behind us. Continuing a few meters further he indicated that we were to park. From here we would continue on foot. We were walking along an…

I was busy in the engine room when an orange glow outside the port hole caught my attention. Sunrise! A scattered layer of clouds promised one of unusual intensity, so I downed my tools, cleaned off my hands and climbed the ladder to the deck. Walking up the side deck toward the pilot house to…

A bit over three hours after leaving the paved road, our four wheel drive truck surged up a steep embankment and stopped in a small corral that was shaded by a few large mesquites. Stepping out of the truck was a step back in time. The wood rail corral was leaning into the surrounding trees,…