LUTRA Launched!

 

Floating high!

LUTRA - Genus name of river and sea otters of the family Mustelidae.

LUTRA Launched!

You'd think it would be getting easier with experience. Not sure it's gotten any harder, but it takes longer than we think and leaves us elated, but whupped each time.

Building one's own vessel - DIY - is a mixed bag. 

On the one hand, it's a long sequence of tasks presenting varying degrees of challenge. Learning curves, supply chain foibles and material quirks, domestic and social duties and distractions... even - or especially - weather all conspire to prolong the ordeal.

On the other, we get exactly what we've dreamed and crafted into being, with a tailored fit no production vessel can match, and the care and attention no professional can afford.

A dream, a plan, a few tools, a pile of materials, skills acquired along the way, and stubborn persistence are all that are required.

And time. LUTRA has about 4 months of work in her for the two of us amateurs. Extend to about 6 1/2 months accounting for the copper plate - including stripping it off WAYWARD and some wasted time learning to translate 2D angle to 3D. Extend to 21 months accounting for all those detours I mentioned on the one hand.

We took a bit longer than necessary to launch her. Each boat is different, and when possible, we like to launch her by ourselves using tools we carry and materials that can be found anywhere in our cruising grounds. This time, we were mostly successful on both counts, but kind friends had to be dissuaded from lending their time and heavy machinery. We look kinda Luddite to most, but we have to be able to handle a potential move out there, and on our own. So we grunted and groaned our way to the water in only three days.

There's work left to go.

We'll spend the next month finishing out the interior, building a rocket stove and moving aboard. Then off to find spars a few miles from Tenakee. Then a few more miles to rig her. But it's now on our own time, and afloat.

The archipelago awaits!

First kiss o' the Sea

Tender time
Photo by Beret Barnes

Towed by Friends
Photo by Darcie Ziel