The Whiskey Plank

The whiskey plank, traditionally, is the last plank fastened into the hull. The occasion is typically marked by a party to celebrate.

The views expressed are those of the authors and may not necessarily reflect those of WoodenBoat.

 

  • by Tom Jackson

    Seattle’s Shell House home of 1936 Olympic gold oarsmen may be preserved.
  • Senior Editor Tom Jackson sent in a collection of images straight from the Wooden Boat Festival, which is in full swing this weekend at the Northwest Maritime Center in Port Townsend, Washington. They have a special atmosphere at this boat show; many of the exhibiting boats welcome visitors aboard.
  • by Anne Bryant

    In this first part of a special five-part video series unfolding in the coming year, Kourtney Patterson of the blog Accidental Sailor Girl introduces us to the Danish-built, lapstrake cruiser NORNA. She has used her YouTube channel to unabashedly share the joys and challenges of cruising aboard a unique wooden boat. Her video logbook of places and practices catches the interest of everyone with...
  • Six years ago, Dave Hupke suffered a near-fatal injury. While his life hung in the balance, he imagined what he would do if he were to have the good fortune to live beyond the age of 46. As a teen, he had been a Boy Scout guide in Ely, Minnesota, and later, as an Eagle Scout, he led trips through the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. Drawing on his fond memories of wilderness paddling and of the beauty...
  • by Matthew P. Murphy

    FLEKKERØY, a Norwegian pilot cutter built in 1936, sailed into the WoodenBoat anchorage a few days before New Year’s Eve 2015. Her crew, Bjørnar Berg and Klara Emmerfors, are cruising the Maine coast this winter. Photo by Dick Leighton, www.5backroad.com/journal . During the summertime, WoodenBoat’s Brooklin, Maine, campus is a veritable Who’s Who of fine wooden boats. A person...
  • by Reuel Parker

    IBIS back in her slip at Riverside Marina, in St. Lucie Village, Florida, 12/10/2015. Sunday 12/06—I left my comfortable anchorage off Fort Frederica, Georgia, at 0800 and returned to the main ICW channel headed south. Just as you leave Georgia to enter Florida, you pass a huge industrial complex that feels very military—including ominous patrol boats that shadow you as you pass...
  • by Reuel Parker

    IBIS in the remote creeks and ditches of North Carolina; The sail cover is off the fores’l to keep it handy if needed. Sunday 11/29 0830—I left the Calabash River and found a fuel dock in Little River. This used to be a small, quiet fishing village, but now it has two huge floating casino ships to take gamblers offshore where it’s legal to separate them from their money the...
  • by Reuel Parker

    Back in the ditch—Virginia ICW Tuesday 11/24/15—I awoke to find the forward cabin hatch frozen shut. IBIS’s decks were covered with ice. Even the ICW—which is salt water—had skim ice everywhere. I remember thinking this was just not fair! But—why should life be fair? Was that ever in the itinerary? After breakfast, cowering in the aft cabin with the oven on...
  • by Reuel Parker

    Reuel Parker’s boat, IBIS, anchored in Cape May, New Jersey on Nov 17, 2015 Sunday 11/15—Having departed Holiday Harbor Marina in Waretown, NJ, (a really good boatyard), I proceeded to motor down Barnegat Bay and the New Jersey Intracoastal Waterway. The problems with the Jersey ICW are three: lots of long, meandering channels; numerous 35′ high fixed bridges; and inattentive...
  • by Reuel Parker

    IBIS at the Holiday Harbor fuel dock, in Waretown, New Jersey. In December of 2013 I sold my sharpie schooner IBIS to a man from New Jersey, using owner financing. It was, perhaps, the biggest mistake of my life (not knowing what further stupidities await me). I designed and built IBIS, a highly modified adaptation of the Straits of Juan de Fuca halibut fishing sharpies of the 1880s, as the...