Soundings is the news and feature publication for recreational boaters. Award-winning coverage of the people, issues, events -- and the fun -- of recreational boating. Check out our generous boats-for-sale section and our gunkholing destinations.
I called my sister last night for an update on her location. She and her husband had boarded a 60-foot Ocean Yachts sportfish in Massapequa, New York, with plans to run from Long Island’s south shore up to Newport, Rhode Island. The boat is owned by a couple they cruise with frequently. The four friends have made the trip to Newport a couple of times in the past and were looking forward to a lively ocean run and then a few nights at a great summer destination. But things didn’t come together as they’d planned. They were about 30 miles east of their departure point, cruising at a slow speed in some fog, when the boat came to a grinding halt. A sandbar brought the big Ocean to a standstill.…
One of only two places on the Atlantic seaboard where the mountains meet the sea, Camden is often called the prettiest location in Maine. Situated on the western shore of Penobscot Bay, the town has a rich shipbuilding history that dates back to the late 18th century. Here, prolific builder Joseph Stetson opened Stetson Shipyard at the head of Camden Harbor in 1817 and built 70 vessels from his own models, ranging from schooners and brigs to passenger packets and clipper ships. In 1875, the Holly M. Bean shipyard opened on the east side of the harbor, where Bean and his sons launched 64 large wooden sailing vessels before closing shop in 1920, including the six-masted schooner George W. Welles in 1920. From shipbuilding to coast-wide and cross-continental trade, Camden’s…
Stewart Brand and Ryan Phelan were dating in the early 1980s when they first stepped aboard the 64-foot Mirene. The vessel had originally launched in 1912 in Oregon, bound for the canneries in Alaska, but since about 1975, it had been falling apart in California’s Sausalito Bay. Scavengers had picked Mirene clean. “The rudder was gone. The steering wheel was gone,” Brand says. “The whole engine room and the engine were gone.” Still, the couple saw promise. Brand was paying for his own place to live at the time. Phelan was, too. They wanted to live together, and they weren’t the type to shy away from a challenge. In the 1960s, Brand had created the Whole Earth Catalog, a counterculture and product magazine that featured, among other things, a slew of…
Second siblings have been on my mind a lot recently as we ready our home for our own second child. Specifically, I wonder what he will be like, will he be a smaller version of his big brother or will he be the diametric opposite? At the Palm Beach International Boat Show I got to spend some time with another highly anticipated new sibling of Tiara’s Adventure Series in the 54 EX. Having spent a day and night aboard the flagship 60, I left incredibly impressed by how the Michigan-based builder blended so many fan-favorite features from their smaller boats into a versatile motoryacht. What would be sacrificed to achieve the smaller footprint of the 54? From the massive swim platform to the line storage in the bow anchor locker,…
By the time Jarvis Newman delivered his first 36-foot Downeast powerboat in 1971, he had already earned a reputation for building high-quality fiberglass sail and power boats that were lauded for their finish and seaworthiness. That 36-footer, the Jarvis Newman 36, came from a mold taken off Irona, a classic wooden lobster boat designed by Raymond Bunker and built by Ralph Ellis. Bunker was Newman’s father-inlaw, and he let Jarvis make the mold to bolster his business. Jarvis sold many of the hulls—complete with engines and running gear—to builders who would finish them with decks and cabins according to their customers’ wishes. One of those builders was Ed Gray, who later joined forces with Jarvis Newman to establish the Cranberry Island business that would finish many of those Newman-built hulls.…
For millenia, members of the East Algonquin tribes paddled their canoes out to Monhegan. They used it as an offshore base to hunt for swordfish and named it Monchiggon, which means “out-to-sea island.” Monhegan is definitively out to sea. It sits in the Atlantic Ocean 10 miles from Maine’s Pemaquid Peninsula. But even though I’ve lived across from the island for five years, I’d never taken my boat there. I had my reasons. My RIB was too small; the harbor was too exposed; the holding ground was poor; there were too few moorings; and there was no dinghy dock. So, I always took the ferry. I love Monhegan. It’s beautiful and quiet. There is no airport, the roads aren’t paved, there are only a handful of cars, and there are…
