It’s hard to believe, but the days are getting shorter, the nights are getting cooler, and the crabs, when you can get them, are getting fatter. Summer is really drawing to a close in Chesapeake Bay Country. Even before the fall layup season starts our boatshops are bustling with activity. Alan Flinchum of Cypress Marine in Severna Park, MD, has a bona fide piece of Annapolis boating history in his shop, an inboard skiff named Sonny, the original towboat from Sarles Boat Yard on Spa Creek. Sarles opened in 1906, and before its recent sale, was the oldest working boat yard in Annapolis. I asked Alan how old he thought Sonny might be. “Nobody really knows,” he says. “I’ve heard it was built in the teens or early twenties. It’s had several engines; it has a modern engine now, and it needs some wood work. It’s leaking around the shaft alley and the rudder, and it’s had a bunch of gooped up repairs, 5200 repairs, on the rudder stock and the shaft alley. The boat is privately owned now. I think it was bought at the maritime auction over at St. Michaels last year.” Dave Hannam of Classic Watercraft Restoration in Annapolis, MD, reports his shop is in the throes of the dog days of late summer. Hannam has just completed and delivered the 1941 22-foot Old School to the Potomac and the 19-foot Holiday and is now focusing on a Chris Craft Sportsman, while completing all the new coatings for the 1990 Hacker craft 20-foot Gin Mill, which includes repairing the top deck beading for a super smooth finish, making her topsides look like glass. CWR is also moving forward with the construction of a new shop, which will re-establish the classic boatshop image, still catering to just the old woodies. [gallery type="rectangular" link="file" ids="5858,5859,5860,5861,5862,5863" orderby="rand"] Do it yourselfer Joe Borrison of Parkton, MD, sends us this brief report on his rebuilt and reconfigured 1977 Grady White Aaarrgh! on her run to the Bahamas. “The boat performed better than expected in many ways. The Yamaha engine was run between 3000 and 4200 rpm for eight hours on both ends of the trip. Oil consumption was zero for the entire trip, which also included 20 hours of use while in Abaco. Gas consumption, 3.2 NMPG, was higher than expected mainly due to carrying a heavy load of supplies for our vacation. The stainless prop may have provided improved performance but the aluminum was used in the event of a grounding on one of the numerous reefs. The boat weathered the trip very well. The balance achieved by moving the batteries forward of the gas tank was excellent and provided a quick time to plane. The ride through the Gulf Stream, while a little bouncy, was dry and solid due to the hull design and the heavy foam used. No cracks in any of the joints or stress areas were noted, and all equipment performed as expected. The topsides paint did not hold up to our heavy usage and was easily scratched. This paint will be sanded and replaced with a two-part paint this winter.” Eric Hedberg of Rionholdt Once and Future Boats, Lt. in Gwynn’s Island, VA, sends us the following newsy report. “While we are highly seasoned carpenters with a passion for wood boats, especially Baycraft, with a wide variety of experience from skiffs to buy boats, to the Susan Constant (Jamestown, VA), what we are truly excited about is our ability to reproduce wooden boats in cellular PVC. We have here a recently completed 14-foot flat-bottomed outboard skiff (sexy little thing), a three-year old reproduction of an 18-foot Wright Skiff (lined off from an original we found orphaned in Deltaville), a 22-foot Hooper Island Sharpie which was our first effort in PVC, and we also have underway in the shop a 20-foot deadrise outboard skiff that we are building for a neighbor of ours. “These boats are all Bay built, ‘by eye,’ true to the old ways but of modern materials that result in a faithful reproduction of a traditional Bay boat that will last indefinitely. They are impervious to moisture, rot, and worms, and hold paint beautifully; they are visually indistinguishable from a wood deadrise. My wife says ‘Now you can have everything you want in a wood boat without having to have a wood boat!’ Our first PVC boat, the Hooper Island Sharpie, has been outside every day of her 10 years and has the original paint on her sides. Now, for the first time, folks can have a true deadrise on a boat lift or trailer with no concerns. Imagine a small skipjack or log canoe on a boat lift!” Patrick Callahan of Worton Creek Marina in Chestertown, MD, sends us this update. “Worton Creek Marina is working on a 46-foot Post Yacht. We are replacing rotten deck coring, replacing the windows, refinishing the interior finish, and installing new carpet and countertops. Work continues on a 31-foot Bertram. During the “remanufacture” process the boat is being converted from gas engines to modern diesels. The engines are fitted and the new, larger, exhaust and running gear are located in the boat. They will then be removed, and the entire bilge will be gel coated and new deck substructure and bulkheads will be installed.” Britt Lilly of Lilly Sport Boats in Arnold, MD, has a lot going on in his shop at the moment. His crew is working on a 42-foot Fountain, originally equipped with twin 525-hp engines. The engines are currently being rebuilt with Whipple superchargers added to up their horsepower to just over 800. The engines are at Potter Performance in Sarasota, FL. The boat is being prepared for the rebuilt engines, upgrading instrumentation, redoing the exhaust systems, and making a whole host of changes to accommodate the upgraded power plants. Other projects include routine maintenance on a 42-foot MDI power catamaran with stainless surface piecing drives. Next to this big cat is a 27 Fountain Fever. It has a single 540-hp 502 big block with a supercharger and is receiving a new transmission. Britt’s paint shop is full as well. Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum (CBMM) Rosie Parks Project Manager Mark Donohue reports a four-cylinder Cummings diesel engine has been installed in the push boat of the skipjack Rosie Parks. The restoration will be completed with the installation of dredge winders on deck and completion of the doghouse interior, which will all be done to restore the boat as it was built in 1955. In June, the skipjack had its first public sail since the late ‘90s, with descendants of the boat’s builder, Bronza Parks, and its captain, Orville Parks onboard. The skipjack will remain dockside at the museum in St. Michaels as a floating exhibit, with plans to race her in the annual skipjack races at Deal Island and Cambridge this fall. [gallery type="rectangular" link="file" ids="5878,5877,5876,5875,5870,5872" orderby="rand"] Totch Hartge of Galesville, MD, sent us a picture of his 1979 Sisu 22 named Kingfisher. Totch describes her restoration, “Hats off to Captain Bob Stein (Black Dog Boat Works, Denton, MD) who restored this great little boat to be one of his best restorations/creations ever. Kingfisher was designed by famous lobster boat designer Royal Lowell of Maine and named for the bird my father, Captain Dick, wanted to be when he was reincarnated.” Mike Moore of Cutts and Case in Oxford, MD, sends us the following. “New to the Yard after an extended storage is Applejack a 1930 vintage Seabright Skiff, in for paint and varnish and soon should be sailing. Ralph Wiley’s 1955 Tancook Whaler Vixen is in the final stages of hooking up the re-conditioned Atomic Four, and the fuel system has been newly plumbed. Deck repairs on Berwyn are currently underway, scarfing in new cedar on the transverse-planked decks. Gold leaf lettering is being applied by Jay Brown to the soon to be launched Spirit, which is also having a new head and treatment system installed, the original Monel fuel tank re-conditioned and the fuel system re-plumbed to accommodate her new Universal diesel.” Meg Roney of Mathews Brothers in Denton, MD, sent us this update: “We delivered a brokerage boat last week to her new owners after putting new nonskid on the top decks and freshening up the teak deck (re-caulking, new plugs, sanding, new sealer).We are wrapping up on the Eastport. The hard top is going on this week, the freshwater plumbing is nearly complete, the AC is in, the electrician is starting to pull things together, the boot stripe has been painted, the windshield and hardtop will go on for good this week; she’s coming together. The Sandy victim we have here in the shop has gotten her fresh coat of awlgrip on the hull. Gel coat repair to the topsides is nearly complete.”