Spirit of Tradition

by Terri Hodgson on 12 Nov 2014 The prospective new owner of the old Bluenose 24 had two objectives to satisfy in the hunt for his new yacht: the boat had to be beautiful and classic AND it would serve as an ornamental anchor in front of his Muskoka cottage. Stuart Cotrelle came to Gordon Laco, a friend, sailor and supplier of finer boat hardware and accessories, with performance specifications of the yacht he wanted to buy. He didn’t want to be responsible for a wooden yacht so they looked at metre boats and dragon class boats.

Gordon thought that a good compromise from a traditional yacht then would be one that exhibited the spirit of tradition. They found and settled on an old Bluenose 24, built by McVey Yachts in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, likely in the early 1970’s. The Bluenose is a One-Design was conceived by William Roué in 1946. Today, fleets of them still race in Nova Scotia. A recent regatta in Chester saw thirty-two boats jousting at the starting line. McVey built a version of these boats which, while basically faithfull to Roue’s design, featured the addition of a small cuddy cabin and a self-bailing cockpit. The plug for McVey’s version was actually taken from B 71, SKYLARK.

The boat was attractive to Stuart and Gordon because she had the look of a dragon class yacht with a well-built glass hull and this was raw material that they could work with. These boats are inexpensive and plentiful in Ontario. Laco found this one, brought it to Charles Wenneker and began the process of transforming her into a classic yacht. She was somebody’s nice, quiet cottage boat and was tired and worn from having received a minimal amount of care.

Wenneker discarded the aluminum mast and built a spruce spar for her. She has an epiphanus two part polyurethane paint job, giving her a new rich colour, complete an impressive gold leaf stripe. All of the wood work in the vessel has been replaced with mahogany. Extra care and thought has been put into the accompanying hardware for the Bluenose so the blocks for were made in England to the specification of blocks made in England in the 1920’s for racing. The yacht’s rope comes from Holland. A lot of the custom made gear (was hard to make out the word there) comes from Poland and Germany.

Charles’ work on this Bluenose is not an aberration from his usual woodworking. He told us that over the past several years his woodworking shop, that was originally centred largely around kitchen cabinetry, has evolved gradually into being almost exclusively woodwork on boats today. Charles told us of his woodworking education years ago in Germany which unfolded over four years, learning all of the different aspects of wood and its characteristic and applications in a detailed way so that today he applies this knowledge in beautiful practical applications. He has a thorough knowledge of the natural ingredients and behaviour of different wood species.

The completed Spirit of Tradition was picked up by her new owner and launched at Hamer Bay Marine on Lake Joseph this past July. The stepping of the mast and the rigging went well as did the placement of the last fittings – they held that off till the stick was up in order to ensure correct alignments and fair runs of the various lines.

According to the proud Laco, 'We sailed the boat to her owner’s island property in light air – she behaved well and I reckon will be a successful yacht.'

Information about the class association can be found here

www.WennekerWoodworks.com" target="_blank">Wenneker Woodworks

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