Marty's Travels

My house has wheels

New boat in the yard

Couldn’t miss this one on the hard at Port Townsend Boat Haven today, it looked like it had been been brought up from the bottom after a few years. It’s an interesting story:

It’s known as the Western Flyer, used by John Steinbeck and Ed Ricketts out of Monterey and in the Sea of Cortez. It was just recently pulled up from the bottom in Anacortes, Washington and towed to Port Townsend. Passionate literary historians have dreams of “restoring” the vessel.

To describe it as in bad shape is a ridiculous understatement; I’ve never seen a boat in the yard, presumably for repair work, completely covered with barnacles and with no salvageable timbers. The yard took it in with a deposit of $25,000 to cover destruction and landfill fees. Wise on their part, and I’m sure that will be the end of the story.

Fans of John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row and The Log of the Sea of Cortez will be familiar with this boat, and glad to see it first-hand. But it’s life is over, I’m afraid.