NARWHALI

NARWHALI, originally christened AVALON, was constructed over a seven year period by first owner Mike Rostron in Skagway and Haines, Alaska, and launched in the summer of 1998 in Haines. She is a hard-chined double-ended cutter with bowsprit and boomkin—an unmodified Buehler Emily design. Rostron built her stoutly using old-growth Douglas fir and Alaskan yellow cedar for her backbone, and fir for her frames. She was planked above the chine with 1 1/4″ fir, and below the chine “cold-molded” with four alternating layers of marine plywood and System 3 epoxy. Her deck is three layers of marine plywood. Mast was a spruce tree cut from the forest near Haines.

 Mike sailed her down from Haines to Bellingham the summer of 2002, spending twenty-five days en route. You can read one article about this adventure in the October 2012 issue of 48 Degrees North. “A Long Day On The Inside Passage.”  www.48north.com/articles.htm

 Rostron sailed AVALON on Bellingham Bay and throughout the San Juan Islands before selling the boat in 2006. Her present owner, Justin Francis, hailing from Nanaimo, sails her on the Sunshine Coast and Gulf Islands.

 Rostron’s band recorded the sailing song and video “Bluegreen Sea,” which opens with photos of this boat.  www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWdNZci2TDE