The Black Rocks sailing dory is just about ready (just waiting on a piece of stainless rod for the rudder) and Jay’s taking advantage of a gorgeous summer’s day to do a bit of painting in the boatyard before starting two new prams.

Champagne and Solomon Gundy accompanied the launch of our spring dory class’ boat this morning. As usual, we had a bit of an initiation before taking the boat down to the beach during which the guys had to take the four gastronomic sacraments of Lunenburg – Solomon Gundy (that’s pickled herring to the uninitiated), sauerkraut, Lunenburg pudding, or pig’s pudding as I grew up calling it, and all washed down with a shot of dark rum.

Participants in The Dory Shop’s spring dory building course took a little field trip yesterday, down to Second Peninsula to visit another historic (but considerably less dusty) workplace – the Michele Stevens Sailloft. Located on the second storey of an unassuming little building at the very end of the road, this sailloft is filled with history – you can almost feel it as you walk across the workworn but always clean wooden floor – and so much skill. Michele is a fourth generation sailmaker whose business occupies the very loft established by her great grandfather Randolph when he moved across the bay from Tancook Island. Literally thousands of sails have been built here – from the largest working mainsail in the world today, for Nova Scotia’s own Bluenose II, to sails for our little dories.

We kicked off the long Victoria Day weekend this afternoon with ‘graduation’ ceremonies for participants in our spring dory building course. Once again, we were blessed with a great group, all eager to learn about traditional wooden boats, to get right in there with the plane or the hammer or the paint brush, and to enjoy the offerings of Lunenburg, Nova Scotia and our waterfront in particular.

The gunwales are in and the guys are making the seats, known as thwarts, for their handsomely crafted Black Rocks dory. This afternoon we’ll get out of the shop a little and visit Michele Stevens Sailloft in First  Peninsula.

We told you the fellows in this spring dory building class were quick learners. Turns out they are also quick builders! Check out these photos of their dory, taken Friday afternoon.

We’d like to extend, a little belatedly, a big welcome to participants in our spring 2011 dory building class, which got underway Monday. We’re always wondering how we manage to get such great groups of people – truly! And this gang also includes some pretty fast learners. At this point, they actually have the dory fully planked (more photos to come obviously!) and will be fitting her knees this afternoon. Jay is highly impressed.

It’s a little over a month until the start of The Dory Shop’s fall dory building course and spaces are still available. I could give you the ‘hard sell,’ telling you all about how great the course is, and of course Lunenburg is spectacular in the fall. However, I’d prefer to pass along some comments from past participants instead

Once every year, about this time in October, The Dory Shop welcomes a pair of very special visitors. They arrive in their stunningly clean pick-up truck (always wonder how they do that!) and unload the equivalent of dory building gold. They are Edgar and Otho Hatt and they supply our “naturally-grown” dory frames or knees.

We had such a great time hosting our dory building course this spring, and have had such overwhelming interest in the prospect of future classes, that we’ve decided to host another course this fall. And this one will be even better thanks to the valuable input of our spring class.