Christmas Lights Boat Parades

Do any of you boat owners participate (or spectate) in Christmas Lights Boat Parades?

I first became aware of such parades about 15 years ago when I saw the Annual Clear Lake Christmas Lights Boat Parade in Clear Lake, TX. For many years I was a spectator, but never a participant.

I live over 100 miles away from Clear Lake, so my participation in this annual event is highly unlikely. But I like the concept.

I live on Lake Livingston and own a Thames Rowing Skiff. For this festive season, I decorated my rowboat with Christmas lights and made my own Christmas Lights Boat Parade (consisting of one boat).
Naturally, I won first prize!



I have finally become a participant in a Christmas Lights Boat Parade.



Even though my "First Place" win is bogus, my boat has won prizes at wooden boat shows.
Keels and Wheels 1st Place 2011
Pirates Cove Wooden Boat Show 2nd Place 2013
Madisonville Wooden Boat Festival 1st Place 2013

 

My friends and I are looking for a summer project and we saw your boat at the Madisonville boat fest last fall and we though it be nice to build a boat like that so I was wondering if you could send us the dimensions of you wooden skiff my email is brierrebreaux@gmail.com

 

I am glad that you had an opportunity to see my boat at the 2013 Madisonville Wooden Boat Festival. It was a really great wooden boat show.



If you are a skilled amateur wooden boat builder, this would be a good design for a boat building project, but it would be a challenging choice if your group is contemplating a first or second boat building project.

My rowing skiff was built by http://picnikyacht.com/ from plans available from Selway-Fisher. It is their Mandarin 17 design. Basically it is a stitch and glue design of a typical Thames Rowing Skiff, scaled down to 17 feet overall length.



http://www.selway-fisher.com/Rowskiffs.htm#MANDARIN

I don't have the wood working or boat building skills required to build a boat of this quality. I was fortunate that the builder of this boat had put it up for sale at the time I was looking to buy a "rowing exercise machine".



I would hate to see you and your boat building friends encounter the situation that the Ancient Kayaker posts in another topic on this forum.

"?? I've never done a S&G ?? I helped a guy do one, saw his hopes die slowly and I vowed not to even try. He was a retired cabinet make obsessed with perfect and by the time he got the fillets to his satisfaction he just gave up. I would have settled for less especially as it was a sailing canoe with decks. I might have hidden the evidence with narrow side decks. Such a shame, lovely hundred-year old design updated to S&G."


I would suggest you contact PicnikYachts to get a better feel for the complexity of building this design.
Note: The build of my boat was modified to eliminate the stitch and glue construction, and built over a mold instead. As of this morning's rowing exercise, I have logged 945 miles of rowing in my rowing skiff.

I hope you find the right design that will work for you.

 

Beautiful Don.