Wow. I just got home from a 15-day Grand Canyon trip to encounter the Scared New World. I should not have left y’all in charge of things when I was gone. But now that we are all locked in our little cages for the foreseeable future, it’s a good time to catch up. 
Back in February we finished up Papa Bear, the new king-sized Briggs boat for Canyon Explorations–a twin to Shaman’s Gallery, that we built a year ago. Here we are glassing gutters and decks.

Gluing up scarfed ash gunwales.

And bolting those gunwales onto the boat.

We took a break to dress the place up for the annual Flagstaff Mountain Film Festival party. Mini boats got a display above the band stand.

Hatch lids getting glassed the eve prior to the party.

Peter McLaughlin and Chris Brashears tearing it up.

Back to work on Papa Bear. Pulling tape.

Touching up lines.

Milling out the oar stands.

The Doryaks came in for a little love before our training trip.

Papa Bear awaiting a ride to the warehouse.

But since we had almost two weeks to kill before launch day, we banged out another boat. Chet and Kat came in to assist in banging together a standard Briggs.

We try to leave about an inch extra above the designed gunwales so we can adjust and cut to what looks perfect. This time we added a little over half an inch to bow and stern. No two are ever quite the same. As it should be.

With the gunwales on it’s just a matter of a few details. Day after day of a few details.

 And that’s it for this one. Chet and Kat get to take her home now and figure out the paint job.

Somewhere in there we got in a few more days on the Powell mini-replica. Here’s a long, wiggly strake. The straighter they look installed, the wigglier they are in actual shape. Go figure.

About 150 teeny ribs got made, boiled, and bent in. The spacing is scaled off a remnant of one of the Nellie Powell, one of the 1871 Powell boats.

The Barbies taking the hull out for a test run.

Ready for the seats, end compartments, and oarlocks.

Time out for a test float/ test flip of the Doryaks, and a test run of Cricket’s little Jiminy, the wee motorboat. Sorry not to get any good shots of the festivities.

Interview time in our silly little boats.

The day before the river trip, I found out we were taking both Doryaks, but I only had one set of oars. Time for some speed-whittling!

 And off we go, with a huge fleet of craft including four Fretwater boats.

Dawn and I stayed aboard Peekaboo most nights. Such a cozy little thing.

Cricket and Dawn in Papa Bear.

The Doryaks rocked it. Not a single flip on the whole trip, and we ran big at every opportunity.

I should get some good action shots of the Doryaks before long, but none just yet. I’ll close with an emblematic campfire shot, summarizing man’s relationship with our planet.

Stay healthy, stay rested, and we’ll see you at the other end of the tunnel. Remember: Worrying never fixed yesterday or changed tomorrow, but it sure fucked up a lot of todays.