Here, looking straight at you, is Grayling, a yacht with a serious past. She has been moored in Great Cove this week.
Grayling was built in 1915 in East Boothbay, Maine, as a double-ended fishing vessel with a distinctive cypress pilothouse. She trawled for mackerel and herring at first, and then became a sardine carrier in 1920. She trucked sardines to and from canneries for 70 years and then, when her useful life was thought to be at an end, she was left to rot.
However, Grayling is a tough old girl. In the 1990s, she was rediscovered and restored into an eye-catching, ketch-rigged yacht that sleeps 11. And so she has remained. She’s long (almost 65 feet overall) and thin (12.5-foot beam), which means she must carry significant ballast (10 tons) to avoid rolling.
By the way, as you may know, a grayling is a freshwater fish in the salmon family that prefers very cold water. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on August 9, 2022 [cloudy] and August 14, 2018 [sunny].)