Custom Uffa Fox designed Ankle Deep

Ankle Deep - Wild Rooster

     Wild Rooster launched in summer 2023 -- Wild Rooster is a replica of a high-speed, low draft skiff originally designed and built by English designer Uffa Fox.

Construction

• Sheathing: 2 ⅛” Western Red Cedar
• Stringers: ¾” x 1” Douglas Fir
• Furniture: ½” BS 1080
• 1 layer 6 or 8 oz. ‘glass

Wild Rooster Through the Eyes and Pen of the Owner

WILD ROOSTER Spreads Her Wings

     It was a beautiful spring day as I strode down Montague Street in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. We had recently moved here after we sold our house in Brooklin, Maine, and we had gotten off to a promising beginning: already a fine cast of friends (and acquaintances). It was with high spirits that I set off on my walk through town, with a set of boat plans under one arm, and a book under the other.

     At the risk of boring you for a few moments, let me tell you a little bit about Lunenburg. It’s located one hour south of Halifax, on Nova Scotia’s south east shore. I doubt there’s a more picturesque town or village in the Atlantic Maritimes. It has a population of 2,400 year-round residents, with totals much greater than that in the summer. Of course it is best known as the home of BLUENOSE, the legendary fishing schooner that won every race in the International Fisherman’s Cup that pitted Nova Scotia’s fastest fishing schooner against the fastest boat from the US in the 1920s. After her fishing days were over, she hauled freight in the West Indies until she hit a reef in 1946 and was lost. Currently, the second of her replicas (BLUENOSE II) sails out of Lunenburg. She’s quite a sight to see as she moves through the harbor. Of course, there is much more to Lunenburg than just BLUENOSE II – the architecture of the houses and buildings is gorgeous and varied. But this is not a tourist article. For more on the town, simply Google it. Lunenburg is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

     OK, back to boats. I was on my way to meet with one of our friends, Paul Baskett. Paul graduated from the boatbuilding program at the Landing School in Arundel, Maine. He then moved to the UK, and worked with the acclaimed boatbuilders at Spirit Yachts in Ipswich for five years. He owned and operated a boat shop in town, Old Town Boatworks, and had recently moved his shop into a bigger and better space. I needed to talk to Paul about an urgent need I had: to have a boat built. 

     I don’t say this easily: to have a boat built. Much more money and mystery and stress than buying one already built. But the boat I wanted wasn’t one easily approximated. And, for whatever reason, I really wanted this boat, almost to the point of need. I’ve tried to understand this about myself, but without much success. I’ve been fairly profligate in my boat-ownership history. But maybe this boat would be my last?

     So, the boat: Uffa Fox’s ANKLE DEEP, a 25-foot open launch, as you can see in these pages. Fox was an extremely successful British boat designer and builder. ANKLE DEEP is the last of his designs,1969-1970, and is the only powerboat among his design catalog. His primary focus and success was fast and lightweight planing sailing dinghies. The original ANKLE DEEP has been restored and is on display at the Classic Boat Museum in Cowes, the Isle of Wight.

     You’ve been a sailor all your life. Why, now, a powerboat? I’ll give you a short answer now and a longer, better answer later in this article. The simple answer is: adventure. 

     I used to write a blog for WoodenBoat.com (and the WoodenBoat Forum) called My Wooden Boat of the Week. I’d trawl all sorts of sources and try to find something unusual or noteworthy to write about. I wrote one of those almost every week. Call it 45 a year. And I think for 10 years. So, that’s a total of 450 posts. At maybe the halfway point, I was looking for inspiration in Fox’s book, More Joys of Living. As with all his writing, there are some bits of fascination, and some too-boastful claims. On page 158, Fox quoted himself: “The seas divide the world for al andsman, but for a seaman, they unite it.”

     And then he introduces us to ANKLE DEEP: “I built this fine-lined launch, which I had specially designed to cut her way easily and cleanly, without waste of energy, through and over waves. She is the largest launch that can be handled easily by one [person] in all conditions of wind and sea…” I found her design to be just what I wanted (but didn’t know at that point that I needed). Very pretty boat. Easy, clean lines, simple, lightweight, and a degree of strength to her. I liked how he kept her beam all the way aft, and that tremendous flare at the bow.

     Uffa comments on her lines: “.. I designed ANKLE DEEP with a lovely set of fine-angled sections which combined the ease and graceful entrance of rowing boats, a very fine entrance, with dead-straight waterlines. The bow lines, with a 3 degree angle of attack forward, flow into dead stright [sic] buttock lines as they sweep aft to the stern, a set of lines combining straight waterlines in a fine wedge from the stem with dead straight buttocks (over the aftermost three-fifths of their length) which causes the boat to run level and steady at all speeds.”

     My purpose in going to Paul’s shop today was to iron out the details of design and construction. For example: Epoxy wasn’t readily available when Uffa designed and built ANKLE DEEP in 1970. So, she was built with 2 x ½” double-diagonal mahogany, which is relatively heavy. “Ours” was going to be cold-molded, 2 x ⅛” Western Red Cedar with epoxy construction, and a significant weight saving.

     Here in Paul’s office on a dock in Lunenburg Harbour, with the light streaming in, we unrolled the lines and construction plans and weighed them down at the corners. And I presented Paul with his own copy of More Joys of Living. Starting at the bow, we debated adding a foredeck. We actually didn’t debate – we were unanimous that a foredeck was necessary. Uffa had two 9.9 hp Evinrude outboards. We’d have some overkill with a 20 hp Honda because of the new boat’s weight saving. Extra horsepower can be good in emergencies.

     Next was the seating. Uffa opted for thwarts; I preferred fore-and-aft seating as being more sociable when there are a number of passengers aboard. I’m not sure if you can tell from the construction drawings – near the bow and also near the stern, there are large areas for flotation foam. These show as fairly blank spaces, but they take up a lot of room. I have an old, poor quality photo of ANKLE DEEP tied up to a dock. There doesn’t appear to be any flotation foam, which should be visible. Perhaps Uffa ran out of time or money, or just didn’t want to give up the space? At any rate, this illustrates one of the drawbacks of the design: very little space for storage, whether an anchor or for life jackets, or a bucket for a head, or for lunch. She’s a quintessential day boat: no frills. Just out for cruising during good weather.

     Paul and I agreed on no electronics. Paper charts of course, plus a phone in a pocket in addition to a VHF. And, yes, a bucket. 

     The workday ended. We closed up the shop and adjourned to one of Lunenburg’s award-winning pubs. This part of the agenda was where I would explain to Paul whatI wanted out of our version of ANKLE DEEP. Ours was tobe named WILD ROOSTER. There’s a story behind that. Let’s see if I have room for that, near the end.

     After we sold the Brooklin house, we bought the one in Lunenburg. But neither I nor my wife Melissa are Canadian, and we couldn’t stay longer than six months a year. We had also bought a small, non-luxury condo in Portland, which was perfect: Lunenburg in the summer and fall, Portland in the winter and spring.

     It might have been the fourth year we were in Lunenburg that we actually committed to having WILD ROOSTER built by his crew at Old Town Boatworks. We headed west (yes, I know it feels south, but it isn’t. Brooklin and Lunenburg are almost dead west-east of each other.) after putting our house in order, hauling our few boats, saying goodbye to our good friends. “We’ll see you in six months!” Fate conspired otherwise.

     Of course the Covid pandemic arrived a few months later. Canada and the US agreed to close the border. Wait, whatabout me? I wanted to ask. But our problems were so minor compared to the horrible suffering, tragedy, and deprivation borne by so many. 

     Paul and his crew began the building of WILD ROOSTER. Emma May, Paul’s partner and primary finisher and bookkeeper and doer-of-everything, would send me photos every week. It was beyond exciting. But the border showed no signs or reopening, the pandemic was still raging, and life in the small condo was stifling.

     We made some hard decisions. Would the border ever reopen? Would the pandemic ever cease? The housing market in southern Maine was insane – buyers galore, low interest rates, very high prices. We jumped, and found a perfect house for us in leafy South Portland. Alas, no shop, but that wasn’t surprising in our residential neighborhood. And our condo sold almost overnight.

     I don’t know if you’re familiar with Casco Bay at all. If you put one of your hands in front of your face, and turn it soyour fingers are dangling down – that’s close to the geography of Casco Bay. The space between fingers are rivers or long inlets; the fingers are peninsulas. To a kid of 15 with an inflatable and 5 hp outboard or a geriatric sailor with a powerboat, they represent the same thing: adventure! I imagine cruising up the rivers, maybe spending the night at an inn or motel for a hot shower and dinner, and on my way again the next day. WILD ROOSTER can probably cruise easily at 20 knots, but I’m more a 7.5-10 knot person, and it’s not a race. 

     The next difficult step: we sold the house in Lunenburg. Just a heart-breaking but correct decision. WILD ROOSTER was to become a Maine boat, then. But on a trailer, so hopefully we can bring her back to Lunenburg at some point in the future.

     Launching Day arrived! And we couldn’t be there due to a scheduling problem. But Emma kept me fully apprised with photos, as did Chris Reardon. WILD ROOSTER had some cavitation problems (ventilation) but there was no time tofix them – that would have to be done in Maine. That problem was caused by a mis-measurement of mine, and has been remedied by some delicate surgery by the good people at Maine Yacht Center.

     Here’s my confession: due to the lateness in the season and the surgery to WILD ROOSTER’s transom, I’ve only been out on her twice. The first time was flat seas in protected waters, overcast but no wind. She was a rocket.. Until the cavitation kicked in as we turned to port or starboard.

     The second time was perfect: Good friends aboard, windy, we ran between the islands, venturing out to sea for a limited amount of time. The seas weren’t too big, but she took them in stride, both straight ahead or abeam. A bit astern as well. And she performed flawlessly.

     Like many a good sailor, here I am in January, looking at the calendar. That many months to go! But the wait will be worth it.

     Oh, WILD ROOSTER. I used to go to a trade show in the Netherlands for WoodenBoat every year. After the show concluded one year, we ventured to a spectacular collection of Van Gogh paintings in the east of the Netherlands, at the Kroller-Muller [umlaut over the “o’] Museum. The trip leaves Amsterdam by train, then a bus, and then a short bicycle ride. Just as we approached the museum, there was a sign warning of a slippery cattle grate. It showed a car skidding, and the word “wildrooster.” As did one of us, who forgot that the brakes weren’t on the handles but the pedals. A humorous accident ensued, and no injuries were reported. The word lives on.

     My greatest thanks to the crew at Old Town Boatworks and all the good people in Lunenburg." ~ Carl Cramer Owner of Wild Rooster

Disclaimer

     The Company offers the details of this vessel in good faith but cannot guarantee or warrant the accuracy of this information nor warrant the condition of the vessel. A buyer should instruct his agents, or his surveyors, to investigate such details as the buyer desires validated. This vessel is offered subject to prior sale, price change, or withdrawal without notice.