One of the good jobs over this winter has been to assist with the winter refit of the Cornish Pilot Cutter, Lizzie May. On a boat of this size, used for chartering, there are always a collection of broken locker catches, sticking doors and minor breakages to attend to. One of the more photogenic tasks relates to Lizzie May’s tender and has a nice tale attached.

When Lizzie May was built by Luke Powell, way back in 1999, she was supplied with a traditional clinker tender built by one Will Stirling. At some point the yacht (if that is the right word) and her tender were separated and subsequent owners had to make do with inflatables. On a trip down south over the winter Jerry, Lizzie May’s owner, was offered her back and jumped (I think) at the chance. After a lot of oil poured into her inside and a grey paint job to her planking she arrived in Granton (winter berthing) to be re-united with her ‘parent’.

There is no evidence of dinghy chocks on deck so she was originally stored, I presume, inverted over the coachroof and skylight. Anyway, Jerry decides that it makes more sense to store her right way up so chocks are made up (by me) and a cover is measured for and made (by Fabricworks).

So, on a very very wet day I drill a few holes in the coachroof, bolt in the chocks and we fit it all together. The arrangement looks, I think, quite fitting.

I was initially sceptical about ‘right way up’ storage on deck but can now see three big advantages.

– somewhere to put the fenders (and lots of other junk)
– no need to roll the tender over when launched and recovered
– light still gets through the skylight

The gap between the tender and boom is not large (some surgery was needed to the stemhead to ensure clearance – sorry Will) but she fits on deck rather well – for a counter sterned boat ‘only’ 42′ LOD.

Assuming that she gets well lashed down when it blows hard she should stay in place. In harbour she will enable skipper and crew to arrive ashore in considerably more style than last year. I do hope that yacht and tender manage to stay together second time round!

BTW Lizzie May is a charter boat and can be booked.