Boat Review: CLC Skerry

This 15-footer is fun, functional, and easy to build

Small, simple-to-build boat designs—the type most likely to be tackled by a beginner—rarely end up offering the on-the-water performance and virtues necessary to actually satisfy their builders. While there’s potential for these rudimentary boats to be a gateway to more building and sailing, many don’t serve any realistic waterborne need and end up being used once or twice and unceremoniously decommissioned. The “family skiffs,” once so full of promise, end up as garden art, full of sand.

The trick then—and it’s much harder than it looks—is to design a small, simple boat that offers some of the advantages, performance, and versatility of larger, more complex designs. The goal is a “big” little boat. And if it can somehow be a handsome-looking craft, so much the better.

One of the rare boats we’ve seen that appears to tick these boxes is the Skerry, designed by John C. Harris at Chesapeake Light Craft. Sold both as plans and in kit form, the Skerry has proven immensely popular since its release in 2002.

“About 600 have been built from kits,” Harris says. “The number built from plans is harder to pin down, but there must be a bunch. These aren’t kayak-kit numbers, but for a small sailboat that’s not a white fiberglass sloop, it’s an impressive tally.”

What first caught our attention was her pleasant appearance which, while not reminiscent of a particular traditional boat, seemed somehow rooted to history. Harris says Skerry combines elements of traditional working craft of the British Isles and Scandinavia, with a little bit of American Swampscott Dory thrown in.

“The starting point for the design was in fact a peapod,” Harris says, “and the early prototypes had more burdensome lines. But I realized at once that the essential character of a true peapod is, above all, its enormous weight. Which of course isn’t consonant with a mail-order boat kit.” Knowing a stitch-and-glue Okoume plywood boat built to these lines was going to be light, Harris went the opposite direction, looking more closely at Scandinavian small craft for inspiration.

As for the final product, the designer is delighted. “I was startled by how well the boat handled both as a sailboat and as a rowboat.” Harris says. “It’s tricky and rare to combine those qualities.” He’s quick to acknowledge, though, that none of the individual design elements were particularly original. “I wish I could credit my genius as a boat designer,” he says, “but all I really did was collect a grab-bag of features long known to work well: a narrow waterline to make her easily-driven, flaring sharply to a broad beam up at the rail for solid secondary stability. The boat can be driven fast without much sail area, and you rarely hear of these being capsized. The flare makes her dry in chop. It’s a very forgiving sailboat but fast enough to keep the dinghy-racers happy. And of course you can row it all day.”

We asked Harris if there was anything he’d do differently or anything that came to surprise him about Skerry.

“Among the critiques of the boat is that it has a rather spare fit-out. The interior, for example, is simple bordering on austere. Serious builders who look forward to laminating frames, fitting thwart knees and assembling spacered inwales are apt to be disappointed. But the modest parts-count was a deliberate design choice, and in fact probably explains the boat’s success.”

The current base Skerry kit—which includes computer-cut hull parts in Okoume, Spanish cedar rubrails, Sapele breast hooks, the daggerboard trunk assembly, an epoxy kit, fiberglass for the hull, one pair of bronze oarlocks and sockets, and a spiral-bound assembly manual—sells for $1,425. A sailing kit is an additional $1,269.

“More importantly,” Harris says, “the Skerry is quick and easy to build, so amateurs are likely to make it all the way through to completion.” And whether it’s the French fleet of 50 Skerries gathering for their own messabouts or Skerries entering the Watertribe races, these boats are getting out on the water for serious use. All the more impressive when you consider that at 95 pounds, Skerry, as John Harris points out, weighs less than some German Shepherds.

We were pleased to get a chance to row, sail and review a well-built Skerry with owner Jonathan Patton.

PERFORMANCE:

“Moves nicely even in light air.” Jimmy Vitale, Victory

“The Skerry is a fun boat to sail. It gets me where I want to go. That said, it does not point into the wind well.... it goes back to that sprit sail. I suspect the other rigs offered would perform better.” Steven Roberts

“Fast enough! It reaches hull speed, then maxes out. Fine for my needs, as a recreational cruiser. Points well, not as well as a main-and-jib rig, but does well. It sails like a large boat. To tack, you have to maintain forward speed. The rudder is totally effective, but not to ‘horse’ the boat around if you run out of speed tacking, like in a Laser or small dinghy.” Dave Barton, 2014 Tritone Substitution

“It rows easily and, being 72 years old, I have no problem maintaining a steady pace. Under sail the boat moves in very light air.” Henry Wing

We met Jonathan here in Washington, at Marrowstone Island’s Mystery Bay, where he’d already offloaded his Skerry and set it down on a portable dolly-cart trailer. He wanted us to have the “complete experience,” so we walked the boat down the ramp ourselves, launched it, removed the strapped-on dolly trailer, and pulled the boat over to the adjacent beach. Simple.

Next we grabbed the oars, slid the oarlocks into the center sockets (Skerry is designed with two rowing stations) and headed toward open water. The svelte Skerry slipped along effortlessly. Movement was so smooth and it carried so well we decided she’s a boat you might actually choose to take for a row, as opposed to merely acting as a secondary propulsion option. We weren’t surprised to discover later that owners laud her rowing prowess—with a few mentioning even having performed well in rowing races.

After returning to shore it was time to rig Skerry for sailing. We stabbed the lightweight mast into the mast partners and attached and hoisted the cream-colored lugsail Jonathan had ordered from Duckworks. There’s a single halyard to raise sail, a downhaul, and one sheet—this simple and effective rig is forgiving both in terms of setup and handling under sail.

Pushing away from shore with our foot—you can do this sort of thing on a small boat—we sheeted in and sailed from the shallow channel until it was deep enough to drop the daggerboard.