38' Morecambe Bay Prawner (1903) - ZISKA

Ziska was built as a cruising and racing yacht to the lines of the working prawners of her day. Ziska was first launched on 28th January 1903. For the first 20 years of her life she was very successfully raced on the coast of Ireland, mostly sailing out of the Royal Cork Yacht Club, where she is well remembered on the silverware. After that she was used as a family cruising boat until being laid up for the Second World War from which she didn’t really recover.

In the early 1970’s she broke a mooring line in a blow and was wrecked. She was taken to Cowes where what was to be a 30 year rebuild began.That restoration ended when Ziska found Ashley Butler, a young sailor and shipwright: Ashley completed her rebuild part time while building a 48′ wooden cutter for the yard, replacing the stem, sternpost, several planks, deck, rig, and interior. Ashley solo sailed her 25,000NM in six years and then sold her. Ziska spent two years doing charter sails on Chesapeake Bay. She was then sold to a tall ship sailor and shipwright, Clint Thompson, who moved her to Port Townsend, Washington, where he and his young family lived aboard for 6 years, cruising locally. She was then passed to an owner who managed to keep her afloat for 4 years before handing her on to her current owner.

In 2017 Ziska underwent a two-year rebuild involving many of the luminaries of wooden boat restoration in Port Townsend and giving her a few upgrades including new spars, rig, and sails, a new saloon, and a few changes on deck. She completed the R2AK race to Alaska in 2019 and sailed back to Port Townsend and hauled in 2020 for a few new planks, recorking bottom, forefoot rebuild, rebuilding rudder post trunk, rig alteration, and added a Torqeedo Cruise10 Pod Drive with 15KWH lithium ion batteries.