Short description:
This retro-styled “river-exploring” boat started as a Sam Devlin designed Surf Runner 25. She is home-built with a cuddy cabin and other features added by the builder.
Longer description:
Sailing is our main boating passion, but we thought it would be fun to have a fast run-about to explore the Columbia River and surrounding areas. After building a couple of smaller sailboats the 25’ Surf Runner design as a stitch-and-glue by Sam Devlin looked like a good candidate for a power boat and the next challenge. Sam was kind enough to modify his original design to take an outboard motor versus an inboard.
The hull was built upside-down in our “barn” using mostly okoume marine plywood and meranti cold-molded over the bottom. The first changes I made were to add chine flats, for earlier planing and better carving, and a tunnel for a bow thruster. The latter to help in windy marinas with strong river currents.
After bottom paint, flipping the hull, and getting the sole in, we realized how little headroom there would be in the cabin and decided this wasn’t going to fly as is, particularly with my wife. So, I designed a cuddy cabin with 14” more headroom at the helm bulkhead and 10” more at the forward end. While not intended to be an overnighter, there are two 7-foot berths and a porta-potty now with adequate headroom. The cuddy makes all the difference in the world for us.
Other features include a 200 HP long shaft Yamaha outboard, 60-gallon fuel tank, tilt wheel with hydraulic steering, trim tabs, an electric windlass, and suspension built into the pedestals for comfortable helm and co-pilot seating. Cabin sides, transom and trim are done in sapele.
Construction of “GetAbout” was about 2300 hours over a bit more than 2 and a half years and she was launched in May 2024.
Thanks to Nate Rooks, of Off Center Harbor who provided many of these pictures taken during an interview with Steve Stone at the Port Townsend Wooden Boat Festival in September 2024, to produce a video that is now public on their website and at the Video Link below.