Owner’s Description
In the dim recesses of time I was a commercial fisherman working off the north west coast of British Columbia. I was young and the learning curve was steep. Two lessons from that time that stuck with me were first, if I never killed another fish I would most probably die happy. Secondly, that when I retired, the absolute best way to enjoy the coast was in a converted west coast troller.
These boats are seaworthy, inexpensive to run, can be maintained by the owner, and are cheap to buy. I loved the boats and I loved the coast so when I finally retired after far too many years bashing around the oceans of the world in small vessels I talked my wife into sharing ownership of a retired troller.
It will surprise no one who knows me that after searching for a troller and buying Tomte we discovered that she wasn’t a fish boat at all. Or put another way, she had in fact been a fish boat but she was originally built as a logging camp tender, then converted to salmon troller, then converted to prawn boat.
In 2013 when we found her she was well on her way to a final career as soil. She had already suffered a quick and dirty conversion to recreational boat which we were assured by the previous owner (who had an unfortunate speech impediment) was carried out by a wonderful …well we never really figured out whether it was a finish carpenter or a Finnish carpenter. One or the other apparently.
At the first haul out I decided the boat was going in the dumpster. No we hadn’t had a survey done and we knew she was in tough shape but given the price I would have been happy to salvage the Gardner diesel and twin disc clutch. She was that inexpensive to buy..
I had carried out a major rebuild before in my life ( the well known Bristol Channel Pilot Cutter Carlotta was discovered by me rotting happily in a Cornish river, rebuilt and sailed to the west coat of Canada where I owned her for 35 years). I wanted nothing to do with another major rebuild.
Our friend Chad Gheseger, who is a wonderful shipwright, talked me out of the dumpster idea and assured me he would have her fixed up in no time. 4 years later we have a pretty nice boat ( and Chad has two children at a Swiss finishing school). Not an uncommon situation.
We tried to do a ‘sympathetic’ conversion. That is, as much as possible we kept to the original profile of a husky work boat rather than just plopping a big box on the aft deck. One of the unfortunate side effects of this devotion to the aesthetics is that when tied to a dock people on the dock can see into our sleeping cabin but we can’t see out.
We used Tomte during the summers and worked on her winters and I’ve managed to show my wife Christy and occasionally my daughter, Haida Qwaii, southeast Alaska, and summer after summer is spent exploring this beautiful coast in this most perfect but rudimentary old work boat.Photos
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3 thoughts on “46' Converted Salmon Troller (1947) - TOMTE”
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3 thoughts on “46' Converted Salmon Troller (1947) - TOMTE”
Great story, Nate! Thanks for telling it. I have good memories of rowing the length of Tolmie Channel in the calm, too.
It all started about 2 weeks into our 3-week “Race” to Alaska aboard a 17′ open dinghy. In Tolmie Channel, rowing a sailboat slowly across glass-calm water, appreciating sporadic waterfalls and that – for now – at least it wasn’t pouring rain.
A sweet troller chugged up the channel, and the other R2AKer we were buddy-boating with said “Hey, I know that boat from Sidney!” As the troller pulled abeam and slowed, we saw that she was called TOMTE, with a radiant Angel of a woman waving from the deck.
The Angel was giving us encouragement in that perfect, optimistic Lower Mainland lilt, when the Captain came out to offer his kind of encouragement, mostly in the form of dirty jokes. When we told him we were indeed in R2AK, but the winners had finished almost 2 weeks earlier, he said “Well, sounds a bit like teenage sex. You’re not proud of your performance, but you’re sure glad you’re doing it.”
We recounted that story to one another over the next few days as we battled against gale up Grenville Channel, finally making it out for a slow row into Prince Rupert. As we got closer to the docks of the harbor, we started hearing air horns and cheering, and lo and behold Peter and Christy were at the end of the dock with a crowd they’d gathered, cheering us in.
They insisted we raft up to TOMTE and have beers, pulled up from the bottom in their crab-pot cooler. We chatted and were completely enthralled with this odd couple – the Angel and the Captain. One seemed to beam sunshine with every look or word, the other seemed to have an endless supply of stories, usually dirty or adventurous, often both. They offered to let us sleep in TOMTE’s hold, and despite first thinking “nah, we like our beds with a little water around them in the bilge of BUNNY WHALER,” we wised up and had a dry, comfortable night as TOMTE seeped into our blood, bones, and story.
The next morning, sitting in TOMTE’s cabin having breakfast and tea graciously prepared by the Angel, the Captain kept regaling us with more stories. We couldn’t get enough. I said “Captain, your stories are amazing. You need to write a book.” Lo and behold, he pulled out a signed copy of his book Lee Shore Blues – Sex, Drugs, and Blue Water Sailing from below the table.
Both boats left to catch slack through Venn Passage, and Coop and I read Lee Shore Blues out loud to one another as we rowed away from Prince Rupert, towards Dundas Island and our final goal of Ketchikan, AK. The written stories were even more insane and hilarious than those spoken.
Upon landing in Ketchikan, we scrambled to find moorage for the boat for a month until she could get a ride home on a fishboat. And there they were again, the Angel and the Captain, getting moorage for TOMTE. Third time’s a charm – we bowed in front of the goddess Sea Serendipity, and accepted each other as family.
We’ve had the good fortune to stay in touch and see each other fairly often. They’ve since given me a place to stay more than once. And, to top it all off – for now, at least – it was the Captain who put me in touch with Ron and the CROW, my dream boat/home/office, checked out the boat in person as the border was closed, and encouraged me to live the wooden boat dream.
None of it would have happened if it hadn’t been for a chance meeting on a calm, cloudy day in Tolmie Channel, and yet now I have two more wonderful people I consider family (and a troller I consider ideal). I love TOMTE and the fact that she will live on thanks to their care.
Great write-up!!!! Tomte looking good!