: After taking a summers diverson building a 30' alum. hulled houseboat I have
: decided to build the kids a boat. (My wife and I have found that 3 boys
: ages 7,4 and 2 on a 30' houseboat is a little snug!!)

: I'd like to find a design in the 10'- 14' range that one or two of the boys
: could use/paddle at a time. I've built both S&G and strip so either will
: work for me. Its use would obviously be in sheltered inland waters under
: carefull supervision. I've seen designs in the Glen-L catalog but not much
: else. Does anyone have any recommendations?

: thanks, Lance Chico,CA
: I have built 2 boats for my kids. my son has a Mill Creek 13 built from the plans in WoodenBoat. the design is very bouyant and stable ( he can stand in it and paddle) and with a painted plywood bottom he can drag it up on the beach without a worry. the only negative factor in the design is that it is a wide boat with a high sheer so smaller paddlers tend to bump the rail all the time when paddling. my daughter has a 14ft version of Nick's Guillemot design that is widened to 24 inches. it is very stable but doesn't track well because very little of the boat gets wet with small paddlers. the problem with a stripper for kids is they will bang it up and you will spend a lot of time fixing scrathes or worse. my next kids boat will be the new CLC 14. hopefully that will be easier to paddle than the MillCreek, track well (as a hard chine boat) and stand up to more abuse than the stripper. good luck, addison