Lots of good ideas out there - thanks! Doing the inlay before staining with a material that's not going to take up the stain - like acrylic or metal, or perhaps a hardwood that's less inclined to absorb stain - sounds interesting! (And the pictures from Kim and Dave shows how well it works - nicely done!!)

In a plug for Nick's latest book there are words of experienced technique for accent stripe and staining on pages 128-129.

I guess I am still wondering if I can create a thin groove (e.g., 1/8" wide by 1/8" deep) with either a scratch tool or router following a secured track on top of a completed stained deck (before glassing), and lay in a bit of white accent strip that is say 1/32" proud of the surface that I carefully take down. In the end there's the same amount of wood so I'd hope there wouldn't be a line of weakness created.

Still time to noodle about it ... there's a bit of a backlog in shipping Petrel kits!