She’s called Buttercup, partly referring to her bright yellow color, partly to the Gilbert & Sullivan character who rows out in her bumboat to sell “stuff and tobaccy” (and perhaps more?) to the sailors on HMS Pinafore. She’s an Adirondack Dory from the Adirondack Guideboat workshop of Steve Kaulback, pictured delivering it to us yesterday. The man who designed the boat dropped it off enroute from Ferrisburg, Vermont to the Annapolis Sailboat Show, which starts today. Thanks, Steve!

By chance, also yesterday, I fetched up next to John Guthrie of IsisGlobal (a competitive intelligence firm in Pennington) at Princeton University’s Keller Center lecture featuring Stuart Essig, CEO of Integra Life Sciences. We enjoyed comparing notes on “messing around in boats” as Rattie so famously said in Wind in the Willows. Turns out Guthrie makes regular treks to a private Adirondack lake and also has a lightweight boat, though from a different maker.

Buttercup is perfect for us. We like to row, but ordinary rowboats are heavy to heft, and the Adirondack Dory is like a canoe with oarlocks. It’s light (80 pounds, Kevlar and graphite, we can lift it off the trailer) and is painstakingly crafted, with cherry wood gunnels fold-down cane seatbacks. Look for her on Carnegie Lake!