Flicka Dart

Dart's port of origin was Erie, Pennsylvania, and she was trailered overland from Erie to Annapolis for her first voyage under Gill Outerbridge before crossing to Bermuda as deck cargo and being hoisted into Hamilton Harbour. Flicka Friends #3 (Winter 1995) carried Outerbridge's account of turning back for the shelter of Snow's Cut ahead of a white squall on the Cape Fear River and running aground as she made for it; the next morning, on the run down to Southport, Dart was sailed off a sandbar with the tiller lashed, the main hoisted and both crew squeezed onto the bow platform. Writing again in #8 (Spring 1997) she described a thorough refit: new Beckson and Bowmar opening ports throughout, the port hull-to-deck joint prised apart and rebedded in 5200 to cure a persistent leak, a compressed mast support pad dug out and replaced with a teak block glassed in under a stainless plate, entirely new rigging after seventeen years, and hidden rot repaired at the end of the bowsprit.

Outerbridge later shipped Dart from Bermuda to New Jersey and launched her at Liberty Landing Marina for a voyage through the canals of New York and Canada. The rig came off and a friend made a short mast from an old boom; she took an eleven-gallon fuel tank in the cockpit locker in place of the original six, along with a new Yamaha 9.9 four-stroke with electric start and cockpit controls and a Raytheon Autohelm. With her Jack Russell terrier Tucker aboard, she motored up the Hudson past the Palisades, worked the Erie Canal's flight of five locks, crossed Lake Oneida, turned north on the Oswego Canal and made Kingston, Ontario after a ten-hour crossing of Lake Ontario. The trip ran in Flicka Friends #36 and #37 (2005), and she revisited the fit-out in #63 (Spring 2015).

Outerbridge reported in #63 (Spring 2015) that she had owned the 1979 boat for twenty-five years and that her homeport was in Bermuda; a caption in #36 (2005) calls St. George's Harbour her home water. In 2018 she sent Flicka Friends a photograph of Dart at the St. George's Dinghy Club during the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers — the only boat there dressed overall, with signal flags and Buddhist prayer flags.

Gill has written a book about her adventures in Dart. You can buy it here.

Has voyaged the ICW from Annapolis to Marathon after purchase in 1990, shipped to Bermuda, cruised Bermuda until 2002, shipped back to US and cruised Hudson River, Erie Canal, Lake Ontario, Rideau Waterway, Trent-Severn waterway, shipped back to Bermuda 2005. Installed 11 gallon fuel tank in the cockpit locker. Propane in custom built cockpit locker between seats.