Ceres is a recently built craft trading non-perishable food goods up and down the Hudson river.
As many British readers will instantly see, she’s a home-built boat modelled on Thames sailing barges of the past, and has the flat ‘swim’ head that sailing barges had some two centuries ago.
Read all about how a carpenter-turned-farmer started up the Vermont Sail Freight Project, built Ceres and started carrying cargoes on the VSFP weblog.
There is a small piece of film of her maiden voyage here (music warning – stand by your volume control!) and an early short film and fund-raising page introducing the project here. And Tugster has photos here and here.
Fascinating stuff. I’m always interested in modern day examples of working sail.
I recently came across another example: this one is a couple in Cornwall making use of the concession under EU fishing regulations that allows unpowered vessels under 10 metres to fish without a licence and, thus, without the imposition of quotas.
http://teachmanfish.wordpress.com/