Sometimes, famous writers also make their boats famous: Hemingway, Darwin and Cousteau, to name a few. After falling into disrepair, the boats are eventually resurrected because of their famous connections.
Such is the case in Port Townsend, Wash., where a boat made famous by John Steinbeck is being restored.
The Western Flyer is weathered, aged and nearly a lost hope. But after a year or so underwater, the story of the Western Flyer is not over yet.
John Steinbeck is known for writing such classics as “The Grapes of Wrath”, “Cannery Row” and “Of Mice and Men”, but scholars say those overshadowed what was Steinbeck’s favorite book: The “Log from the Sea of Cortez.”
In 1948, Steinbeck, his wife Carol and others set out aboard the Western Flyer to chronicle nature during a long voyage as it had never been done before, combining science, literature and philosophy.
Yet the unintended star of the book was the boat itself.
