Classic Sailing Charter

Classic Yacht Charter Description

A 45′ lugger (75′ with bowsprit and bumpkin) carrying 2,500 sq feet of sail. Built in Looe 1921 by Dick Pearce for the J E Pengelly family for £435, she was skippered by his son, Alfred John. She fished for some 65 years in the pilchard, mackerel and later shark fishing industries.

She was the last sailing lugger to work out of Looe and was owned by Mike Darlington and Stuart Murray. Mike, who fished on the boat with the legendary Alfred John Pengelly, said: “A J told me, ‘One day, she will be yours,’ but he forget to say it would take 21 years…”

She has been re-built as a yacht with a Dandy rig.

General Info

• Skippered charter only
• The boat is also part of our short sail packages from £85
• Max crew: 10 + skipper, sleeps 6
• Pillows supplied
• Lunch included
• Available for corporate bookings

Prices – Vessel Hire

£750 per day*

Prices – Charters (per person)

5 day: £645

7 day: £875

9 day: £1095

 *Includes lunch and skipper

About Cornish Luggers

The luggers built to operate out of the harbours east of the Lizzard, such as Mevagissey, Looe, Fowey, Gorran Haven and Polperro, were somewhat different than those built in West Cornwall. They were all registered at Fowey with the letters FY.

Both had a dipping lug on the fore mast and a standing one on the mizzen, but the east coast boats had finer underwater lines often with a fore mast stepped in a tabernacle on deck occasionally without lowering back into a scottle. The boats from both areas were of a similar size. The sails were made up to their own yards and when not in use, were stowed forward on the deck port side (unlike the west Cornwall luggers with their raft irons for stowing). Any spare sails with no yards were kept aft below deck.

Although the luggers of Porthleven were generally built with a transom stern, this was the exception in West Cornwall as they were usually double ended or pointed sterned. The boats of East Cornwall were all transom sterned and only varied in the different harbours with the rake of the transoms: well raked at Mevagissey and with more upright stern posts at Looe and Fowey. They were built somewhat lighter than the vessels west of the Lizzard and had the same sail configuration but often with the addition of a jib on a running bowsprit to port through a hole in the bulwarks and even a mizzen topsail set on a mizzen pole topmast. They used legs in their drying-out harbours, as they had finer bodies than their West Cornwall counterparts.