“Gislinge Boat“ Replica by Chesapeake Light Craft

This is a plywood-epoxy replica of the 12th-century “Gislinge Boat,“ built by Chesapeake Light Craft. The boat is 25’4“ () long and 5’7“ () wide. Fully rigged, with ballast, the boat weighs about 975lbs (442kg). In the future we will be offering this boat in the form of a CNC-cut kit. In 1993, archeologists excavated a boat near the village of Gislinge (GISS-ling-ah), in Denmark. Dendrochronology established that the boat was built around the year 1130. The Gislinge Boat was reconstructed and documented by the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, Denmark. In 2015, the Museum released the working drawings to the public, launching the Gislinge Boat Open Source Project. In 2019, Chesapeake Light Craft began developing a computer-cut wood-epoxy replica of the Gislinge Boat. CLC’s pre-cut marine plywood kit, assembled using ordinary “stitch and glue“ techniques, makes the construction of this ancient design accessible to serious amateur builders and organizations. Read more here: Video was captured in October 2023 at the Mid-Atlantic Small Craft Festival, hosted by the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum in St. Michaels, Maryland, USA. At the helm is John C. Harris, with CLC boatbuilder Steve Youngkin and serial adventurer John Guider.