The Nancy is a Plockton boat built in 1934 by John McKenzie and Son, boat builders in Portree, Skye. She cost £1/foot to build (£3/m) and is built of larch with oak frames. It was Angus Gillies (Buckie) who ordered the boat for racing.
Buckie lived at Harbour Street Plockton adjoining the Hotel and to this day the pier outside his house is still referred to as Buckie’s pier. It’s believed that the boat was called Nancy after his girlfriend at the time but this was not the girl that he subsequently married. The name wasn’t changed, however, as it was considered unlucky to change the name of a boat. She was built to race in the newly formed Plockton Small Boat Sailing Club (PSBSC) and was raced successfully by him for many years.
Buckie lived at Harbour Street Plockton adjoining the Hotel and to this day the pier outside his house is still referred to as Buckie’s pier. It’s believed that the boat was called Nancy after his girlfriend at the time but this was not the girl that he subsequently married. The name wasn’t changed, however, as it was considered unlucky to change the name of a boat. She was built to race in the newly formed Plockton Small Boat Sailing Club (PSBSC) and was raced successfully by him for many years.
By the mid 1980’s she was owned by Calum "Seal trip" Mackenzie but she was by then rather elderly and in need of a lot of work. Calum was often to be seen before a race applying flashband to the worst seams to keep her afloat. Calum recalls “In one race after the start she was leaking so badly that we all had to sit on one side to try to keep the leaking seam out the water."
Alistair Bruce, who was sailing for the first time in a local boat and was the lightest of the three crew members, gingerly crawled up to the gunwale with a gas blowtorch to dry the wood enough to stick on some more flashband! "I think we went on to win the race too!”
Needless to say it was the last time “Brucey” offered to crew on the Nancy. At one point she even had an electric bilge pump to attempt to restrain the ingress of the North Atlantic and keep her afloat. She was fibreglass sheathed shortly after this and recently has had new thwarts and knees fitted and is now in fairly good condition for her 76 years. She has also been fitted with a small removable foredeck and breakwater to keep the worst of the spray out of her in open water.
The Nancy
