Roger Barnes, April 27, 2026 – The Peace and the Peril
My plan was to sail up the River Goyen from the sea, to spend a night at the ancient town of Pont-Croix in western Brittany, sleeping aboard my little cruising dinghy in the saltings beside the river, under the storied roofs of the historic settlement. But I had reckoned without the deep Atlantic swell that was sweeping into the entrance of the river, by the fishing town of Audierne.
AVEL DRO, my own boat.
Avel Dro is an Ilur designed by François Vivier, and built of clinker plywood by Les Charpentiers Reunis of Cancale in 1994. I bought her in France in 2003 to import her into the UK, and more recently returned her to France again. The design is based closely on the traditional inshore fishing boats of Brittany in the early years of the twentieth century – hence her simple boom-less lugsail rig and lack of a mainsheet horse, (sometimes controversial among my viewers). Although rare in Britain, Ilurs are relatively common in France. Modern Ilurs are slightly different from mine, as they have more built in buoyancy. The name Avel Dro is Breton, Avel = wind, Dro = to turn – so it means a whirlwind.
- Length 4.44 m
- Sail area 12.2 m²
- Beam 1.70 m
- Draught 0.25 / 0.86 m
INTERESTED IN DINGHY CRUISING?
- Read Roger’s books, The Dinghy Cruising Companion and Sailing The Shallows
- Join the Dinghy Cruising Association
Neil Gutekunst says:
Well done, great video.