Meet the man planning to row from Massachusetts to Nova Scotia

James Tarantino has gotten used to people telling him he's crazy.

This summer, the 63-year old is planning to row from Gloucester, Mass., to Lunenburg in a small wooden boat he's named the Heart o' Gloucester. 

When word of his plan started circulating in Gloucester, Tarantino said dozens of people reached out to say it couldn't be done. 

"[They say] the tide up there and the currents are too strong, you can't do it in a dory, you're going to die," he said.

But Tarantino has a trick up his sleeve — a traditional Grand Banks dory built in Lunenburg.

"It's a very, very safe boat," he said, adding that's what makes him confident about a trip that includes two nights in open water crossing the Bay of Fundy. "Semi-confident," he clarified.

Lunenburg-Gloucester connection goes back centuries

Tarantino will set out from Gloucester in late July with a dory mate, rowing the 1,100 kilometres to Lunenburg. It will take about three weeks.

Gloucester and Lunenburg have a connection that goes back centuries.

Gloucester was mapped by Samuel de Champlain in 1605, and incorporated as a town in 1642.

In the 19th century, fishermen travelled from Atlantic Canada to work on the Grand Banks schooners that sailed from Gloucester. "All your best guys in the late 1800s wanted to come to Gloucester — they could make more money, they could feed their families better," said Tarantino.

In the 20th century, that became a rivalry between Lunenburg and Gloucester over who could build a superior schooner. The Bluenose prevailed.

Since then, dory racing has maintained the relationship between the two towns, including for Tarantino, who's been dory racing since he was 17, going to Lunenburg for competitions many times.

"There's something about a fishing community, the character resonates, and there's a pride there as well. So it's fun to meet people from … another country that still share those same values."

As he got older, Tarantino began dreaming of rowing between the two communities.

He's not one to shy away from a challenge, or — as a former contestant on the television show Survivor - the limelight.

"I always like attention," he said. "I'm a character, as you can tell."

When it came time to have a dory built for his journey, he heard about a builder in Lunenburg, and made an appointment while attending a dory race in town. 

But when he saw the other dories that Andrew Rhodenizer was making, Tarantino was taken aback. "I said, 'Well, I want a dory — I don't want a [expletive] Viking warship."

The dory, built in the traditional style, was bigger and heavier than the dories Tarantino was used to racing.

Rhodenizer, who works with the Big Boat Shed on the Lunenburg waterfront, said the Grand Banks dory was traditionally used in the fishing industry, most often on Grand Banks schooners, where their design made them easy to stack, and able to carry an immense amount of weight for their size.

Over time, that style has become less familiar, Rhodenizer said. 

"The kind of boat that we build here  is a rarer thing these days … they're very traditional."

Rhodenizer said they use traditional linseed oil paint and make their own pine tar. They also make the frame, otherwise known as the knees, from wood that is not bent, but cut from the roots and lower trunk of the hackmatack tree. 

"We try to practise really sustainable methods for going out and harvesting the materials that we use in the boats here, that's a big concern." 

Rhodenizer said the more Tarantino learned about their process, the more convinced he was that it met his need for a trustworthy vessel. 

"Using the construction methods that we do, you end up with a very rugged vessel," he said. "Truthfully, I wouldn't trust any other way."

"We always say the dory is going to end up somewhere. It's just a matter of whether you can hang on."

Journey raises awareness of tradition

Wooden boats are hardly an anachronism, says Rhodenizer. Even as the community has changed, Rhodenizer said they remain an important part of Lunenburg's character

"The maritime skills that are involved here are super important to us," he said "I don't know what the culture would be if it wasn't somewhat focused around maritime skills." 

Daniel Moreland, who runs The Dory Shop in Lunenburg — which has been making dories on the waterfront since 1917 — notes that at one point, every town on the Eastern Seaboard would have had dory shops. Lunenburg had three.

The community doesn't need three any more, he said, though The Dory Shop still sells about 20 dories a year. Still, he's turned down offers to sell the shop for businesses like a tea house. "It's a pretty spot, a lot of people would like to have it for something other than building dories. But once you lose it, it's over."

As for Tarantino, he said he intends the journey as a way of raising awareness of the importance of preserving those skills.

Over time, Gloucester has changed. Groundfish have dwindled and employment in fisheries has declined.

Tarantino said it's important for people to retain a connection with a sense of place. He said that in Gloucester and Lunenburg, that includes the skills that have characterized those places for centuries. 

"Whatever you can do to inspire other people to keep those traditions alive — once they're gone, they're gone."