canim yacht harbor springs mi

Classic Yacht Register

• Bell Harbor 2023
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Historical Summary:

Designed by Ted Geary as one of four ships of her class in 1928-1930, all of which are still in service. CANIM was built at Lake Union Drydock, Seattle, WA in 1930 for Col. C. B. Blethen, publisher of the Seattle Times, as a private yacht.

Length: 96'4"      Draft: 7'6" Beam: 18'10"      Displacement: 89 TONS Fuel Capacity: 2400 GAL.      Water Capacity: 800 GAL. Power: (2) Cummins: 325 HP      Cruising Speed: 10 KNOTS

CANIM has 7"x 7" frames of yellow cedar on 20" centers. Hull planking is 2" old-growth Douglas fir over diagonal 1" yellow cedar, main deck is 3" yellow cedar and boat deck is 1" red cedar. All framing and planking is clear, quarter sawn and original. Interior woods are teak and mahogany. CANIM has been continuously upgraded since 2002.

CANIM is privately owned. Home port: Harbor Springs, MI USA

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Sailing on board the ultimate nautical antique

Elegant 1920s yacht Canim is the ultimate nautical antique in Marty Sutter’s extensive collection.

US yacht owner Marty Sutter has been collecting nautical antiques since his 30s. “I have one of the most foremost collections in the country,” he says. “That includes compass binnacles, telegraphs, builder’s plates, navigational instrumentation and even a lot of furnishings that came off 19th and early 20th-century cruise ships.” Only one thing, though, would provide the icing on the cake. “It occurred to me eventually that the ultimate nautical antique I wanted to own was a large wooden motor yacht.”

Together with his wife Lisa, a country-wide search began, starting with vintage Trumpy boats, so-called thanks to the name of the naval architect who built them, John Trumpy, and favoured by the aristocracy back in their heyday. “We looked at about every Trumpy that was for sale but none of them passed the smell test! My wife has a sensitivity to mould and she’d be able to smell it in them,” says Sutter.

Yacht owner Marty Sutter and his wife Lisa

It was only after years of searching that they happened upon a 1920s motor yacht called Canim , entirely by accident. “We have a villa in the British Virgin Islands which looks onto Virgin Gorda. We saw this magnificent wooden boat in the water there.” The couple ventured down to the ocean to investigate and it was love at first sight. “It was so elegant and beautiful, I had to have it,” says Sutter.

Fate then intervened and back in Harbor Springs, Michigan, while flicking through Wooden Boat magazine in a grocery store, Sutter happened upon a full-page sales ad for that very boat, built by Ted Geary. “Geary cut his teeth designing sailboats in Southern California but he ended up migrating to Seattle where he started designing motor yachts,” explains Sutter. After a few false starts with the existing owner, he finally bought Canim and set about doing a restoration. “The previous owner had done a structural refit,” says Sutter, “but aesthetically, it could have been better.”

It was always important for the couple to retain a sense of Canim ’s rich history. “During the roaring twenties, eight of these boats were built, and eight are still floating,” says Sutter. “Ours was the last one, commissioned by a certain Colonel Blethen. He owned the local newspaper which made him a very powerful man. In our minds, we always assume that Canim was meant to be the belle of the ball, the most elegant of the eight.”

Another of the boat’s previous owners was Hollywood movie star Buster Keaton. “He had married the middle daughter of a very powerful Los Angeles businessman, but he was a notorious philanderer and she had enough of him. He bought the boat for her as an olive branch for his philandering ways. She accepted it, then divorced him anyway!”

Canim interior

Since then, there have been good owners and bad owners, but for Sutter – renovations would take all of them into account. “We feel that it’s almost a responsibility to be a custodian of something of historical value,” he explains. That’s not to say they haven’t put their own mark on the boat, and in fact, the Dutch craftsman who helped out with their restoration work was even drawn to offer an added feature. “As he was approaching the finish, he asked if he could do something at his own cost to put his thumbprint on the boat,” explains Sutter. “He wanted to inlay a large compass rose on the forward salon sole of 80 exotic hardwoods. He did that and it is just brilliant.”

Canim is not the couple’s only leap into the world of historical yachts. For six years, they also owned a 1973 Burger boat by the name of Chanticleer, before donating her to a charitable organisation. She was originally owned by Ogden Phipps, a famous horse breeder and tennis champ, but in 1986, she was sold to Frances Langford Evinrude.

Chanticleer

“The boat’s second owner Frances really made it famous – she was a Hollywood songstress and an amazing business person, and she loved boating,” says Sutter. “When I acquired the boat, the interior was almost entirely pink. She bought Chanticleer in her late 80s and owned it until her death.” Even after the renovations, Sutter paid homage to Evinrude, designating a Francis Langford Stateroom, complete with posters and movie memorabilia.

Canim , meanwhile, turns 90 this May. “It is our intention to own the yacht for another ten years until it reaches 100,” says Sutter. For now, the couple is spending more time than ever on board, cruising up and down the coast of Western Michigan – revelling in the boat’s rich past and remarkable present.

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CANIM yacht NOT for charter*

29.26m  /  96' | lake washington shipyard | 1930 / 2000.

Owner & Guests

• Previous Yacht

Special Features:

• Sleeps 6 overnight
• Able to access shallow bays and coves

The 29.26m/96' motor yacht 'Canim' was built by Lake Washington Shipyard . She was last refitted in 2000.

Guest Accommodation

She is also capable of carrying up to 4 crew onboard to ensure a relaxed luxury yacht experience.

Range & Performance

Powered by twin diesel Cummins (855) engines, she comfortably cruises at 10 knots, reaches a maximum speed of 12 knots. Her low draft of makes her primed for accessing shallow areas and cruising close to the shorelines.

*Charter Canim Motor Yacht

Motor yacht Canim is currently not believed to be available for private Charter. To view similar yachts for charter , or contact your Yacht Charter Broker for information about renting a luxury charter yacht.

Canim Yacht Owner, Captain or marketing company

'Yacht Charter Fleet' is a free information service, if your yacht is available for charter please contact us with details and photos and we will update our records.

NOTE to U.S. Customs & Border Protection

Specification

M/Y Canim

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Canim: Refitting the 29.3 Metre Classic Superyacht

It was a love of collecting, as well as yachting, that led Marty Sutter to take on the glorious 29.3-metre Lake Union -built classic Canim . Having tracked down numerous rare binnacles, steering stations, telegraphs and the like, it occurred to him that “the ultimate nautical antique would be a big, old wooden boat”. And so the search began.

For Sutter, an old wooden boat in the US equalled a  Trumpy , and for eight years he and his wife Lisa travelled everywhere, from Connecticut to Chicago, Florida to South Carolina, in search of the perfect craft – and yet none of them passed muster. First, they didn’t make it through Lisa’s unique smell test; she frequently flagged up a musty, damp odour as a result of the wood not being adequately maintained. Second, the boats they were looking at “were not made for the Atlantic Ocean. They were built to go out on the Intracoastal Waterway, or to look pretty at the yacht club, which they did,” says Sutter. The couple were after something altogether more solid.

It was a twist of fate, then, that while they were relaxing in their villa on North Sound in the British Virgin Islands , Canim passed by. “I said, ‘Look at that, Lisa, it’s like a Trumpy on steroids!’” laughs Sutter. He says it was “literally love at first sight” for the couple, and they soon rushed out on a tender to photograph the yacht from every angle. With naval architecture by the late Ted Geary , the beautiful canoe stern only made them more certain that she was the boat for them.

Before Sutter began the lengthy process of trying to track down her owner, he fortuitously caught sight of  Canim  while flicking through a magazine at the supermarket. The yacht was for sale – but not for two years – when it was due to be sold in Seattle. “I wanted the boat for the Great Lakes, so picking her up there was just not desirable,” says Sutter, explaining that he paid a significant fee to get an option to buy the boat, and to keep her on the east side of the Panama Canal.

In time, however, Sutter says the owner began to have seller’s remorse. “[The seller] made it really difficult for me to do my due diligence. He became quite a cantankerous person to deal with.” Sutter was close to his wits’ end and told his wife he wasn’t sure he could go through with the purchase after all. “You’d better get over this old wooden boat thing then,” she quipped, and Sutter realised that if he didn’t secure  Canim , he’d regret it for the rest of his life.

When he finally took delivery in Florida in November, it was too late to take the yacht to the Lakes, and so she was taken over to the BVIs for the winter. She was “satisfactory from a structural standpoint” after having had a refit at Philbrook’s Boatyard on Victoria Island,  British Columbia , carried out by the previous owner, but a lot of the brass work had become greenish black having been exposed to salt water and sea air, and Sutter felt her interior was lacking.

“This boat was launched in the golden era of yachting,” he says. “The original owner had owned the Seattle newspaper, he was the commodore of the Seattle Yacht Club… I thought the interior should be the belle of the ball, but she wasn’t. ”The priority was the forward section of the saloon, where Sutter found “plywood with cheesy carpet tacked over it” rather than the teak sole he had envisioned.

One of his biggest learnings from the refit is that his initial misgivings over having the work done in the BVIs were totally unfounded. “My fear was that it would cost me twice as much as in the United States, and that the quality wouldn’t be half as good,” he admits. “But I quickly found out that when you have a classic, historic boat like  Canim , it doesn’t matter who has something to do with it – they all want to give it their best.”

For the Burmese teak sole, for example, every plank was bent “using rags and spit and the palms of hands”, rather than using boxes pumped with steam and machines to bend them, as is common practice in the US. Every board either side of the king board in the centre of the sole was perfectly matched to give a mirror image effect, and each of the 11,000 bungs that cover the screws in the wood matches the grain on the plank it sits in exactly. The Dutchman running the project even created a beautiful inlaid compass rose made from eight exotic hardwoods at his own cost, in order to leave his thumbprint on the boat.

“It’s been a constant refit,” says Sutter. “Given that  Canim  is  wooden , she needs to stay in water, so we can’t really haul her out and let her sit in a yard for two years doing everything we want.” The best thing any owner with a similar yacht can do is make continuous improvements, Sutter says. “And if you’re hands-on on a regular basis, then it’s easy to find better ways of operating her and maintaining her.”

These continuous improvements aren’t minor, either. They range from putting a custom-made table into the saloon to match the dining table on the fantail, and changing interior lighting to give more of an art deco look, to replacing more than eight decades’ worth of radar equipment in the pilothouse. “As long as it was working, it seemed fine to me, but someone convinced me that if we put modern electronics on board, I’d not only have better kit, but better visibility, because I wouldn’t have all these boxes blocking my view,” says Sutter, “and that was exactly correct.”

Perhaps the most significant change to  Canim  has been the work done to the vast amount of brass on board. Initially, keeping everything shipshape and shiny proved to be an endless task for the Sutters. “At one point when friends, family members, anyone else wanted to be part of the life of the boat, the first thing we’d ask was, ‘Well, can you polish brass?’” laughs Sutter. “All kinds of people polished away to earn their right to a ball cap or a T-shirt with  Canim  on it.”

Sutter finally found the answer to all his problems after meeting Gary Norton, the owner of Freedom , who had previously owned Canim twice. Sutter couldn’t help but notice that the brass on Freedom was as bright as a button. “I asked him what product he was using to protect it, and he said he’d gold-plated it,” says Sutter. “I’m a chemical engineer by training, so that made sense to me, because gold doesn’t tarnish. So I said, well, how much did it cost?” Disappointingly, the answer was unenlightening. “Not as much as you’d think,” was all that Sutter could glean.

And so he began sending tarnished stanchions off to five different vendors to have them gold-plated. Only one came back a warm honey shade, rather than a greenish yellow, during which time a worker at Southwind Marine in Milwaukee who knew Sutter and  Canim  had worked out how to do it himself.

Then followed a three-year plan, whereby different sections of the boat were gold-plated during each off-season. Everything, including the portholes, which had to be taken off the boat, is now gold-plated, with the exception of a few pieces of historic value – the original yacht’s bell, which reads “ Canim , Seattle, 1930”, the horn and floodlights. Today, there’s no more slavish polishing to be done. “Whenever it rains, you just have to wipe it down and it stays shiny all the time,” says Sutter. And the cost? “Well, not as much as you’d think,” he laughs.

As work continues,  Burger , in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, is where  Canim  goes when she needs to be hauled out. “Howard Meyers, the owner there, has been amazing,” says Sutter. “Due to my previous ownership of the historic Burger yacht  Chanticleer , Burger makes us feel as though  Canim  is an extended part of the family.”

What has now been a 14-year project continues to roll on, and today Sutter’s main priority is, what happens next? “Not a month goes by when we don’t have a family conversation about how to make sure Canim reaches 100 under our control,” he says – the yacht is now 89 years old. “Right now, we’re thinking of donating her to a charitable organisation, like the Great Lakes Historical Society or something, along with a grant to allow them to continue to maintain the boat in the manner that we do.”

For, as with his rooms full of antique collectables, it’s the history element that matters most to Sutter. Buster Keaton and entrepreneur Clessie Cummins both owned  Canim  at one point in time, while  Hollywood  royalty Julie Andrews and Anthony Quinn also chartered her. “We sit at the fantail and just think of all the stories that were told and created here and think, jeez,” Sutter enthuses. “You just can’t capture that in a new boat – even though I love them – and to be a part of that evolution of yachting is unbelievably fulfilling.”

So has he finally found the antique to top all antiques? “Ha! No,” he laughs. “I’ve got enough pieces to fill 12  Canims ! It’s borderline obsessive-compulsive disorder, but it is what it is. I’ve just taken delivery of a binnacle that has three dolphins coming out of the water holding the main case. It’s quite spectacular.”

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50-100 feet, in Harbor Springs, Mi Boats

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• Seven Day Sailing Itinerary

SEVEN DAY ITINERARY

Day 1    Power island & Sutton’s Bay –  While sailing north, visit Power Island (1-2 hrs away), a nature preserve with hiking trails and great beaches. Stop off for a quick swim or explore the island. For the overnight, take a slip in Sutton’s Bay (3-4 hr sail). This quaint little town has a great selection of restaurants and shopping. Power Island and Sutton’s Bay both offer great anchorages as well.

Day 2    Northport / Old Mission –  The Village of Northport is a quiet town with several restaurant options and a few really good bakeries and coffee shops. You can take in the amenities at the full service marina or anchor off the pristine shoreline of Northport Bay. Old Mission Bay offers a quiet, pristine anchorage and a long stretch of sandy beach.

Day 3    Charleviox –  Head outside of the bay to the storybook town of Charlevoix (3 ½ – 4 ½ hr sail from Northport or Sutton’s Bay). Truly a unique setting; a short channel runs through Charlevoix which connects Lake Michigan to Round Lake. Another short channel connects Round Lake to Lake Charlevoix which opens up many more cruising opportunities. Great live music and restaurants abound in Charlevoix. Anchor Out – Charlevoix offers Round Lake right outside the village which makes for a well protected anchorage.

Day 4    Omena Bay / Northport –  The Village of Northport is a quiet town with several restaurant options and a few really good bakeries and coffee shops. You can take in the amenities at the full service marina or anchor off the pristine shoreline of Northport Bay. Omena Bay offers a fun restaruant and wine tasting room right on the water and is a very scenic anchorage. Great Lakes Sailing has recently installed 3 permanent moorings here for the fleet so you won’t have to worry about your anchor dragging over night.

Day 5    Elk Rapids –  A quiet little harbor town on East Grand Traverse Bay, Elk Rapids’ Grace Memorial Harbor is one of the nicest in the area. Just stick to the channel on your approach, East Bay can get shallow!

Day 6   Sutton’s Bay –  For the overnight, take a slip in Sutton’s Bay. This quaint little town has a great selection of restaurants and shopping and has a nice anchorage outside the marina.

Day 7    Traverse City

POWER ISLAND

MODERATE DAYS

Day 1    Omena Bay / Northport –  Omena Bay is a pristine setting on the Leelanau Peninsula. You’ll find a fun restaurant on the water with an adjacent wine tasting room. There is no marina in Omena Bay so you’ll have to dinghy in to shore. Northport is a quiet little town with a few restaurant options and a full service marina. If you prefer to stay “off the grid”, just outside of the village, the anchorage to the north offers a sandy bottom and a quiet setting.

Day 2    Charleviox –  Head outside of the bay to the storybook town of Charlevoix (3 ½ – 4 ½ hr sail from Northport or Sutton’s Bay). Truly a unique setting; a short channel runs through Charlevoix which connects Lake Michigan to Round Lake. Another short channel connects Round Lake to Lake Charlevoix which opens up many more cruising opportunities. Great live music and restaurants abound in Charlevoix. Anchor Out – Charlevoix offers Round Lake right outside the village which makes for a well protected anchorage.

Day 3    Petoskey / Harbor Springs / Boyne City –  you have three great options from Charlevoix. Petoskey and Harbor Springs are great little towns with marinas. Harbor Springs has a perfect natural harbor for anchoring also. Boyne City is a 14 mile sail to the east end of Lake Charlevoix and provides protected, scenic inland lake sailing in deep, clear water. Boyne city also has marinas and great restaurant options.

Day 4      Oyster Bay – this is a nice anchorage just outside of Charlevoix Village limits on Lake Charlevoix.

Day 5    Northport –  Northport is a quiet little town with a few restaurant options and a full service marina. If you prefer to stay “off the grid”, just outside of the village, the anchorage to the north offers a sandy bottom and a quiet setting.

Day 6    Elk Rapids / Bower’s HarborDay

HARBOR SPRINGS

SPIRITED DAYS

Day 1    Charleviox –  Head outside of the bay to the storybook town of Charlevoix (3 ½ – 4 ½ hr sail from Northport or Sutton’s Bay). Truly a unique setting; a short channel runs through Charlevoix which connects Lake Michigan to Round Lake. Another short channel connects Round Lake to Lake Charlevoix which opens up many more cruising opportunities. Great live music and restaurants abound in Charlevoix. Anchor Out – Charlevoix offers Round Lake right outside the village which makes for a well protected anchorage.     

Day 2    Beaver Island –  Discover the “Irish Island”

Day 3    Mackinac Island

Day 4    Mackinac Island / Round Island –  Spend a day on Mackinac Island or explore nearby Round Island

Day 5    Petoskey / Harbor Springs –    Harbor Springs has a perfect natural harbor for anchoring and a great boating scene with marina options. Petoskey has one of the best waterfront parks by the marina and a hiking trail that follows the river which is accessible from the marina also.

Day 6    Charlevoix –  Head for the storybook town of Charlevoix. Truly a unique setting; a short channel runs through Charlevoix which connects Lake Michigan to Round Lake. Another short channel connects Round Lake to Lake Charlevoix which opens up many more cruising opportunities. Great live music and restaurants abound in Charlevoix. Anchor Out – Charlevoix offers Round Lake right outside the village which makes for a well protected anchorage.

MACKINAW CITY

MACKINAC ISLAND

DESTINATIONS

ITINERARIES

4-DAY CRUISING ITINARARY

7-day cruising itinarary, charter resources, charter documents & booking info, standard yacht inventory, harbor reservations, destinations & itineraries.

12935 S West Bay Shore Dr

Traverse City, Mi 49684