Almost there now! In the end I put 4 coats of varnish on the hull and 5 on the deck as that gets the most exposure to the sun, and this summer is hot and very sunny.

Not many picture now, but I fitted the skeg and the skeg control. The skeg is the design from Nick Schade of Guillemot kayaks and that as worked well for me on my petrel play. The box is made from plywood and glassed into the hull, the blade is made from thin ply and some thin 90gsm carbon fibre cloth that's used to repair fishing rods.

The control box I designed and 3D printed together with the control knob.

Seat is from Fyne boats and the backrest from some random vendor on eBay. Foot pegs are the aluminium adjustable set from Fyne Boats. Several other details like hatch tethers and safety lines were added and then I declared this done (for now!).

I arranged to go paddling with a group from my local club (Poole Harbour Canoe Club) on Wednesday and loaded the boat onto the roof rack and set off. The baot is slightly longer than the car by a few inches.

On the beach at Hamworthy.

and finally on the water in Poole harbour.

First impressions: Very happy with how this turned out, and its a real pleasure to paddle. We had a moderate breeze of 10-15knots, some chop, and waves from other boats. The baidarka tracks really well, and didn't really need the skeg in cross winds or downwind. Its quicker than the Petrel Play, and fairly quick paddle with a couple of others had us at 5+ knots for a short time. Its a bit less stable than other boats I've paddled so its going to take some time to really get comfortable, with the balance, edging, and bracing but really looking forward to getting out and getting to know the boat properly.

Rob Macks has created a superb design that turns heads and invites questions with its unusual bow and stern configuration. The build manual was a great help with lots of details in the text and several great videos on YouTube. His willingness to quickly answer my dumb questions helped get over a few bumps along the way.