Gareloch yachts have become the latest plinth addition to Helensburgh’s award-winning Outdoor Museum.
These historic classic one-designs were designed by Ewing McGruer in 1924 and built at the McGruer company yard on the Gareloch at Clynder.
The exhibit in Colquhoun Square shows a half-model replica on the centre plinth to the immediate north side of the road.
All 16 of the original fleet still exist and all are based at the Royal Northern and Clyde Yacht Club in Rhu – within sight of their place of birth.
It wasn’t always so, though.
Within around a decade of build, the Garelochs had been replaced by newer models and the yachts were dispersed around the UK, with racing fleets based at the Gareloch, on the Forth and later Aldeburgh in Suffolk.
But a concerted effort in the 1950s by John GD Henderson reunited all of the boats and brought them back to their Gareloch home.
Remarkably, all 16 are regularly raced on the loch. They are only three years away from their centenary celebrations.
Carving around the base tells the story of the boat and more details about Scotland’s first outdoor museum can be found here.
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