Always up to something

By Aaron Beswick

FOR THE SOU’WESTER

Old skippers…they’re always up to something.

When St. Lunaire-Griquet, N.L.’s Rex Saunders stumbled upon a few old, broken bicycles, the gears in his head started turning.

Soon after, neighbours of the 65-year-old retired skipper heard a roar before seeing Saunders fly down the road on a bicycle shrouded in oily black smoke – a salvaged chainsaw motor attached to the sprocket.

“Ever since the cod moratorium he’s just been one big baby,” said his wife Irene Saunders with a nudge and a caring smile. “There just aren’t enough hours in the day for him – he’s always got to be up to something.”

Saunders fished with three of his four sons until the 1992 cod moratorium on his 53-foot longliner, The Four Boys. His sons moved to Toronto after the moratorium and Saunders, plagued by repeated back surgeries, found himself trying to keep busy in the shed.

Maintaining a longliner requires many skills – welding, electronics, engine repair, carpentry. Feeling idle and compelled by a zeal for enjoying life, Saunders started building his toys.

After the chainsaw bicycle, fishermen steaming into the St. Lunaire wharf were greeted by their former colleague riding a bicycle powered paddlewheel raft.

But his toys have another target audience.

His grandchildren – he waits for their summer visits from Toronto with his wild inventions.

“They love to come home and see Pop out with the boats.”

His latest creation required some scheming.

A six-foot, six-inch replica of the Four Boys filled the basement of Saunders’ shed. But it wouldn’t do for his longliner to sit inert and lifeless.

His mischievous eyes fell upon his wife’s lawnmower.

“I started hinting around that maybe the old mower needed replacing,” recalled Saunders.

But he got nowhere.

“So one day I walked into the house and said ‘the old mower’s gone – her engine is useless. Better get a new one’.”

The 3.5 hp Briggs and Stratton engine was in the Four Boys. He added a remote control and it wasn’t long before he had her doing 4.5 knots beside a speedboat.

“It was blowing a storm when we had her out – you can see her heaving,” he said, his eyes aglow while thumbing through photos of his little longliner breaching swells.



(Aaron Beswick is a journalist with Transcontinental Media’s Northern Pen newspaper and a contributor to the Sou’Wester.)