Lacey: First Miles on the Great Loop, Down the Mississippi

Jessi Webb • October 8, 2026

Lacey is underway on the Mississippi


Lacey is officially on the Great Loop! After a ride across the country on a flatbed, she went back in the water on October 2nd near St. Louis, where Demian is starting and finishing the Loop. Since then he has reassembled her and put her first 18 river miles behind them. Here's how the first week of the roughly 6,000-mile trip went.

Off the truck and into the river


On Friday, October 2, the Drift Co. Boat Hauling truck pulled into Saint Charles, Missouri, with Lacey strapped to the trailer. She had shared the ride with another boat and a truck, and she came through it without trouble. That same day she went back in the water.

Putting her back together in Grafton


A boat that's been on a truck doesn't come off it ready to go. Demian spent the first days rearranging gear and starting the reassembly. On Saturday afternoon, October 3, he made a short 4-mile run to Grafton, Illinois, the small river town where the Illinois River meets the Mississippi.


He stayed in Grafton through Tuesday morning and kept working on her. The harbor turned out to be a good place to do it, with the town climbing the hill behind the docks and sunsets like the one below.

Downriver to Alton


Around midday on Tuesday, October 6, Lacey left Grafton and ran 14 miles down the Mississippi to Alton, Illinois. That stretch of river runs along the white limestone bluffs of the Great River Road.


Alton comes into view with its riverfront bluffs and the Clark Bridge, a cable-stayed bridge that carries US-67 across the Mississippi. After that, Lacey tied up in Alton.

How it feels to be underway


We asked Demian how it feels now that the trip has really started. His answer was short: "Feeling good. Boat did great on the truck and also so far on the river."


Next, Lacey continues down the Mississippi. Then she'll head up the Ohio River and onto the Tennessee River and the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway. Demian plans to reach the Gulf Coast around December, after hurricane season. We'll keep sharing his photos and updates here on Shipwrights News & Stories and on our social channels.

New to Lacey's story? Follow the adventure from the beginning.

Start with Lacey: Designed to Work, Bound for the Great Loop for her history and Demian's route plan.

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Lacey: Designed to Work, Bound for the Great Loop

By Jessi Webb • September 25, 2026
From Forest Service Scaler's Boat to the Great Loop Lacey was designed to work. Her design dates back to 1953, when Seattle naval architect H.C. Hanson created a 25-foot Forest Service scaler’s boat for the U.S. Forest Service. Scalers determine the amount of lumber in each log cut by a timber crew, and boats like these were used by the Forest Service in the western United States. Three vessels were built commercially to Hanson’s design in the mid-1950s. More than half a century later, the design found a new life in Port Townsend. Lacey’s hull construction began in 2013 at the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding, with Tim Lee overseeing the project as instructor. For this build, Lee redrew the design to 28 feet to get the engine out of the cabin. Today, Lee is a partner at Port Townsend Shipwrights. After the hull was completed, the boat spent 11 months on the hard. In 2019, Demian Detweiler purchased Lacey and brought her to the marina, where he finished the cabin, interior, systems, and mechanical work himself. He completed the boat in 2020.  Now, more than a decade after her build began, Lacey is preparing for a very different kind of working life: a journey around the Great Loop.
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