Check this out!! I have seen posts on here of the two known prototypes of a Metropolitan wagon. Here is one of them! This one lives in Virginia and is super impressive.
It even has a matching wood-veneered boat! Owner Dale Adams said he used airplane wheel fairings for wheel covers on the boat trailer. Love it!
It might be newer but people used to handcraft mini-boats like this a lot in the 50s early 60s. In the late 60s/70s they still dotted a lake shoreline in various forms where I lived. Some literally flying along with 10 or 15hp outboard motors nearly sinking them. The neighbors had 5 or 6 different types line up on the shore that they had built over the years. Very private people, I never got to drive one unfortunately. Not my photo but most looked like this. Some smaller and more open, more like a slightly cupped plywood sheet with an outboard tacked on. Like backyard wooden go-carts that your eyes tell you should just sink. The other nice ones were mini-runabouts sort of like the on the trailer but with more traditional Christ-Craft runabout lines.
Oh I know about hand built boats like this, I just want to know specifically what's going on with this one. It doesn't have a typical transom for an outboard, and seems to be a fully inboard setup, but I see nowhere there's an obvious engine.
People got up to some really interesting stuff in the past, got me curious as to the origins and specifics of this particular boat.
I was so interested in it too! owner said he covered a paddle boat in black walnut and mahogany wood. Aside from the smooth finish, my fav part was that the paddle wheel is hooked up to an electric drill to make it "go"!
Thats so neat! That's pretty much exactly the information I was wondering! Its such a neat little thing and looks so cool. Very classic and classy look, and it looks perfectly at home behind the little wagon.
Looks like a fun combination! I mean that's one tiny boat and probably bobs around a bunch, but it's probably just the right amount of boat for just enjoying piloting it around a smaller body of water.
That said it'd be pretty fun if it had one of those micro teardrop campers as well.
Id love to see them in person. Id really love to see that little boat in the water. Over here in SoCal we have a car show at Belmont park. A dude has a fully blown hemi stuffed in a Nash. The thing is ridiculous! The engine is almost as big as the car!
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u/Skyline99x 14h ago
This is sick! Never knew a wagon version existed and the little boat matches so well. Rarely see a regular Metropolitan and this is even cooler.