Wind, weather, water: the ‘Viking’ from Lake Constance

Stefan Züst is one of the last wooden boat builders in Switzerland – and as a passionate sailor, he feels just as much at home on Lake Constance as on the rough oceans of the world.

With his strong build, thick beard and long hair, the man from Thurgau looks like a sailor from another era. The 42-year-old also shares a Viking’s passion for boats and sailing.

He has undertaken many adventurous sailing trips: With the night-blue Ailean Mor, his 5.8-metre short wooden cutter, he repeatedly sailed solo on the ocean for weeks at a time. For example, in Scotland, around the North Cape or through the Bay of Biscay, one of the most demanding sailing routes in Europe.

Züst is definitely not a fair-weather sailor. The more intensely he feels the wind and weather, the better. He seeks a connection with nature, with as little artifice between himself and the water. He also doesn’t mind being alone: “I rarely feel lonely, but rather free,” he says.

Pushing one’s own boundaries

On rough seas in a small wooden boat, even experienced sailors reach their limits. But Züst remains calm even when thinking about stormy conditions. 

“There’s nothing better for getting water out of a boat than a man who’s scared – and a big bucket.” That’s what it’s all about, he says: “Finding your own limits again and again, exploring them and pushing them higher.”

After his adventurous sailing trips on the world’s oceans, the “loner”, as he calls himself, always returns to calmer waters back home, to Lake Constance. 
“You have to fight for the sea, but you can just have Lake Constance,” he says.

At home on Lake Constance

Growing up in Güttingen on Lake Constance, Züst was already fascinated by boats as a child. In the fourth grade, the he received a kit for building a canoe from his godfather.

“From that moment on, I spent a large part of my youth on the water or in some garage or backyard, tinkering with my first sailing boats.”

That’s basically what he still does today, but professionally. Shortly after completing his apprenticeship as a boat builder, he went into business for himself. Today he runs a boatyard in Altnau with seven employees. With his team, he builds, repairs and maintains boats by hand and restores old classics.
Whether sailing yachts, motorboats or rowing boats – the main thing is that they are made of wood, the building material he loves.

 “The sound of the waves hitting or knocking on the hull, that’s a completely different sound than when they knock on a plastic thing.”

Carved from his own wood

Instead, the waves of Züst’s boats knock against special wood. The so-called moon wood from his own forest, which he was able to take over from his grandfather a few years ago. For this, the trees are felled during the waning moon in winter.

This way they have less moisture in them “and we get a much calmer wood,” Züst is convinced. So convinced, in fact, that he gives his boats a guarantee until he retires.