The next phase of the ferry dock was building the piling walls along the inside edges of the dock.
In a departure from the plastic construction I had been using to build the trestle sections, I decided to try my hand with using real wood to represent wood.
First, I stained 3/16" hardwood dowels using thinned Vallejo Model Color 70-822 German Black Brown:
After cutting an insane number of pilings, I got out some "dark wood" carpenter's glue (it dries brown instead of yellow) and started to assemble the wall. Working from photos, I realized that the pilings needed to be spaced apart AND an extra layer of angled timbers were used to tie the wall together:
I really liked the look of the wood, but then I realized the next phase of the problem— I needed to paint the white plastic trestle sections.
As a test, I took the thin section of the dock, and painted it with Games Workshop Chaos Black primer, then began dry brushing Vallejo paints over the black. I ended up dry brushing over the primed dock with the 70-822 German Black-Brown and 70-871 Leather Brown.
Here's a better look at the progress so far (with the barge for a reference):
