uising Yachts

I CARRONADE, 30 ft Sydney j. was due to leave Auckland une 1 for the French Polynesian ds of Rapa, Tubuai, Rurutu and ti. Her crew comprises Andrew f (skipper), Ken Mills and Des ■ns. From Tahiti, the crew hope ike Carronade round Cape Horn, r. Kearns (who served as a member of the trading schooner ? Taporo in the New Hebrides year) told us in a note from dand that Carronade sailed i Sydney on March 21 and made Hiree Kings in seven days. After ort stay in the Bay of Islands, moved down to Auckland to >ut for her voyage to French nesia.

Barbara Allen, 30 Ft

eman ketch, left Honolulu re y for Fanning and Penrhyn ds, Western Samoa, Fiji and ;a. Skipper of the ketch is Earl xtell, who has Dick Gehring and i Ferneding as crew. The trio d to visit as many South Pacific ds as possible. There is no time on their cruise.

KAHUTARA, a new 45 ft ketch, was wrecked on a reef daiao, Society Islands, in late . Maiao (also known as Tubuai u) is a small island about 40 j west-south-west of Moorea. ihutara, was on a trip to the ed States from Russell, Bay of ds. New Zealand, with Mr. and R. R. Kershaw, of Russell, and four children, the youngest of n is nine. le French Administration vessel tai Mann was due to sail from etc to Maiao on May 31 to le the castaways.

TRI-ODYSSEY, 35 ft American Iran, arrived in Pago Pago from ►tonga on May 20 with Ron ey, Leßoy Fry and Jerry Allen, f California, and John Brink, of on. le crew expected to stay in Pago several weeks, refitting and isioning their craft for a voyage onga and New Zealand. i-Odyssey has been sailing the ftc since June, 1963, when she San Francisco for Honolulu with a and Fry, who built her in a yard at Redwood City, California /, June, p. 117).

• NEOPHYTE, 45 ft American ketch with Lee Quinn, 38, and an all-girl crew of three, was sliced in two just outside Sydney Harbour about 4 a.m. on June 13 by the 4,000-ton freighter Woomera. Quinn and the three girls spent half an hour in the sea before being picked up by a lifeboat from the Woomera.

Two of the girls, who were asleep below when the collision occurred, suffered minor injuries and shock; the third girl also suffered shock; and Quinn escaped unscathed.

The ketch was on a voyage from Hobart to Sydney when the collision occurred. The fore section sank almost immediately, but the after part, containing Quinn’s personal papers and other valuable personal items, was salvaged.

Neophyte has been a familiar name in PlM’s yachting columns since she began a Pacific cruise from Sausalito, California, in December, 1963, with Quinn and an all-girl crew of four.

Since then, 37 other girls have sailed with Quinn; Neophyte has visited most of the main island groups in the South Pacific; Quinn’s first wife has been granted a divorce from him on the ground of extreme mental cruelty; and Quinn has married a second time. (His second wife, formerly Mrs. Bernice Berkson, is a one-time crew member). • SOLO, 57 ft Sydney ketch with owner-skipper Vic Meyer and another all-girl crew—of two —left Cocos- Keeling Island (Indian Ocean) on May 28 for the Seychelles after a stay of just over 24 hours. Solo left Sydney at the end of February on a round-the world cruise, which has so far in cluded a week stuck fast to Cow lishaw Reef, off Cooktown, Queens land {PIM, May, p. 117) and a visit to Darwin.

The two girl crew members are Miss Elsa Wanstall, 21, of Sydney, and Miss Wendy lies, 26, who joined the yacht in Darwin after another girl, Miss Rhonda Figgis, withdrew because of persistent sea-sickness.

After leaving Darwin, Solo called at Christmas Island, 533 miles ENE of Cocos-Keeling, where the staff of the British Phosphates Commission repaired a faulty pump.

Mr. Meyer intends to cruise in the Mediterranean for some time before sailing across the Atlantic to Panama and back to Sydney via the Pacific Islands. • SOLANO, 35 ft Alden sloop, reached Honolulu from Tahiti re cently after a 25-day single-handed voyage with Leo Woyshner, of Honolulu.

Woyshner bought Solano, in Syd ney and left there solo on January 7.

Sixteen days later he arrived at Whangarei, New Zealand. On his next leg to Tahiti he had a New Zealander, Gerald Griff, as crew.

Woyshner is well-remembered in Honolulu for his single-handed voyage from New Zealand to Honolulu aboard the cutter Traveller last year. • TANG ARO A, 37 ft ketch, arrived in Hilo, Hawaii, in the first week in June after a year’s cruise in the Marquesas, Tuamotu and Society

nds. Aboard the husky Vancouver [t boat were Wendelvborg Hansen, wife Ann and their two children, fy, 15, and Dirk, 11. \x. Hansen, noted a stiff official tude in French Polynesia which Felt was a direct result of President Gaulle’s increasing coolness ards the United States. But he ssed that the coolness was con d to French officials, saying his lily was warmly received by the pnesians wherever they went, he Hansens interrupted what was irst planned as a world cruise to back home and put their children chool. They will sail for Edmonds, ihington, after a short rest in lolulu.

I ELSIE, 30 ft cutter, owned and ;d solo by a 60-year-old Ameri , Frank Casper, arrived in Port •esby from Whangarei, New land, on June 1 after a 26-day, ■stop voyage of 2,600 miles. lr. Casper, a retired electrical neer, of Melbourne Beach, ida, left Miami on a voyage round world in December, 1963. He since visited Tahiti, Bora Bora, 3tonga, Pago Pago and New and. He stayed in New Zealand six months because he “loved place and the people”. bie, which once took Mr. Casper a solo voyage from Miami to •altar and back, is fitted with a 1 vane rudder, which enables vessel to sail on a given course tended, provided the wind main -5 direction.

Mrs. Casper was to stay 14 days in Port Moresby and then sail through Torres Strait to Cocos Island, Durban, the Cape of Good Hope, and home. © ONE STEP, 63 ft Chinese junk, which is on a cruise of the Pacific with a crew of Australians filming underwater documentaries, returned to Noumea early in June from a four-week trip round New Caledonia and the Loyalty Islands.

One Step arrived in Noumea from Sydney early in April.

Skipper Noel Stroud tells us in a note from Noumea that on the night of May 14. while sailing from Touho to Ouvea, in the Loyalties, heavy seas and high winds smashed One Step’s 14 ft aluminium runabout from the davits.

“On discovering the loss, we turned about but were unable to find it,”

Mr. Stroud writes. “I am reasonably certain it will have missed the north ern tip of New Caledonia and will eventually arrive in the Solomon Islands. The local authority has been advised.”

Mr. Stroud adds that the runabout is a De Havilland Topper. His address, in case anyone finds it, is: Boite Postal 235, Cercle Nautique, Noumea, New Caledonia. © ATOM, 30 ft Tahiti ketch, lone-handed by Jean Gau, a French born naturalised American, reached Port Moresby from Auckland on June 5 after a voyage of 51 days, 18 of which were spent in battling bad weather. Gau had intended calling at New Caledonia but the seas were too rough outside the reef.

Gau, who is 63, has been cruising the world in yachts since 1931. His philosophy is to work ashore for four years, then cruise for four years.

During his periods ashore he works as a chef in New York restaurants.

He has crossed the Atlantic solo in yachts seven times. This, he claims,

is a record for such crossings. Six of his crossings were in Atom, which has also taken him to Port Moresby previously—in 1955.

From Port Moresby, Gau plans to sail through Torres Strait to South Africa, possibly via Cocos Island, and on home to New York. • JINNI, 42 ft double-ender American sloop, was due to sail from Whangarei, NZ, about the beginning of June for Tahiti and her home port of Honolulu.

The crew comprises Ree m s Mitchell, of Tennessee (skipper), Derek Craman, 25, an English merchant seaman. Miss Carol West gate, a 21-year-old Whangarei hair dresser, formerly of Eastbourne, Sussex, and Miss Carol Lucas, a Hamilton masseur.

Neither of the girls has had pre vious ocean sailing experience. • MELIKA, 28 ft trimaran, with two Australians, Noel Burchill, 33, and John Doolan, 25, arrived in Santo from Suva on May 13 en route to Cairns, Queensland. • POP EY DUCK, 20 ft yacht, built and sailed single-handed by Mr. W. A. Procter, an Englishman and former civil servant, left Vila for Santo, the BSIP and Port Moresby on May 29.

Popeyduck (Cornish for puffin, a sea bird) arrived in Vila on May 25 from Noumea and New Zealand.

The yacht is on a voyage round the world.

She crossed the Atlantic in 30 days, passed through the Panama Canal and reached New Zealand by way of islands in the south-eastern Pacific.

Mr. Procter will cross the Indian Ocean to Mauritius, and will return to England via the Red and Medi terranean Seas.

Casper's cutter "Elsie" in Port Moresby in June.

Veteran lone-hander Jean Gau, 63, paid his second visit to Port Moresby in June in his Tahiti ketch "Atom". His last visit was in 1955 (see be low).