Cruising
pp. 71-74 · Read in the full issue
Yachts
• APHRODITE, yacht, which had been cruising in Fiji waters for several months, caught a thief's eye recently while anchored at Levuka. The owner, Robert Meelberg, a retired US businessman, discovered two outboard engines had been stolen. The police caught the thief, who admitted taking the engines, plus a fuel tank from the yacht's dinghy. The thief got nine months in gaol. • AQUARIUS, a 34 ft sloop registered in Portland, Oregon, arrived at Rarotonga on April 30 from Tahiti with Othell Hallouf (captain) and Maxine Hallouf.
They planned to call at Aitutaki, Su warrow and Pago Pago. • CHAMARU, 50 ft ketch-rigged diesel auxiliary trimaran, arrived at Raro tonga from Bora Bora and Papeete on April 1 with owner-skipper Commander Charles M. Sturkey, USNI ret, his wife Mary, and a Filipino. Cdr Sturkey, who did his last stint with the navy in Japan, had the tri built at Sasebo, Japan, in 1965-68, by local craftsmen under his supervision. Commander Sturkey is a marine architect and also a radio ham (K7BGS —W7TNA). The tri is registered in Seattle, Washington, which is the Sturkeys' home. Plans were to call at Aitutaki, Samoa, Fiji, New Hebrides, the Solomons and the Philippines. The Sturkeys had cruised 49,000 miles in Chamaru since leaving Japan. • CHERRY BRA 111, a 30 ft sloop of Japanese registry, arrived in Guam re cently from Hawaii with stops at Fanning Island, Tarawa, Kusaie, Ponape and Truk.
Owner-skipper Shiro Sugiyama named his boat because of his partiality for cherry brandy. With Sugiyama are his crew, Yoshio Suzuki and Yoshihiro Kusuda.
From Guam they planned to sail back to Japan, with stops at Saipan, Pagan
and Agrihan.
• COQUILLE, a 37 ft yacht, arrived at Rarotonga on April 18 from Papeete with Captain Ronald L. Hayes and crew Phyllis Hayes, Annie Larmor, David Peek, and guest Stephen Schenkel. • EASTERN WANDERER, 30 ft sloop n Tahiti, was bought a year ago by : renchman Bernard Calvet, and his Swedish wife, Kerstin. They are living aboard with their 8-month-old daughter, sabrina. Bernard is a former captain of he South Seas Winds boat chartering
company and is working in Tahiti repair ing boats. Kerstin formerly worked as crew on windjammer cruises in the Caribbean. They hope to sail the islands of French Polynesia and perhaps to Hawaii. • FOLLY 111, 30 ft sloop, left Tahiti on April 5 and arrived at Rarotonga a week later, carrying co-owners Suzanne M. Wilson (captain) and Eleanor A.
Gobrecht. They spent five months in French Polynesia. On the way south from Long Beach, California, they called at Acapulco, the Galapagos, Marquesas and Tahiti. They lost a gudgeon in the Gala pagos. From Rarotonga they planned to sail to Aitutaki, Suwarrow, Pago Pago, Tonga and Fiji. • GRAY BEARD, 73 ft ketch out of Vancouver, stopped at Guam on its way to Japan. On board were captain Lol Killam and his wife Rose and crew members Go Southam, Tony Griffin, Chett Chettleburgh, Brent Davis, and Tom Fee.
The big ketch made many interesting stops in Micronesia and the Solomons in the past few months. • GRETEL, which is at Rarotonga, is an ex-trading vessel converted for ocean cruising and is both roomy and comfort able. The globe-circling cruise started from Stockholm on September 1, 1974, with ports of call at the Canary Islands, the West Indies, Panama, then the Gala pagos and Marquesas. The circumnavi gation will take them to Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and Port Moresby. If the Suez Canal is open for shipping, they will use it to return home to Sweden. If not, they will take the longer route around the Cape of Good Hope. • GYPSY COWBOY, a 41 ft Sea Wolf ketch, Miami, Florida, planned to leave Tahiti mid-April to continue a circum navigation. Captain Carl Erickson, Colo rado, and owner-crew Bill Duncan, Mis souri, left Miami a year ago and have sailed to Jamaica, through the Panama Canal to the Galapagos, Marquesas and arrived in Tahiti in December, 1974. They intend to sail to New Zealand via Hua hine, Bora Bora, the Cook Islands, Samoa and Fiji. • HIKUERU 111, 43 ft ketch-rigged Calypso built in Holland, arrived in Tahiti on March 31. Owners Peter and Dorothy Bufe of Berlin, Germany, started their round-the-world trip from Southern France in July, 1974. They have visited Gibraltar, Palma de Mallorca, Marbella, Casablanca, the Canary Islands, several islands in the Caribbean, Colombia, and Panama before passing through the Pana ma Canal to the Pacific. They went to the Galapagos and the Tuamotus. They also visited the island their boat is named for, Hikueru, formerly a pearl diving locale. Their scheduled calls for an April
11 departure were Samoa, the New Hebrides and Port Moresby, before going on to Indonesia. • KISSES, 45 ft Columbia motor-sailer, left Tahiti on March 25 for Hilo, Hawaii.
Owners Don and Mickey Kidder left California in December, 1973, and sailed down the coast of California and Mexico, then came to the South Pacific, where they visited the Marquesas, Tuamotus, the Society Islands, the Samoas, Fiji, Tonga and Rarotonga before returning to Tahiti. They were joined in Tahiti by Mickey's sister, Mary Jo Downing, for the trip to Hawaii. From Hilo they will sail to Honolulu and back to California.
Also aboard were pets Tammy and Dam mit, a cockatoo and a Siamese cat. • LA CARETA, a 32 ft sloop, arrived at Rarotonga from Tahiti and Bora Bora on April 14 with twin brothers Anders and Gunnar Eriksson, co-owners of the yacht. Their voyage started from north Sweden in July 1973 and took them to Germany, England, Portugal, Spain, and across the Atlantic to Barbados. From Panama they sailed direct to the Mar quesas and then Tahiti. Plans are to call at Tonga, Fiji, New Caledonia and Port Moresby. • MAHINA, a 27 ft sloop built in Sweden in 1969, arrived at Rarotonga on April 2 from the French Polynesian Islands with single-hander, John Neal.
John, born in the Sudan, and now from the US, started his voyage from Seattle.
Ports of call included San Francisco and the Hawaiian Islands—where he spent two months. He then attempted the diffi cult 2,300 miles "leg" to the Marquesas —difficult because it was the wrong time of the year and he had to battle against head-winds and seas. His yachting friends who had attempted the same feat before and failed, told him he would never reach the Marquesas and would have to "run off" to an easier landfall. However, John made the passage in 22 days— which he believes is a record. His plans were uncertain, but he hoped to visit Aitutaki, Palmerston, Suwarrow and Niue. • MARI AH, a 44-year-old 81 ft John Alden schooner from Portland, Maine, was to sail from Tahiti in mid-April for Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and Brisbane. Aboard are: Phin Sprague, captain and co-owner, of Portland, Maine; Gladys Szapary, co owner from New York; Mimi Sprague, Phin's sister; Joanna Makela, Phin's fiancee from Canada; and crew Tim Harris from California and Fraser Drum mond of Canada. Seth Sprague, brother, will join the boat in Samoa for the rest of the circumnavigation that has, so far, brought them from Maine in November, 1973 to the Caribbean, through the Pana ma Canal to the Galapagos and Tahiti.
Mariah was built in the Chesapeake Bay
area as a flagship for the DuPonts and sailed under the name HIGH TIDE. Later it was used by the Coastguard for two years as a schooling ship and, after pass ing through several owners, was used in the Caribbean as a charter boat under the name GOLDEN EAGLE. The owners bought Mariah in New York. While in Tahiti they completed in a circle-island race with the Tahiti Yacht Club boats and won. In November, 1974, they sailed between Tahiti and Moorea with two other Alden schooners. A unique feature of Mariah is the Bogart sail, a forward staysail that was once owned by the late movie star Humphrey Bogart. • MO ANA, a 34 ft ketch registered at San Diego, California, arrived at Raro tonga on April 30 with lonehander Ray mond Quint who will also visit Aitutaki and Tonga. • MY LOVE, a Cheoy Lee offshore, 50 ft registered in Arizona, arrived in Ta hiti in November, 1974. Randy Weston and her two daughters, Heather, 15, and Pamela, 13, and son, SFiea, 10, left Ft Lauderdale, Florida in October, 1973 and cruised to the Galapagos, where they stayed four and a half months. Their generator broke down there, and later their forestay half broke and their bilge filled with water. They visited the Mar quesas and Tuamotus before arriving in Tahiti with no engine. They hailed a pass ing fishing boat and traded a couple of cans of beer for a tow into port. Randy is owner-skipper, mother, engineer, mechanic, carpenter, plumber and any thing else the situation calls for. My Love arrived in Tahiti with a crew of seven, but now they have only one crew besides the family, Casey Stevens, 18, from Newport Beach, California. Randy hopes to sail to Rarotonga and New Zealand when they leave Tahiti. • NEW WORLD, 69 ft schooner, left Guam recently for Palau. From Palau the intention was to sail south-west to the remote islands of Sonsorol, Tobi and Helen. New World's skipper is Art Merserau. • NORSEMAN, 37 ft gaff ketch, was a recent arrival in Suva from Port Moresby. The owner, Mr Peter Lattey bought the Norseman about two years ago. The yacht is on the way to Van couver, from where Mr Lattey came be fore going to Port Moresby. The Norse man, built in 1949, won the Brisbane- Gladstone race five times in 20 years. • ODYSSEY, 38 ft Atkins-modified Engrid ketch with canoe counter stern, arrived in Tahiti in late March. Aboard are owner John Schafer, 24, and girl friend Randy Wecker, both from Aber deen, Washington. The boat, built in 1950, sailed the Sea of Cortez and spent
nine months in Baja, before coming to the South Pacific. From Tahiti they plan to sail to Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand. • PAULMARKSON, 70 ft steel hull ketch, sailed across the Tasman Sea in April to Sydney on the first "leg" of a Pacific cruise. She is owned and skip pered by Aucklander Athol Rusden, well known in New Hebrides shipping circles.
With him are his wife, and two sons, Paul and Mark, and daughter, Sonja. It is not difficult to work out how the ketch was named. Also in the crew are Rod and Shelley Leversedge. From Syd ney, the Paulmarkson was scheduled to cruise to Cairns, via the Great Barrier Reef, then to Noumea and the New Hebrides. After that, plans are a little uncertain, except that she will eventually sail to Hawaii, probably via Fiji and the GEIC. Paulmarkson is a big "sister" of a ketch of the same name, which cruised in the Pacific some years ago. The older Paulmarkson was a 60 footer and had a wooden hull. • PILOT, 150 ft overall gaff-rigged schooner left Tahiti mid-March for the Leeward Islands and planned to sail from Bora Bora to Samoa. The three owners and crew of 15 left Boston four months before arrival in Tahiti. Pilot is an old Boston pilot boat and underwent a big renovation for the present circum navigation. After the boat was restored the owners sailed her back to Boston and held a party for all the pilot boat captains. • QUEST, 52 ft sloop rigged motor sailer, arrived at Niue recently from Aitutaki carrying owner-skipper Charles H. Carter, and crew. She left later for Vavau. • REALITY, 43 ft ketch, sailed from Yokohama on Atpril 2 and arrived in Guam on April 23 with a broken main mast. On board were skipper Leland Campbell and crew Mike Harris, Bruce Kueffener, and Jim Hill. The mast snapped off just above the spreader arms while they were in a "modest squall" off the island of Agrihan in the northern Marianas. They were able to
pull into Pagan some 40 miles distance to make repairs and jury rig the boat for the remaining 300 miles to Guam.
They report that they were well treated by the people of Agrihan and Pagan. • RAWHIDE HARRIS, a 35 ft sloop, arrived at Rarotonga on April 27 from Papeete with Doyle McKim (captain) and Scott McKim. The yacht is registered at Seattle, Washington. The next port of call was to be Tonga. • SANDPIPER, 34 ft ketch from Bremerton, Washington, US, arrived at Rarotonga from Bora Bora and Papeete on March 29. On board were owner captain Herbert Shinn and Joyce Shinn.
The third crew member, Kay Shinn, left the yacht at Rarotonga. Sandpiper sailed for Niue on April 1. At Niue they were visited by Charles Carter, of the Quest (see above) who stayed aboard. A race to Vavau was arranged, with Quest getting away first, but leaving the skipper in the Sandpiper. As Sandpiper is much faster, Charles Carter expected to arrive at Vavau before his sloop. • SILVER SWORD, 54 ft racing cutter, arrived recently at Rarotonga from Niue Island, after earlier visiting Micronesia and Fiji. The weather was so bad when she left Niue she had to receive port clearance by radio. After Rarotonga, the Silver Sword was to sail to Papeete, the Tuamotus and Marquesas, before return ing to Honolulu. She carried skipper Jay Lambert, his wife Lou, Walter Bush, Pip and Cindy White, and Linda Cheyney. • SIROJA, 50 ft cutter, arrived in Sydney from Auckland in April after a rather rough trip across the Tasman. On board were owner-skipper, Robert Rykers, formerly of Holland, but who lived in Australia for many years, his American-born wife, Susan, who spent some years in New Zealand, and children Jaro 12, and Roja 10. Mrs Rykers was expecting their third child in May. Later in May, Mr and Mrs Rykers planned to
Charles Carter's Quest (see this page) photographed at Vila at the end of 1973.
She has covered a lot of water since then.
sail north to Cairns, spend some months there, then cruise in the Pacific Islands, and perhaps turn north to Japan, • STOWAWAY, 24 ft Endeavour class yacht, recently sailed from Guam to Sai pan and back, stopping at Rota and Tinian. She did the 300-mile journey in seven days. On board were skipper Tony Heaney and Bob Bradford. • SUNDAY, a 44 ft ketch from San Francisco, arrived at Rarotonga on April 12 from Papeete. On board were owner captain William Podbreger and J. Pod breger. Their next call was to be Fiji. • SUN MATE 11, 46 ft fero-concrete sloop, met with disaster after sailing 1,600 miles on her maiden voyage from Japan—running hard aground on the reefs of Guam. In a heavy and confused sea Sun Mate II missed the entrance to the Agana boat basin. She broke up and became unsalvageable. It was the first leg of a round-the-world voyage by hus band and wife, Juji and Yoko Inoue.
Juji and Yoko plan to return to Japan and either build or buy another yacht and continue their voyage. [Cruising yachtsmen visiting Guam for the first time should be cautioned against pulling into Agana boat basin. The chan nel is narrow and for the uninitiated it can be tricky even in good weather. Apra Harbour is far better suited. The channel
is wide and there is plenty of room. It is also close to immigration and customs
officials.]
• TRADITION, 50 ft ferro cement gaff rigged cutter, left San Diego in Septem ber, 1974 and sailed to the Marquesas and Tuamotus, arriving in Tahiti in De cember. Owner-skipper, Walter E.
Gleckler, is a singing teacher at a college in Costa Mesa, California, and his wife, Jean, who joined the boat in Tahiti in January, is a first-grade teacher in Cali fornia. Both are on one-year sabbaticals and have been cruising the Society Islands with their two daughters, Allison, 20, and Dana, 15, and their son Jeff, 18.
The Tradition, which they completely out fitted on the inside in two and a half years, adding a head, was hauled out for repairs in Tahiti. The family planned to leave in mid-April for Rangiroa or Hawaii, depending on the winds. • TYREE 11, 37 ft trimaran owned by Charles Burnett of Hawaii, has been in Tahiti since September, 1974. She left Hawaii in January, 1974, and arrived in the Galapagos 52 days later; she then visited the Marquesas and sailed to Tahiti. The captain, John Fraser, is aboard and says the boat has no engine.
He is awaiting instructions as to whether the boat will sail tO‘ New Zealand or back to Hawaii. • WHISPER and FREE SPIRIT, sister yachts, skippered by Dick Lewis and Larry Liberty sailed from Guam together headed for the uninhabited island of Anatahan about 200 miles to the north.
The two yachts are Taiwan-built CT 41 ft ketches. Larry and Dick along with an assortment of guests planned to spend about a week at Anatahan before return ing to Guam. • WINDSONG IV, 40 ft ketch, was in Sydney late in April being prepared by owner-skipper Greg Ellers for a two year cruise. South Australian Greg bought Windsong IV, which was built in 1959, from Phillip Weate, of Sydney, who cruised the world in her several years ago. From Sydney, Greg intends to sail to Cairns, via the Great Barrier Reef, then across the Coral Sea to Honiara.
After that, well he is "just going to hop round here and there". With him are his wife, Jenny, two children, aged five and four, his brother Roger, and Penny Gil lard, who is teacher for the children. • The Niue Island and Blue Water Yacht Club is concerned that it is unable to offer a mooring buoy for visiting yachts. Without a buoy, visiting yachts have to anchor. This may be all right in fine weather, but is very trying in some of the rough weather the island experi ences. The club is looking to the Public Works Department to reinstall a buoy.