Yachts

Sydney-Noumea’81

Anitra May, Regardless

fwo yachts designed and built trimarily as fast cruising yachts for heir owners to enjoy family cruis ng in the Pacific look top honours n the Sydney Heel of the 1981 Club Jed Noumea ocean race. Line onours. culling almost 24 hours olf he previous record, went to the 0 m schooner Anitra May owned nd skippered by Ron Wallers of lydney.

The clipper-bowed, black-hulled :hooner, designed by Australian clcr Cole, will be used for exten ve cruising by Wallers and his imily over the next two years, icluding the Pacific islands, New Zealand, and the west coast of the iSA and Canada.

Winner on corrected lime was the lew Zealand 12.8 m sloop Regard 's. designed, built and skippered y well-known Auckland yachts lan John Lidgard. His wife leather navigated the yacht and icir two sons, Kevin and Dulhic, ere in the crew.

Runner-up on corrected times rider the International Offshore ule (IOR) was the Australian isigncd, American-built and rench-ow ned I 1.9 m sloop Shanti. his modern racing sloop was by expatriate Australian :01l Kaufman of New York, built 1 the US West Coast and is owned < Philippe Escol of the Cercle aulique Caledonien in Noumea. 3r the race the skipper was Jean icolas (Touki) Bandaletoff. Third ace on lOR was Anitra May.

This year for the first time, a new vision also started from Brisbane, ilh 27 boats from Sydney and 16 om Brisbane.

Line honours in the race from ■isbane went to Siska 11. the 18 m x»p owned by Doug Jewry of ooloolaba and skippered by Jeff nith. First on lOR corrected time is the new 12.8 m Envy , which is built by her owner/skipper Mai

ewitt of Brisbane. Breakaway

eler Mounsey) was second and ?monstrator (Reg Brost) third.

The Sydney-Noumea fleet had ar galcforce winds on the first two ys but from there on had easy innaker running and reaching nditions. while the Brisbane □umea fleet had fair winds all the iy. Peter Campbell.

Jane Deridder Re

ports from Kerikeri y New

Zealand:

• EV E. Bill and Muriel Courtenay of Brisbane, Australia, describe themselves as ‘perpetual gypsies’ though they admit to ‘bouts of work between voyages’. Their sea-going caravan is a 10 m steel yacht. She’s a Temptress, designed by Joe Boro and appropriately named Eve.

When I spoke to them the Courtenays were clearing customs at Opua, bound for Noumea. ‘lt will be our third visit to Noumea always a delight!’ Bill and Muriel left in May ’BO, came to New Zealand via New Caledonia and Fiji. They will visit Vanuatu and Solomon Islands before re-entering, Australia at Cairns.

• GENESIS. Patty and Carl Kaiser’s 9 m cruising home is a Robert Perry-designed Baba 30.

Carl says: ‘For 30 feet she’s the best

boat I can imagine consistently

fast on passages, some of them pretty rough ones. We had it on the nose all the way to New Zealand from Fiji and still made it in 12 days.’ The cnlhusiatic young sailors had planned to return to Olympia, Washington, this year. But after visitors from home gave gloomy accounts of the economic situation there, they’ve changed their minds.

They’ll slay out for another year and head next for Fiji, then Vanuatu and New Caledonia. ‘Our favourite part of New Zealand is

the Mercury Islands ofT the east coast of North Island where there is fabulous diving. We had lobster or scallops every day, and it was there we found the most beautiful waterfalls of anywhere in the Pacific,’ said they. They ‘dis covered’ the Mercury Islands thanks to Peter and Monica Crccdon of Auckland whose Cava lier 32 Buckshot they sailed in company with. The Kaisers hap pened to meet Crcedon, an Air New Zealand pilot, when he flew in to Nadi. ‘He was sitting in the Regent Hotel reading the most recent Sail magazine so we struck up a conver sation.' Now Genesis is back in Fiji again after a nine-and-a-half day

At the microphone after taking line honours in this year’s Sydney-Noumea is owner skipper of the schooner Anitra May , Ron Walters of Sydney.

Others (from left) are past commodore Alan Jones of the Queensland Cruising Yacht Club, Club Med managing di rector John Youngman, Commodore Kerry Roxburgh of the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia and President Francois Coursin of Cercle Nautique Caledonien of Noumea.

Muriel and Bill Courtenay

iassage from Opua which Patty and 'arl spent reading, watching Ibalrosscs and savouring spectacu ir sunsets . . . • CHRYSALIS. A Canadian-built Überg 37, she was selected by 'exan Mike Phelps for his cruising ome since it is ‘the only boat under 0 feet that I can stand up in', ‘helps, who serves as second officer n merchant ships when he's not in ommand of his own’ vessel, is 98 cm tall (6’4”). Chrysalis’s :cond officer, tall blonde

Californian Susan Mcßride, keeps

1 trim by doing yoga for 40 minutes day, a routine somewhat modified t sea when she has to refrain from anding on her head on the cabin ale. As they cruise in their low

taintenance fibreglass chrysalis,

le young couple make gifts for eople they meet along the way. like makes ships in bottles. Susan lounts shells on varnished wood.

SABBATICAL. Jim and Jeanne eneston were both born and raised i Coco, Florida, next to Cape anaveral missile launching base, aking a lengthy sabbatical from ork in Seattle, Jim and Jeanne ave launched themselves on a >und-ihe-world trip in a Westsail 2. They bought the yacht as a kit ad finished her themselves. We pped lea out of pottery mugs aught at the Black Sheep in erikeri. Interior designer Jeannie cplained: ‘After a year and a half ' plastic we rebelled.’ Other signs comfort are an autopilot a

miniature helmsman who can't talk back and an acrilon sailing awning which shades the cockpit between the dodger and the boom gallows. So far. Sabbatical has been blessed with perfect passages. The only blows sustained have been in sheltered anchorages. ‘Someone is watching out for us,' Jeannie reckons . . . • RESTLESS. Tim Beattie of Auckland is back in New Zealand after a voyage around the Pacific lasting well over six years, his second trip in his vintage 1919-built boat. He'd already sailed to Hawaii and back in '7l. Tim's latest voyage in the still solid old girl took him to

French Polynesia, Hawaii, then to Kodiak, Alaska and down the inside passage to Vancouver, thence to San Francisco and San Diego w here he met his cruising companion, Jo Ellen Orth from Colorado. On their return to New Zealand Jo Ellen and Tim stopped at Mangarcva in the Gambier Islands. Ordered by the French authorities to Papeete, they were unable to visit any of the Tuamotuan Islands. They tell of sailing past Moruroa an eerie night-time sight, ablaze with lights.

Tim's adviee to yachtsmen wishing to cruise within the test zone? ‘Get permission before going there.' • ANTALYA. This recently launched, solidly built 16 m Colin Archer vessel with the euphonious Turkish name was nine years a-building. Paul Zeusche, an indus trial chemist formerly of Mel bourne, Australia, fashioned her in Auckland of 5.8 cm spotted gum planking. Each plank look 80 hours work. B\ himself he steamed the massive planks in place using long canvas steam bags, clamps and a hydraulic jack. It look 1 1 tonnes force to push each plank into position. The fastenings arc aluminium-bronze square boat nails which Paul had cast especially for the job. Antalya, with a hefty 5 m beam and 2.5 m draft, is a

magnificent example of the oft copied Colin Archer sailing life boats which looked after the fishing Heel otf the Norwegian coast at the turn of the century, but she has been finished and equipped to yachting standards. Her 5-cylinder, 40-year-old Gardner diesel turns a Trident reverse/fealhering variable pilch prop, bringing the 34-tonne ship to hull speed at just 800 rpm on 4.5 litres of fuel an hour. With his Kiwi wife Andrea. Paul hopes to sail Antalya to Tasmania, then perhaps to Japan, and through the Aleutians to Alaska. “Our plans are still vague.

There's work to finish yet fiddles, lockers, electrics . . .'

PAUL RYSAVYreports

from Rarotonga , Cook

Islands:

• Touch Rs L’Audace. A

15 m Columbia sloop, she called in to Rarotonga on the return trip to home port San Francisco. On board were owncr/skippcr Louie Chand ler and crew John Collins. Joe Savo and Dcbby Turner. Also aboard was Cisco, their garrulous parrot.

The 11-year-old craft has been owned by Chandler for two years, but he didn’t begin his present voyage until February 1980 when he set out for Mexico, where he slopped ‘everywhere’. From Mexico the yacht made its way to the Marquesas, the Tuamotus, the Societies, the Cooks, Tonga, and New Zealand, where it spent the hurricane season. Rarotonga was the first slop on her return trip, and from here the yacht was to call at Tahiti and Hawaii before returning to San Francisco in September.

When asked if they had experi

Patty Kaiser and Genesis

Clearing Chrysalis through cus toms are (left) Susan McBride and Mike Phelps with customs officers Lewis Sabin and Diana Andela.

Vintage New Zealand vessel Restless gets a refit after more than six years cruising the Pacific. Tim Beattie of Auckland and Jo Ellen Orth from Colorado USA take time off from the job.

Pictures on this page by Jane DeRidder.

enced any particularly exciting mo ments, the skipper said that one experience he would not like to have repeated occurred in Tonga last October, when the harbour was battered by a cyclone. Apart from that, it’s been smooth sailing so far.

• Pampero, Sugar. Two Naut

33 sloops, arrived together in

Rarotonga in early May. Pampero’s

owner/skipper, Ben Dallacosta and his family have been travelling with

Sugar’s owner/skipper Neville

Snowdon and his family since August 1980. Both yachts left their home port of Cairns, Australia, to sail to Mooloolaba, Queensland, before striking out across the Tasman to Whangarei in New Zealand. After a three-month work ing holiday in New Zealand, the families set sail for Rarotonga, and, 13 days later, arrived at Avatiu Harbour. After a week in

Rarotonga, Sugar and Pampero

were to sail to Tahiti, Borabora, Suwarrow in the Cooks, Pago Pago, Apia, Fiji, Tonga and then back to New Zealand.

The Dallacostas will remain in New Zealand as they have pur chased land there, while the Snowdons will return to Cairns.

Both families anticipate Suwarrow to be the highlight of their trip as Tom Neale’s An Island to Oneself

describing that author’s experience

in Suwarrow was the inspiration behind their decision to travel around the South Pacific.

• Brown Palace. A 13.5 M

C.S.Y. cutler arrived in Rarotonga in late April. The two-year-old New

York-registered yacht is owned by Bob and Jane Brown. The Browns are on a circumnavigation trip which began two years ago in Tampa, Florida, and which has taken them to the San Bias Islands, Panama, the Galapagos, the Marquesas, the Tuamotus, the Societies and Rarotonga. The rest of the trip, which will take at least four years, will include stops at Samoa, Tonga, Fiji, Australia, Vanuatu, Bali, the Maldives, Seychelles, South Africa, Brazil, and the Virgin Islands, before the yacht finally returns to Bolton Landing in New York. • QUINTET. Visiting Rarotonga briefly in May was this 15 m

Sparkman-Stephens-designed sloop

owned and sailed by Fred Bieker and his family. The Portland, Oregon, registered yacht is on her way back to the USA after cruising the South Pacific for nine months.

She will visit Suwarrow, Penrhyn, Palmyra and Hawaii before arriving back in Portland in August this year. • SINTRAM, a 12 m Westport, Massachusetts, registered yawl spent 10 days in Rarotonga. The 17-year-old yacht has been owned by the Truesdale family since it was built, and is presently skippered by Bill Truesdale. His sole crew member is Rikus Van Der Es.

Sintram left Massachusetts in November 1979 and sailed to Florida, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Panama, the San Bias Islands, through the Canal to the Galapagos, Easter Island, Pitcairn, the Gambiers and Tahiti, where it spent the hurricane season.

Rarotonga was the next stop, and from here the yacht will sail to

American and Western Samoa, Tonga, New Zealand and Australia, where Bill will decide on what route he will take to do a circumnavi gation.

• SAUNTER. Following virtually

the same route as Sintram, this five year-old ketch is owned and sailed by Morris Griffiths and his wife Sue. Morris bought the ketch as a bare hull, and much patience and skill eventually produced a sea worthy boat. Saunter left its home port of Barry in South Wales in 1976 and journeyed to the Caribbean where Morris worked on cargo ships for three years. Sue and Morris left the Caribbean in early 1980 and sailed to Panama, where Andy Amatt came aboard as crew.

The trio then set off across the Pacific, following the same route as Sintram, and arrived in Rarotonga

in early May. Andy came ashore

here with the intention of crewing on another yacht that is sailing directly to New Zealand, while the Griffiths will make for Aitutaki, Tonga, and eventually down to New Zealand. • SHANDRA. ‘We’ve sold every thing and we’re going to cruise until we’re fed up with it. We have the sailing bug and have to get it out of our system.’ So said Betty Karlovic on this 13 m sloop, yet another arrival in Rarotonga in early May.

Skipper Lewis Karlovic, his wife Betty and their son Peter, along with crew Dick Edwards and Henry Cotter, left Sydney in October last year to explore the Pacific. They spent the hurricane season in the

Bay of Islands in New Zealand, and then sailed to Rarotonga. After what they described as a ’magnificent’ week here, the Karlovics and crew sailed for Borabora and Tahiti. • ZARA 11. This Vancouver registered 12.5 m ketch arrived in Rarotonga from Borabora in mid- May. She is owned by Roy and Sylvia Willie, both US citizens. The Willies lived on the yacht for nine years in Vancouver before embark ing on this trip in September 1979.

They sailed from Vancouver to the Sea of Cortez and then across the Pacific to the Marquesas. After 11 months in french Polynesia, the Willies made for Rarotonga, and from here continued on to Pago Pago, Tonga and Fiji. From Fiji the plans are uncertain, but they antici pate staying in either New Zealand or Australia to work for a period. • RENAISSANCE. This four-year old CT27 cutter was another of the many callers at Rarotonga in May.

On board were Jim and Donna O’Steen, from Seattle, USA. The O’Steens have been cruising the Pacific for 10 months, with stops in Hawaii, Fanning Island, the Societies, and Rarotonga. The next ports of call were to be N ice, Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand, where the couple will visit friends in the Auckland area. In April 1982, they will begin their return trip, and hope to make it back to Seattle before September, a time when the weather starts to become ‘danger ously stormy’ on the northwest coast of the USA.

Jim and Jeanne Keneston on board Sabbatical (see p65).

Jane DeRidder picture.

Visiting Rarotonga was this Montevideo 43 sloop Hie, launched only last year in Capetown and equipped with sophisticated electronics. Paul Rysavy tells the story at right of the yacht’s clash with French authorities who were suspicious of its presence near a nuclear testing site.

► HIC. West German-registered Hie was also in Rarotonga in May. fhe Montevideo 43 sloop was built n South Africa about eighteen nonths ago and was launched in

lapelown in January 1980. Owner/

kipper Detlef Martens and ohannes Diemmer set sail for Irazil. and then continued on to the Vest Indies, Panama, the Marquesas, and the Societies, /here they visited over 50 atolls in he Tuamotus. The two Germans in into a little strife in French olynesia, as they stayed close to angataufa Island during a bad orm. The problem is that angataufa is only 10 km away om Moruroa, and the French lilitary were not at all pleased that icy had come so close to the

aclear testing site. Another prob

m was that Detlefs profession is arine electronics, and Hie is

juipped with sophisticated elec

onic gear. The French suspected etlefs motives, and warned him to ;ep his yacht well away from loruroa. In Rarotonga Hie took /o additional crew aboard ernelte and Rainer Detering, also am West Germany, who had flown Rarotonga from Tahiti to join the cht. The itinerary includes stops Tonga, Fiji, Noumea and Austra i before Hie heads back to South

ica for modifications. Detlef icipates returning to West rmany in June 1982.

JHAMMY. This 15 m ketch was another visitor to Rarotonga in y. The yacht is owned by lliam Shamharl and he is ac ipanied by his wife Carol and ir son David. The Shamharts, 3 left San Francisco in October 9 to sail to Baja, the Marquesas, nch Polynesia and Rarotonga,

contemplating doing a circum

igation ‘depending on who’s iting where . . .’ iITANA IV. This 10 m Westsail ter, arrived Rarotonga from the ieties. Owner Russel Dunlop

bought the Oregon-registered yacht two years ago and has been cruising ever since. His sole crew member is Brazilian Patricio Levy. Russel began his voyage in July 1979 from San Francisco, and has since visited Hawaii, the Marquesas, the Tuamotus (‘great diving’), the Societies and the Cooks. Tonga, Fiji and Australia are next, and then Russ will decide whether he wishes to brave the Indian Ocean or return home the way he came. • TIRNANOG. Her name is Welsh for ‘Forever Young’, and she visited Rarotonga briefly in May. The Vancouver-registered Truenorth 34 sloop arrived here from Tahiti and is headed for Fiji, New Zealand and Australia.

Joan D. Pease Re

ports from Papeete ,

French Polynesia:

• Quintessence. A 16.7 M

fibreglass cutter equipped with just about everything you would need on a boat, is in French Polynesia with owner Eric Tarr and friends aboard.

The vessel left Newport Beach, California, last November and cruised down the coast of Mexico before crossing from Puerto Vallarla to Hivaoa, a trip which took 16 days and 10 hours. The cutter called at anchorages in the seven islands which comprise the Marquesas and then sailed to Tahiti. Quintessence is a Trade winds 55 hull with topsides and interior designed by Eric and built to his specifications. The vessel’s equipment includes a washing ma chine and dryer, whirlpool hot tub, a large freezer and refrigerator, satellite navigation, self-furling jib and self-tailing winches. When Eric leaves the Society Islands in July, he will sail to New Zealand, Australia, and Borneo. • HALCYONE. A 10.7 m ketch, she was designed and built by owner

Will Davis. The vessel has a flush deck and is cold-moulded with fibreglass over. Will also designed and built his tender, a Tahitian style pirogue which the fishermen in the Tuamotu and Marquesas Islands found appealing. According to Will he was offered much larger canoes in trade because his pirogue is constructed of fibreglass and in the outer islands the pirogues are usually made from plywood and last only about three years. Halcyone arrived in French Polynesia from Ventura, California, and spent seven months in the Marquesas, including four months in Fatuhiva.

The vessel then called at Manihi and Ahe in the Tuamotus before arriving in Tahiti. The ketch then headed for Suwarrow Island. • OSPREY. A 12.5 m wooden sloop, she was built by Ralph Wiley in Oxford, Maryland, 25 years ago.

Dan and Peggy Van Ginhoven took possession in 1971 and set sail from Chesapeake Bay in 1977. They spent a year calling at ports on the east coast of the US and then sailed

to the Bahamas, Haiti and Panama before crossing to the Marquesas Islands. The Van Ginhovens have spent the past year in French Polynesia and are now going to American Samoa, Western Samoa, Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand. ‘We are on a very slow circumnavi gation,' Peggy said. • MICHAEL STUART. The 9 6 m bilge keel sloop is in French Polynesia with owners Jim and Liz McCann aboard. The sloop is a Golden Hind built by Terry Erskine Yachts in Plymouth, England, and launched in July 1969. The McCanns began their cruise from

Chesapeake Bay, Maryland, in

October 1979 and travelled through the Intracostal Waterways before heading ofFshore to the Bahamas, Haiti and Jamaica. They passed through the Panama Canal in May 1980 and called at the Galapagos Islands before arriving in the

Marquesas where they stayed for

several months. Liz said that one of the highlights of their trip was stopping at the Galapagos Islands.

The animals have no fear of humans. It seems almost unnatu ral.’ Before arriving in New Zea land for the summer, they will cruise to the Cooks, Tonga and Fiji.

sail off Nukuheva in the rquesas is Zara 11, a 12.5 [?]tre ketch from Vancouver. e notes at left.

A flash flood in the Kerikeri River in New Zealand caused one death, wrecked the

Pendennis Slipway at Waipapa

Landing and damaged a num ber of cruising yachts. Shown above is the New Zealand yacht Kimmoana which was cast well above high tide level by the sudden rise in the river. Another casualty was the twin-keeled Magic Dragon shown below on the hard near Opua while undergoing repairs. A car washed into the river rolled under the yacht’s hull, taking out the windvane auxiliary rud der. Pictures by Jane DeRidder.