ARDUOUS VOYAGE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIX, Issue 98, 25 March 1939, Page 11

ARDUOUS VOYAGE.

YAWL REACHES TORT, Per Press Association. AUCKLAND, March -24. Flying a tattered ensign of the United States of America, a strange yawl slipped unexpectedly into Auckland Harbour late this afternoon. She came from Sydney, and the voyage across the Tasman took 30 days. On board were two very hungry young men, one a Netherlander and the other Swedish by birth and a naturalised Australian. For the. last eight or nine days, they had been living on potatoes, fried onions and pancakes, make of flour and water. All other supplies were exhausted. The owner is the Netherlander, Mr Frank Dona,, and the AustralianSwedo is Air' Oscar Strom. Each said lie had suffered from sickness because of their restricted diet, which was relieved only briefly when they put into Spirits Bay and found there a solitary camper who gave them a loaf of bread and a couple of apples. Both also boro on their logs severe abrasions caused when they were flung about their small craft by the heavy weather that, together with irritating calms, prevented them from reaching Auckland on the date they planned, March 8. Air Dona said the depression caused him to put into realisation a dream ho had already cherished and with his brother Pete he went to Seattle and began to build a boat. The task took him a year. When his yawl was finally launched in 1935 he named her Alarie after his mother and set sail for Alaska. A year ago the two brothers left Honolulu and sailed to Tahiti, going thence to Samoa, Fiji, and finally to Sydnev, where they stayed three months. On February 22 lie set sail for Auckland. “Meanwhile,” he 6aid, “my brother Pete had decided to stay in Sydney where he found work. So we parted after sailing for more th.an three years together. T took on Oscar and here I am. though it took so long to get round that devil of a North Ckipe that I began to despair of reaching here.” Head winds and then calms were tho Alarie's lot for the whole of the voyage. Good progress was made for the first few days, but then they ran into a storm, and were hove-to for five days, in which time they were taken northward, far off their course. Then for three days the Tasman was as peaceful as the Waitemata, and they stayed almost where they were. After that there were more head winds and they lost a greater distance than they gained. The Alarie sighted the New Zealand coast almost a week after they had hoped to he in Auckland. They tried to sail round North Cape and were foiled hv more head winds .and calms. Finally they were forced to use the auxiliary engine with which the Alarie is fitted. Air Dona had shipped 44 gallons of petrol when he left Sydney, and lie had intended to reserve it for harbour work, but the rapidly diminishing supplies of fresh.food decided him to draw on the engine to get past the cape. For the last few days they had rationed the water to a few “fingers"’ for drinking and to a splash for washing. The Alarie is only 34ft long", with a beam of lift and a draught of 6ft.