NOVEL METHOD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27026, 10 March 1949, Page 9

NOVEL METHOD

RETURN FROM JAMBOREE DUNEDIN SEA SCOUTER An unusual method of return to New Zealand was used by a Dunedin Sea Scouter, Mr A. P. Allan, who left the city on December 11 last year to attend the Pan-Pacific Scbut Jamboree in Australia without knowing how he would make his way back again. He travelled as a member of the crew of the New Zealand yacht. Te Hongi, which was sailed across the Tasman by its owner, Mr Jack Markwalder, in the 1949 Trans-Tasman Race. The Scouter arrived back in Dunedin last Saturday exactly 12 weeks after he left for Australia. He had been in Newcastle. New South Wales, when he had read a story in a newspaper about the Te Hong!, Mr Allan said. The story told how the yacht’s captain was taking three New Zealanders back to their own country as crew members. The captain had been cruising on the Australian coast since he had taken part in the 1948 Trans-Tasman Yacht Race and would now contest the 1949 event On impulse, he had sent a telegram to Mr Markwalder, to ask if he could go along, Mr Allan said. The request had been granted. The Te Hongi, a 43-foot schooner, with a crew of four and the skipper, had had an uneventful trip, Mr Allan said. The winds had been good apart from a patch of calm weather which lasted for five days. The schooner had arrived fourth and taken fourth place Her official time was 18days 4hr Bmm 20sec from starting to finishing line Mr Allan'is Scoutmaster of the 7th Dunedin Anderson’s Bay Sea Scouts.