SEA ROVERS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVIII, Issue 21558, 22 January 1940, Page 4

SEA ROVERS

A GUERNSEY FAMILY SYDNEY, December 20. A family of sea rovers from the Channel Island of Guernsey arrived in Sydney Harbour in an old weatherbeaten yawl, Reine d’Arvor (Queen of Brittany), which has been their home for two and a half years. For sixteen months they have been wandering in the Atlantic and the Pacific, and for the last six weeks they have been battling towards Sydney from Fiji. The family consists of the owner of the boat, Mr Henry Brache, who grew tomatoes for twenty years on the island of Guernsey, his wife, and two children, Anne (16) and Noel (14). The navigator was Mr Fred Rebell, who made a lone voyage in an 18ft. boat, the Elaine, from Sydney to Los Angeles about eight years ago. The only other member of the crew on the last part of the voyage was Mr W. J. Woodward, a professional photographer, of Guernsey. The Reine d’Arvor is 50ft long, is of about 40 tons, and is 25 years old. She was formerly a French fishing boat. Built to withstand the tempests of the Bay of Biscay, the sturdy little craft has since ridden out the storms of the Atlantic and Pacific without a wave breaking over her. The Brache family originally started off on their world cruise two years ago, but bad weather sent them back on their first attempt, and after waiting for six months they ventured forth again. Their leisurely course was along the French coast to Jersey, the Canary Islands, Barbadoes, St. Vincent Panama, the Marquessa, Tahiti, Samoa, Suva, with their journey’s end at Sydney. There were ten in the party when the voyage began, but one of the crew left at Barbadoes, another remained at Tahiti, and two more found employment at Fiji. Short-handed in the crew, the two children took turns at the tiller. Short of food, the party lived mostly on rice on the last stage of their voyage. “When we came off the coast of New South Wales near Sydney Heads, none of us could sleep because of excitement,” Mr Brache said. “We had no wireless, and had heard no news of the war since leaving Suva 39 days ago. You have no idea what it feels like to have come all this distance and to find civilisation again”; above all now find a piece of Britain.”