Some Craft I have Owned.

Progress, Volume VII, Issue 4, 1 February 1912, Page 981

Some Craft I have Owned.

BY O. FREYBEEG.

From my earliest childhood, when I played with toy boats, I have always had a great love for the sea and the ships that sailed her great blue bosom; and while I did not finally adopt seafaring as a profession, it has become an all absorbing passion as a pastime. Naturally enough, after sailing in other fellows’ boats, I yearned to possess a craft of my own; and a craft I got as soon as funds permitted. I tried to get one before that, however, and as a boy of thirteen ran off with a fishing boat to be a pirate; but that, as Kipling say, is another story. After a succession of flat bottom punts and canvas canoes, my first real live boat was the ten-foot half-decked dingey “Taipu.” She had a false keel and a small sloop rig and her principal virtues were that she was tight and would beat to windward, features that were lamentably lacking in my previous craft. Small wonder, then, that to my youthful ideas she was a wonderful and beautiful ship, and I well remember the pride with which I turned out to swell the fleet on Opening Day, 1893. My bosom swelled when I claimed right of way from the big 50-foot “Maritana, ” and was accorded it with a huge grin by the late George Martin, her skipper. I had a very hazy idea of “ Taipu V” limitations as a sea-going craft, and once with Lees Brownnow Chief Engineer at the Nelson Freezing Works—started to cross the Strait in her. Fortunately a stiff southerly stopped us before Ave got far, or these lines might not have been written. My next craft was the 14-foot, dagger fin, 'half-decker “Kura,” a brand new and remarkably fine little boat; although she came to me with the bad reputation of having capsized several times, the last time drowning a man. After shifting her mast ten inches aft, altering the sail plan slightly and ballasting her differently she performed remarkably consistently, and I brought her through some very heavy weather, making many trips outside, including one journey round Cape Palliser, from which the “Kura” returned in a strained and leaky condition. My first deep-keeler that I owned outright was the “Haeata,” a well-known third-class racer built by the McKeegan’s in the late eighties. ,She was about 21 feet over all, sft. lOin. beam, and drew a little over 4 feet. She carried over 400 square feet in her total sail plan, and had IGewt. of lead outside, and about the same w r eight inside. As the drawing shows, she could not be called a handsome craft, her low stern and sharp bow making her very wet, but I had a good deal of fun out of her and some good racing. There was plenty of sport in the third, class in the “nineties” with such boats as “Greyhound,” “May” (still afloat)“Dido,”“Ripple,”“Pearl,” “Haeata,” and “Iris” (now a launch at Waitara). There was keen competition and many close finishes before the class gradually broke up, owing largely to the lack of anchorage in the Harbour. My next purchase was the dismantled hull of the cutter “Ariel,” a craft in which I had had a quarter share some seasons before—my one and only partnership. The “Haeata” had grown too

small for me, and I wanted a craft I could go to sea in with some slight degree of comfort and safety. I paid quite a trifling sum for the Ariel and her mainmast and standing rigging. She was, as nearly as I can remember, 30ft. over all, 27ft. on the water line, 7ft. 6in. beam, and 6ft. draught, and was a regular old timer of the cod’s head and mackeral tail variety. She had a nice sheer line, but she had a long, straight keel, which extended right forward, and the stem met it with only a slight round off, forming a forefoot which necessitated a truly awful headrig. The bowsprit was a formidable spar nearly 18ft. outboard, with watch tackle purchases on guys and bobstay. I determined to alter this as I had had enough trouble with that bowsprit in a seaway when part owner, so I altered the sail plan to a ketch —the very handiest for cruising—and balanced

her nicely with a bowsprit only 10ft. outboard. I took the lead off the “Haeata,” as the two boats laid side by side on Huff am slip, and bolted it on, without recasting, to the “Ariel.” The “Haeata V’ mast I used for a mizzen, as well as her boom and gaff for the mizzen rig. All her gear was used one way and another in rigging the “Ariel.” The sails I made myself of lOoz. cotton duck. They were a labour that I should be very loath to undertake again, but cash was scarce. Anyhow, they stood the weather and set fairly well, although, as a sailmaker told me, they wouldn’t bear inspection. Below decks she was fairly comfortable. I built in two bunks under the bridge deck aft, each extending under the deck alongside the cockpit. They were rather difficult to get into, but once in, they were very comfortable. In the main cabin, owing to her draught and

coach house, there was almost headroom for my six feet of length, and the side benches, which slept four, were wide and comfortable, and underneath there was ample locker space. A table was rigged suspended from the coach roof at the after end and screwed to the mainmast on the forward end. In the fo’e’stle were the stove and cooking gear, and many were the good feeds prepared there, for I ran her winter and summer, rarely missing a week end at one of the bays or down at Palliser where we used to go pig and goat hunting. I made several trips to Port Underwood and the Sounds, and once each to Flaxbourne and Kapiti in the old “Ariel” before she was wrecked in the early part of 1898 by some “friends” who had borrowed her without leave. As the drawing shows, she was a homely looking craft, and although archaic and clumsy in design, according

to modern ideas, she was very weatherly; in fact, I have never been in a more weatherly vessel, the “Rona” alone excepted. While I was fitting out the “Ariel” I became possessed, under rather peculiar circumstances, of the ketch “Neva,” 8 tons, a vessel I had brought up from Lyttelton some time before for a friend of mine who wanted to cruise in the Sounds, and afterwards, having to leave New Zealand hurriedly, presented her to me. She was originally built as a yacht for Mr. J. C. Martin, by Westlake, at Lyttelton, and was then cutter rigged. Afterwards she was converted into a trader and ketch rigged. Her dimensions were, roughly, 38ft. x 9ft. x 4ft. 6in., and she was a splendid seaboat and fast off the wind, but when we set sail from Lyttelton in her, and ever after, she was incorrigibly leaky. We took as many as

forty buckets of water a watch out of her on a wind coming up the coast. She eventually foundered at her moorings and became a total loss. After the loss of the “Ariel” I bought the cutter “Mapu,” 7.54 tons, from Mr. John McLean. Lead was at a high price then, £22 I think, and Mr. McLean had taken the 4-ton keel off, and sold it. I bought the hull, gear and dingey. With my crew, who had stuck to me through the “Ariel” and “Neva,” I got the “Ariel’s” lead sawn up, added some more to it, and cast a 30cwt. keel for the “Mapu.” This was enough to make her uncapsizable, and we brought her down to the marks with, inside ballast. It was not very successful, however, though we made two trips to the Sounds and one to

but we managed many glorious feeds all the same. I sold her and delivered her in Nelson, where I saw her a year or two ago, converted into a trawler with her rig cut down, schooner bow cut off, and a great big greasy oil engine in her main cabin. She seemed in good condition and sound. She was well and faithfully built and should last for years yet. I hope she will; she served us well on some wild nights in the Straits. My next ship was the “Viking,” 6% tons, that good little craft that won the Ocean Race to Port Underwood and back last year. She is so well known she hardly needs description; in addition to the drawing of her under the cutter rig there is a good photograph of her in another column, under yawl rig. During

Probably no yachting club in the Dominion is as fortunately provided for in this respect, both as regards efficiency and enthusiasm as the P.N.Y.C. The bulk of the work on the 22nd fell on the capable shoulders of Mr. Leslie Sleightholm, the official starter, judge and timekeeper, and right nobly did he rise to the occasion. The races were all started under the Mark Foy system, by means of flags, except in the 14-foot event, which was started by means of numbers. In the afternoon the first and second class races were started off at the same time, owing to the light wind in, the morning delaying matters slightly. The time for other events was also altered to suit the convenience of starters. There is no question that the special course round Point

Port Underwood during the season in this turn so during the winter we cast another ton on, and with this she was entirety satisfactory She was a very eo m ortably ship and I made many trips across the Straits m her. She was, ? ft -4 V 64 all, Bft. 6m. beam, Wahfp n ■ dra T> Tie r ™ COm - f o tab e accommodation below for six, X! n S° P twota7he U 6 "Te mam-cabin Avas all panelled and varnished except the coach roof and beams, which Avere enamelled white and gold, and she looked very cosy d T Avith , plush cushions, linoleum on the floor, and a nice cover on the table, although the head-, room was not very great The galley was aft, where there was still less headroom,

the time I owned her I made no fewer than sixteen trips to the Sounds and Port Underwood in her, and found that as a sea boat she was hard to beat. All the photographs I had of craft I owned prior to the “Mapu” have been destroyed by fire, and if this should meet the " eye of anyone possession a picture of any of the boats I should esteem it a favour if he would let me have it copied.