“Every Christmas everyone would go, all those who worked on the water, to all the old boatsheds in the area. You’d eat prawns and oysters there for as long as you like – they didn’t fight, they had a great time together – this was at Bayview – Palm Beach was considered a fair way away then.”

After sea trials on St Vincent's Gulf, John, then an academic in history at Adelaide University, obtained a grant to undertake research in the Lau group of islands of eastern Fiji. The boat was trucked to Sydney then loaded onto a ship to Tonga

While no pre-WW2 yachts are entered, there are many examples of yacht genres from the second half of the 20th century, that have helped the Fastnet become the world’s largest offshore yacht race. 

Nick carried out substantial work, including a new rig, new sails and with a crack crew competed at Hamilton Island, Qld, in the Australian IRC Championships in 2001. With her low handicap rating, she was a surprise winner, astonishing the race favourites of Brindabella and Alfa Romeo

While shooting the British Boatbuilders 2023 Tour, we noticed the relatively low representation of women in the U.K.'s boatyards and sail lofts. In Italy, however, the gender gap is even more pronounced.

There are times when owners needs to sell a classic sailboat but the memories of the good times on the boat keep them for committing. David Crosby cherished Mayan, not just for the times he sailed her but also for the inspiration she brought to his song writing

After around 15,000 years ago, sea levels began to rise quite rapidly, reflooding the low-lying coastal areas of the Bassian Plain. It took about a thousand or more years for Lutruwita/Tasmania to be separated from mainland Victoria, and another few thousand years for the main islands of the Bass Strait to emerge.

This class is only permitted to carry the smallest model of electric autopilot, and it is not adequate when the boats are being pushed hard downwind.  This was a deliberate decision by Don McIntyre, race founder, to keep the boats simple and affordable

She sits as a time capsule. She is in a shed with a dirt floor, an ideal environment for a double-planked boat. Her exterior finish is deteriorated but original. Her lovely full-length mahogany planking has checked over the years from drying out and splined, but she still has the clear varnish finish inside and out with which she was launched. She looks to be as original as when she was built. Let’s not forget that her builder, Bjarne Aas, was a legend at the end of his career.

“Across the globe and throughout history, wooden boats have been foundational to the story of human civilisation. Whether for fishing, trade, exploration, or leisure, these vessels have always been part of humanity's shared heritage and culture. They've taken us to every corner of the Earth and they bind us together.”

This 'boaty' environment led to the establishment of the Shipwright's Point School of Wooden Boat Building in 1995, where they taught students how to build and restore wooden vessels, preserving an art that was at risk of being lost.

Built by Deemings boats at Ōpua in 1960, the Bay Belle was first launched in 1961 as the Fullers Cream Trip ferry making deliveries and transporting passengers over a traditional shipping route that took in some of the Bay of Island’s most spectacular coastal sights.

In the realm of environmental activism, innovation often springs from the simplest ideas. Samuel McLennan, the founder of Project Interrupt, epitomises this ethos. His ambitious project involves sailing a raft up the coast of Australia, constructed entirely from waste materials collected from Tasmania's shores.

What’s so good about the auction system in relation to timber boats is that the lingering procrastination that is so common in trying to find a new custodian, is eliminated. Sellers who think that their boat is worth what they put into it over the years, and buyers who think they will score the miracle “lowball” come face to face with reality.

I am sailing from San Francisco to Sydney, writing a book called “The Sea—A Love Story”. (It’s a book for grown ups.) I made a cyanometer—actually four cyanometers—to measure the color of the sea each day while I’m on the ship. It’s very scientific.

If you are in the City of Sails this weekend (1st & 2nd March) then try to make a little room in the diary for this… In association with the National Maritime Museum the Auckland Wooden Boat Festival are presenting two days of talks and workshops

“We have an opportunity to secure two important boats for our archive of sailing dinghies. They are the Falcons 3 and 4, 12 sq meter Heavyweight Sharpies, one used by Rolly Tasker and Huck Scott to win the silver medal at the 1956 Olympics.”

The voyage of one hundred and twenty sea miles begins at Recherche Bay, the southern most anchorage in Australia, and the scene of an extraordinary cultural exchange in 1793 between the Lyluequonny people and the explorers from revolutionary France whose discoveries fuelled the European enlightenment.'

150 years ago, the SS Gothenburg - a sturdy coastal steamship - left the Port of Darwin in the Northern Territory on its final tragic voyage. When the ship hit Old Reef off Townsville in cyclonic conditions, over 100 people died. Just 22 survived. The disaster devastated the fledgling community of Darwin (then called Palmerston). Judges, doctors, bureaucrats, prisoners, women and children were all lost. It was said that every house in the northern colony lost a loved one. 

I have no desire to turn SWS into a free Trading Post (remember the Trading Post?) for odds and ends from the shed… But these look like they need to be holding a boat together while pounding through Bass Strait… not sitting on someones workshop bench!