The Wharram Catamaran has always held a fascination not because its a thing of beauty but because they reek of the promise of adventure. And not a modern day adventure clutching a GPS and Sat Phone, but a 1960’s hippy adventure with free love, tropical islands bare tanned skin, and the rejection of boundaries imposed by a disapproving society.

One of the great pleasures of curating this website occurs, when histories overlap and the threads and webs of wooden boat sailing from different eras begin to form a moth eaten brocade, all the more beautiful for its holes and faded colours.

Ouch, The title of this article is so bad it actually hurts! Surely you can do better! Why not enter THE SWS I CAN DO BETTER Competition. And there’s a PRIZE!

Australian sailors have always respected their New Zealand neighbours. With a population of only 4.8m, NZ holds the America’s Cup, have long pedigree with both ocean racing and dinghy design and a healthy tradition of maintaining their yachting heritage.

We lit a fire in the rain, which spluttered into life and then went out, so we drank some whiskey removed a leech or two and retired to our sleeping bags listening to the rain drum on the fly sheet.

In the middle of the Mornington Peninsula, an hour’s drive southeast of Melbourne, and 10kms from any substantial body of water, there is a block of land that really could only be described as a retirement home for old boats.  A few are receiving some late life attention, but most of them have gone there just to die.  There are the ubiquitous unpainted rusting steel home-made boats with big, hard chimes and protruding welds that look like badly healed scars. 

Here’s a selection three vastly different jobs that peaked my interest. Even if they aren’t actually in your skillset, its hard not to dream of what life might be like if a connection with timber craft meant that money was coming into the bank account, not just going leaving it

When the 2021 Australian Wooden Boat Festival went the same way as so many other mass gatherings over the last 18 months, the organisers quickly made sure that the year wasn’t completely wasted.

By The 1950’S, Sydney Had Developed Small Kids Dinghies Like The 6ft Balmain Bug, A 10ft Skiff And The Vaucluse Junior. Melbourne Had The 8 Footers And The Sabot BUT The Ubiquitous Opti Has Conquered Them All.

“But sailing is a pursuit most fascinating, varied, and exciting, in which women can become absolutely proficient, requiring no particular muscular effort or physical strength, only quickness of judgment, and a knowledge, which can be acquired by practice and the opportunity. So any woman wishing to shine in a delightful little world of her own would do well to emulate Miss Pritchard.”

What a great outcome it would be if she could regularly race on Port Phillip, her spiritual home, against her elder sister, providing pleasure not only for a new custodian and her crew, but for all those lucky enough to witness the sight.

Anyone who thought the world had four oceans will now have to think again, after the National Geographic Society announced it would recognise a new Southern Ocean in Antarctica, bringing the global total to five.

Last week it was wonderful news to hear that Joy Phillips was elected Chair of the Australian Wooden Boat Festival, the largest celebration of wooden boats and maritime culture in the southern hemisphere.

If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the last six months publishing articles on SWS it’s that the events that do best are created by enthusiasts on the ground, having an idea and then making it happen.

Although the Australian’s were quietly confident that they would not be disgraced, they were not prepared for the horse laughter of the English yachting press. One of their quotes read: 'Very sporting of the Australians to send over a couple of cruising boats (double-enders) and a very old Robert Clark design'.

While there are hundreds of beautiful words, lyrical and practical, used to describe the hull a boat, when it comes the interior there are few. Words seem to describe the atmosphere rather than the space. Those that do define space seem to have come from via the Navy rather than from the lips of the designer.

While researching the elusive Errol Flynn and his yachts, see Hobart to Hollywood SWS 3rd June, we discovered Templeton Crocker, the original owner of Flynn’s schooner the ZACA. From 1929 during a global Depression, Crocker spent his huge railroad fortune building and fitting the yacht and embarking on scientific expeditions in the Pacific.

What makes it different to the previous six books in this column is that it’s an adventure brought on by necessity rather than free choice.  It’s a story that is playing out in some form or another every day of the year in 2021, whether it be in the Mediterranean, the Indian ocean or the Caribbean. Normal people, whose mere existence is under threat, take to a small boat, to escape to a new life. 

Errol Flynn was a seasoned sailor before becoming a Hollywood film star. Whether on-screen as Captain Blood or off-screen as master and commander of his 74’ ALDEN ketch SIROCCO, there was always adventure with yachts.

Don’t Get Me Wrong. I love a big, glamorous, highly varnished yacht as much as the next person. However the reality is, most of us are attracted to this corner of the maritime world not because we aspire to have cocktails on the aft deck at Les Voiles de St Tropez, but because somewhere deep down, we have a respect for history, traditional craftsmanship and a quest for adventure.