I sailed on Saga for well over 5 years as a crew member with Lindsay out of the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron. We raced her in the inshore and offshore series and I was onboard in the 1968 Sydney to Hobart. I became very good friends with Lindsay and his family and had some great times on Saga. We also cruised up and down the NSW coast on a regular basis. She is a grand old boat, comfortable, spacious and easily sailed.

With the theme of the 2027 festival being “Working Boats”, the SWS editors have scoured the listings for half a dozen special boats with industrious origins. Even if you are not in the market… It’s fun to dream!

Interestingly when Nossiter raced the boat they stripped all excess weight from her – the head, the bunks and even the engine. They raced her so hard the seams would open up and they’d have to man the pumps. At the end of the racing season everything was put back for the family to cruise the NSW coast.

“I have corresponded with James Hill – Peters’ son – James did a number of Sydney to Hobart races on her in the 60’s and has fond memories of her. He believes she had never been in the water when she arrived in Sydney and that the sails were unused.”

In 2015, when I took on the task of sole ownership, Skipperhood and the need to learn to sail solo, I dared to dream that this vessel's steadying long keel, robust simplicity, warm timbers and curvaceous design, might provide me with sanctuary, adventure and community. This has come about and now 10 years on I find myself at the threshold of another leap.

When it comes to Classic Yacht brokerage there is some terrible copyrighting out there. Running a close second only behind inner-suburban real estate jargon, the average yacht broker is a fountain of cliches that leave me gasping for a trace of originality.

In no particular order we bring you three boats that caught the editor’s eye this week. A motor boat on Pittwater,A Twister in the UK, and a Crayboat in Queensland.

She is not currently in sailing order but has had considerable work done on her over the last 15 years. If you are prepared to do a little more, and respect timeless design and irrefutable provenance, you could do a lot worse than take a look at this 32ft double ended gem.

Two paddle steamer captains navigational charts of the Darling River, from Wilcannia to Menindee and Wentworth to Portee (sic), circa 1870-1890. Indian ink on waxed linen or sailcloth, charting the river course, landmarks, hazards and built establishments, wound onto wooden rollers
21 metres long

Whether it’s a weekend on the Gippsland Lakes, or a circuit of Proper Bay from Port Lincoln, or washing through the Great Sandy Strait in Queensland, an adventure on a shallow draft wooden sailing boat can bring as much pleasure as crossing any ocean.

I always start a search with so much optimism, and then the mishmash of soulless production non entities, unrealistically priced one-offs, and boats than need to be put out of their misery becomes too much, and I switch to the more bespoke sites that have fewer offerings but more potential.

“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.”

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.

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 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!

In 1942 she was bought by Mr. Len Nettlefold who held the agency for General Motors in Tasmania. He had the quaint ‘dog house’ build aft of the mizzen mast and it is said that the design for this was drawn from the cab of a Chevrolet truck.

If you are looking for someone willing to spend a few million dollars restoring a very beautiful 1910 Herreschoff schooner that’s lying wrecked on the seabed of Osaka Harbour, Japan, would you really ask them for A$161,523?

Bassett was a forceful and decisive character who found it hard to tolerate foolishness, but was forgiving of ignorance. The uninformed he set out to educate, lucidly and patiently. He had an uncanny knack of grasping the salient problems and of solving them at the outset.

A yacht constructed with one of the greatest timbers.
By one of the worlds most famous shipwrights.
With 130 years of irrefutable provenance and achievements.

I can’t help thinking that auctions are an under used way of passing on unwanted timer boats. They provide an accurate way of assessing the REAL value of a particular vessel on any given day. Assuming the advertising is comprehensive, and the bidding system is fair, then the market will speak.