PLEASURE PER DOLLAR

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, moored stern to at Les Voiles de St Tropez, but because somewhere deep down, we have a respect for history, an appreciation of traditional craftsmanship and perhaps a repressed quest for adventure.

And to find all these things you don’t have to be a millionaire. I’m constantly amazed at the value you can get in buying a wooden boat. OK, there are always going to be some land mines out there ready to go off in your face… but with a little due diligence (ie a qualified surveyor) and a realistic appreciation of the work involved, you can be afloat and voyaging for a very modest amount of money.

A quick scan of the classifieds came up five examples under $10,000 … And remember the prices listed are asking prices… I’d knock of 25% and start negotiations from there… and you can always share the adventure with your aunt/brother/lover/best mate, immediately halving the costs. We don’t vouch for their integrity or seaworthiness. We don’t have any relationship to the sellers or the brokers. I just find them all interesting in their own different ways and know that they have the the potential to give their future custodians years of deep satisfaction.

BOAT 1
A 22ft TREKKA from the board
of Laurent Giles $9,500AUD

The first TREKKA was designed for John Guzzwell in Victoria, Canada which he built himself in 1954/5. The design was actually called the Columbia Class but most people know them as TREKKAs. Originally designed as a yawl, this one is a sloop.

L.O.A:  20′ 6”  (6.25 m) L.W.L: 18’ 5”  (5.65 m) Beam Max: 6’ 5″  (1.98 m) Draft:  4’ 5”  (1.37m) Displacement tons: 1.39 T.M.: 3 tons Ballast ratio: 31.8%

John Guzzwell’s design brief called for a self-build 20’- 21’ L.O.A. yawl and his requirements included a sufficient length of straight keel to facilitate slipping. Reverse sheer, self-draining cockpit, watertight compartments fore and aft to be used for stowage.  The hull should be sufficiently robust to resist damage by collision with “deadheads”, i.e. water-logged logs, a common hazard of British Colombian waters.  The ability to ride out bad weather at sea was called for, and was in the owner’s mind in deciding on a yawl rig.

An essential feature of the Columbia Class, and one to which Jack Giles attached great importance was that they should be, so far as possible, unsinkable; achieved by providing watertight compartments fore and aft.  The hull possesses an enormous reserve of buoyancy and the bow and stern compartments are closed by removable watertight hatches and panels.  The somewhat unusual angled covering board was designed to give acceptable headroom in the cabin without excessive apparent freeboard and windage in the topsides.

This wonderful little article gives you an idea of what these special little boats can achieve

BOAT 2
A 1954 36ft Jack Earl Huon Pine Sloop $9,900AUD

It’s hard to know what to think of this one. Jack Earl was one of the founding fathers of the CYCA and the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race. He was a noted marine artist, owned a Colin Archer designed 43’ gaff rigged ketch named after his beautiful wife Kathleen Gillett. Jack and Kathleen lived aboard and cruised with their son Mick and daughter Maris. He and Peter Luke were friends who cruised together and had the idea of forming a cruising club, which they did on 6th September 1944.

Jack competed in the first CYCA race in October 1944 from Sydney to The Basin in Pittwater. It was Jack’s intention to cruise to Hobart in December 1945 along with Peter Luke and the Walker brothers which was the foundation of the Sydney to Hobart race.

In 1947 Jack departed Sydney for a circumnavigation of the world only the second Australian yacht to do so, arriving home in November 1948. He completed another circumnavigation in the 1960’s aboard his Tasman Seabird yawl “Maris”.

I’m not really sure where this boat ANONYMA II fits into the picture. @casuarina1967 commented via instagram “ANONYMA II was sailed engineless by the late Tony Curtis out of Gore Cove near Greenwich for many years, racing down the harbour with SASC”. Obviously, she’s got no interior fit out but the Huon Pine hull should last you another 50 years!”

BOAT 3
A 1922 Huon Pine Horace
Tate B Class Yacht. $7,000AUD

Another Huon Pine boat but this ones a bit older. One for the lover of yachting history…This is what I can glean about her. INTREPID was designed and built by Horace M Tate with the help of his wife in Bellerive, Tasmania in 1922. She is one of a succession of competitive ocean and estuary racing yachts, which Horace and his wife built between 1910 and 1945. The Governor of Tasmania owned one of his boats KATHLEEN. INTREPID’s original sail plans from 1922, and an early picture at sail, show that Intrepid was originally gaff rigged. Horace was a blacksmith by trade. Some of her fittings have, like the timbers, survived the test of time. She is a stable weighted deep keel boat with lovely lines. You are close to the water in this “wet boat” but sailing her is going to be fun! LOD feet: 25ft. Hull Timber: Double Parallel Diagonal Carvel Planked. Well if that doesn’t spark an interest…..!

Boat 4
The 2013 Iain Oughtred15ft Acorn $3,000AUD

It has been written of Iain Oughtred…”His drawings are as beautiful as the boats they become, a joy to own and study in their own right; detailed and arced as the fine bones in a bird’s wing. Iain works from what Jung describes as 'archetypal memory', where form springs from subconscious recollection of the ancient, first boat builders, where form truly followed function, honed by the truth of the sea. Such shapes touch that memory in all of us.”

The ACORN is describer as one of the nicest rowing boats ever. It’s often been said that kids don’t row anymore, finding many modern boats unexciting to row. Put any kid near an Acorn 15 and they will be rowing with joy in an hour. With long fine lines and crisp wineglass transom, the Acorn 15 is rowing heaven. If you are feeling a bit lazy, you can add a small sprit rig to take you places with gentle airs, but this is a boat design for rowing and under sail she is tender.

This is an almost new boat and comes with a trailer… all for the cost of a small outboard motor…I want to buy it myself!

BOAT 5
A Laurent Giles 33’ 5”
Brittany Class Classic $5,000AUD

Ok…This one needs some work…but depending on the extent of it you would end up with a boat that could take you around the world. She was built out of Ronstan’s factory in Highett, Melbourne.

“In 1939 the growing demand for a 25ft. waterline cruising yacht capable of making really fast passages and of maintaining a crew of four in reasonable comfort was been met to a remarkable degree by Laurent Giles Brittany class. Here is a yacht not only able to deal competently with any weather likely to be met around the British coasts, but into whose every detail of design, construction and equipment has gone a wealth of hard-won experience to an extent that puts her in a class by herself. The efficiency of the snug bermudan sloop rig, the art and genius of the designer portrayed in the lines, and the specialised cleverness of the accommodation layout, all these proclaim the boat a thoroughbred.”

Do yourself a favour….!

If you are interested in finding out more about any of the five boats above then drop us a line