SAONA is for Sale
Regular readers with good memories will recall three articles published in SWS, about the Philip Rhodes yacht SAONA. Well, here is a fourth, published in sadder circumstances, but with hope for a bright future for one of Tasmania’s most important yachts.
SAONA has attended all fourteen Australian wooden boat festivals so far, and will be there again this year but it will be the first time the Ben Marris hasn’t steered her into Sullivan’s Cove following his death in August last year.
Ever since she was built in 1936 she’s been having adventures….
SAONA was the last boat built by Charles Lucas in his own yard at Battery Point for a Mr Maldon Weston of Austins Ferry. Philip Rhodes’ extraordinary designs are rare in Australia. Others being SCIMITAR (attending the festival this year), the original MARGARET RINTOUL (multiple Sydney Hobart winner) and FAIR WINDS (your correspondent’s ride for 24 years)
Two boats were built to SAONA’s graceful design. The other operates under charter in Chesapeake Bay. They are unusual in having a centreboard, giving her a shallow draft but good performance under sail.
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.
In 1951 SAONA was purchased by Vice Admiral Sir Guy Wyatt, shortly after he had retired as the Royal Navy Hydrographer. Sir Guy, often with his friend Justice Sir Peter Crisp, undertook numerous expeditions around Tasmania. From her deck he prepared many beautiful charts of Tasmania’s more remote bays and harbours.
Ben once wrote to us telling more about this part of her life.
After the second world war many people chose to leave gloomy, battered England and move to the farthest corner of the globe. Two such voluntary refugees were Nevil Shute and Vice Admiral Sir Guy Wyatt. They came to start new lives in the peace and sun of Australia.
Nevill Shute and his family moved to Mt Eliza on the Mornington Peninsula in 1950. At this time he was writing A Town Like Alice, Round the Bend, The Far Country and In the Wet. Sir Guy Wyatt had been the Royal Navy Hydrographer. He migrated to Tasmania in 1950. The following year he bought SAONA.
Over the next 15 years Sir Guy cruised Tasmanian waters in SAONA and prepared many beautiful charts of lesser known corners of our island state. A number of those charts are of Port Davey and Bathurst Harbour including Melaluka Inlet where he formed a friendship with Deny King and his family. Deny, another refugee from war, was mining tin in this isolated but hauntingly beautiful place.
I don’t know how Nevil Shute and Sir Guy became connected but in 1953 they sailed together on SAONA to Bathurst Harbour and spent time with the King family. This experience laid the foundations for Shute's novel The Rainbow and the Rose which was published in 1958.
The Nevil Shute Foundation is an international group who celebrate the author’s work and hold biennial meetings in various relevant locations. In 2013 twenty seven members met in Hobart over six days, touching on all things Shute. My wife and I were happy to host their visit to SAONA.
On reflection I see that, at the time when Shute and Wyatt were packing up to leave England I was growing up in Birmingham but being fed a healthy diet of Arthur Ransom. Shute’s books followed and, no doubt with many other influences, I came to understand that life is best to be lived with many adventures, preferably enjoyed on or by the water.
In 1976 Sir Peter Crisp, with a crew whose average age was 65, cruised SAONA to New Zealand, circumnavigating both islands. On 22nd December 1976 the Gisborne Herald announced
"GERIATRICS BREEZE IN ...
"Calling themselves the Geriatric Crew because their average age is 65, four men from Tasmania sailed into Gisborne on the ketch SAONA.
"They experienced good sailing weather on most of their journey from Hobart to New Zealand.
"Sir Peter Crisp, owner of the 43 year old centre-board ketch, Mr Jack Bennison and Mr Tom Stephens are the full-time crew ... The men were proud to have sailed across the Tasman to Milford Sound in only one week." Graham Blackwood was included in the crew sailing East and John Levett crewed on the return journey. SAONA spent three months sailing around both South and North Islands before a somewhat uncomfortable return passage across the Tasman. The crew spoke of the tremendous hospitality that they had received throughout their adventure.
Over the next few years ownership was passed within the family and friends to the Martin and Maddock families who continued to cruise southern Tasmanian waters.
In 1993 SAONA was purchased by Ben and Jane Marris who based her in Kettering.
Under their custodianship she participated in 1998 the Tall Ships Race from Sydney to Hobart.
In 2001 she circumnavigated Tasmania. In 2003 she won the cruising division of the Australian Three Peaks Race. In 2008 she cruised Furneaux Islands. In 2012 she cruised with Matthew Evans and the Gourmet Farmer TV team to Maria Island. As well as taking every opportunity to sail twilight's and regattas, or taking guests out for a day, SAONA has been on an expedition trip with family or friends every year in the family’s ownership - Port Davey , Wineglass Bay, or around the Channel.
An extraordinary history for an extraodinary boat.
SAONA’s Details
Designer: Phillip Rhodes Builder: Charles Lucas
Year built/launched: 1936 Place built: Battery Point, Hobart
Current home port: Kettering, ARVH no: HV000642
Hull type: Monohull Style of boat: Sailing boat
Description of boat: Centreboard Ketch
Timber - frames: Swamp Gum
Timber - hull: Huon Pine
Timber - deck: Celery Top Pine40
LOA feet: 44 LOA inches: 0
LOD feet: 40 LOD inches: 0
Beam feet: 12 Beam inches: 0
Draught feet: 4 Draught inches: 6
Freeboard feet: 2 Freeboard inches: 6