A young Alan Orams bought the plans from Collins, and built the Althirza on the beach at One Tree Point, near Whangarei, starting in 1946. All with hand tools. And all of the timber used was native New Zealand: kauri for the planking, kowhai and tanekaha ribs, totara cabin sides, matai decking and cabin top, and matai plywood for the bulkheads. Orams’ tight budget necessitated concrete for ballast. “She was my dream yacht. I built her to take me around the world.”

With accelerating speed we were driven towards the point, on the other side of which the swell rose to gigantic breakers, which, hurling themselves against the rugged obstacles with thundering fury sent rumbling waterfalls of foam over the rocky ledges. Sunken rocks off the point showed their frothy fangs, thirty, twenty yards away. The tumult was deafening. Oh, how I hated then, those rocks, these breakers, those snarling fangs, threatening, sneering, evil, inevitable….