Monsieur Couta

…or the birth of a Sorrento Couta Boat and how it ended up on the Brittany Coast of France.

Painting of JESSIE by the late Jack Earl

By Milton Green

JESSIE C44 was built in 1987 by Tim Phillips at the Wooden Boat Shop in Sorrento, Victoria, with Huon Pine brought over from Tasmania. Here is her story…

Growing up in Mornington, just 300 metres from the beach, in the immediate post WW2 years, we, as in my brothers and mates, spent all our summer days there jumping off the pier, hanging around the fishermen and running home barefoot only when hungry or dark.

The population was only a few thousand, no one locked their doors - life was simple. As neighbours, we had three fishermen who would provide us with couta, salmon trout and the plentiful ubiquitous flathead, sold then for threepence each or 5 for a shilling! We would stack up the broadsheet Herald and leave them tied with string or take them down to the pier. There were at least six boats stern in to the pier summer and winter.

Mainly Laccos, although probably a Locke or two. Alec Lacco, decades later, had a factory near my car dealership. The most memorable fisho was undoubtedly Stan Hutchins, whose nephews still net and longline off Fisherman’s Beach in Mornington, Victoria, where the family have been for over a century.

A colourful, big, personality, he was Captain of the Fire Brigade, President of the Football club and involved in many other community activities. He owned the largest boat in the harbour; a clinker double ender named VICTORY. Mast and yard were always on deck with sails bent, but he rarely sailed. Tragically, after spending years behind a shop in a makeshift museum, it was burnt. NANCY survives to this day, as does the former Edna, restored by Ken Woods and renamed, LOLA.

Fast forward 30 years. and I have a family, a business and a keel boat in the same town I grew up in. Much had changed - not a timber boat to be seen. In one of Mornington’s notorious northerly storms, my boat, along with many others, was beached and written off.

Australia Day weekend, 1984, when I would normally be competing at Geelong, I wandered down to the yacht club, where to my delight there were at least a dozen Couta boats on the jetty or swing moorings. A big sense of de ja vu! The then Couta Boat Club had raced to Mornington Yacht Club from Sorrento, had a round the sticks race the following day, then sailed, or maybe raced, back.

This, of course, piqued my interest. I then established the existence of the Club, through Marcus Burke, whose family had a Mornington beach house and hence met Tim Phillips, who had, after working out of his Delgany Street carport, moved to his first shed in Oxford Street.

My monthly meeting with my Rosebud Manager in those days was conducted at the Portsea pub -well it was the 1980s! I called in on Tim several times, asking if he had, or could source, an old boat for restoration, as I had become very interested in owning one. He was always busy, being on the tools then, and I’m sure he thought this bloke in a suit who regularly interrupted his work was, to use car trade jargon just a tyre kicker.

Talking with Tim on one of these occasions, as he continued on the tools, I picked up wood shavings from the spoke shave he was using, rubbed them through my fingers and just naturally smelt them. He later told me that is when he realised I was REALLY serious about wooden boats. 

In a subsequent visit, while chatting, I mentioned a friend in Tasmania had some Huon pine planks left over from a 46 foot Roberts ketch that, at that time, could only be used by Tasmanians (that  boat is SOLQUEST the host boat on Gourmet Farmer Afloat, on which I had frequently cruised the Whitsundays, and entered and retired from the 1983 stormy Sydney to Hobart). In what was an emotional moment for Tim and I, he asked if I would consider a new boat using the Huon if we could get it to Sorrento.

Given the scarcity of older boats, I thought why not?

I remember saying to Tim, I always wanted a boat with a history, but I have the feeling you may, in the Lacco tradition, be creating the start of something historic here and one day your boats may join them. This was 1986 with WAGTAIL being lofted up.

We shook hands on the deal, with me supplying the Huon, engine and sails. $26,000 ($1,000 per foot). To deliver the timber, which was not full length, I purchased from the Launceston Mazda dealer, a long wheel base van, displayed my dealer trade plate and drove to Gary Medley’s yard to load. On to the ferry, thence to the embryonic Wooden Boat Shop. 

Launch day of JESSIE, named after my grandmother, was a wet October the following year, with Tim’s small team and a youthful, enthusiastic Nick Williams assisting. JESSIE had a swing mooring at Lentell Avenue, Sorrento, and I had a dinghy on the beach with paddles stored underneath. She remained here until post amalgamation when I secured an SSCBC mooring. I still had my Mornington Harbour mooring and frequently sailed north post-race to enjoy the Thursday night twilights I instigated, and sponsored, before returning to Sorrento the following Saturday. 

My old keelboat crew joined me with long term friends and daughter, Sally. I had the benefit of the young and talented Grant Wharington as a forward hand, but always found it difficult to beat the lighter and always well helmed, WAGTAIL

In the Bi-Centennial year of 1988, the Club arranged transport of six boats to Sydney, NSW for the Old Gaffers Regatta to coincide with the Tall Ships Parade. We were hosted by the wonderful waterfront Sydney Amateur Sailing Club in Mosman Bay. I had been in Europe for a new model launch and flew into Sydney where the Burke brothers, Peter Kubale and Tim Phillips had set up the boat. One short practice then race day. The atmosphere was colourful, bunting aplenty, dressed ships with everyone keen to win. Bill Davis on KATE had picked up some local talent from the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (CYC) across the harbour and was out practising early. We were probably last to leave the pontoon but before us went the historic Rossman ferry with the Governor, Club Commodore and Officer of the Day, Bill Gale and assorted media.

I had known Bill for many years, as in an earlier life, coinciding with my first involvement with the then Sorrento Sailing Club in 1958, we met while staying at his brother Roger’s Mosman home while competing in the Gwen 12 Nationals. Another story there! As Bill was boarding he said, ”Milton, if you can get more crew, grab them, because before this race is over we will be hit with a southerly buster, so more weight the better.”

Lucks a fortune. A very disappointed Marcus Burke and Sue and Adam Leeming had been bumped off KATE for the CYC hotshots, so they happily joined us. We went out about eight up, did not get the best start, in fact, bad, but avoided a big mess of tangled boats at the first mark, sailed around them to leeward into clear air and took off after the fleet. The event was handicapped to allow for the multiple differences in size and and speed. From the Athol Bight start, the course was north, around a laid mark at Shark Island, a beat back to the finish, in the area of the Sydney Hobart start lines.

As predicted, we were hit with at least 25 knots on the beat home. We were all over canvassed, carrying number ones, but with our weight and judicious trimming, we were able to sail flatter and higher than anyone else. As we were chomping our way through the fleet, I remember passing AKARANA, the Maritime Museum’s NZ Logan designed boat with a metre of her long boom trailing in the water. 

We saluted the gun with great onboard excitement and a cacophony of ships’ horns and sirens. Ten feet high and bullet proof, we celebrated long into the night. In his role as President of the then Couta Boat Club, Marcus was interviewed by various reporters from home and abroad. We met a French journalist who was, in typical Gaelic manner, telling us what superior seamen and boats were in their Maritime provinces. Ignoring, but in all likelihood not, we refrained from mentioning Waterloo, La Perouse, being eclipsed by Cook et al and in contemporary time, Baron Bich and his many ill-fated attempts at the America’s Cup. He was, however, very impressed with the Couta boats, came sailing with us and, in what we did not, at first, take seriously, offered to organise transporting JESSIE to France for the Douarnenez Wooden Boat Festival later that year.

With our boats back at Sorrento, me at work finalising the sale of part of my business, it was some time later, Marcus confirmed the offer was genuine and La Chaisse Maree, a French wooden boat magazine, had agreed to finance the entire trip if I could get a crew to Brittany. Could I ever! But writing the cheque to cover costs would have been the easiest part. The boat had to be packed for the trip, with mast strapped to the deck, spars and bumpkin in the hull, sails stowed under deck forward, sheets bagged in the bilge, with the lead ballast shrink wrapped on a pallet. Paperwork was a nightmare, with insurance, Carnet so the boat could re-enter Australia, Customs, Custom Agents and Freight Forwarders, just to get the flat pack, no sides, container to Footscray, to be loaded. JESSIE was carried top load on a container ship berthing at Zeebrugge in Belgium, from where an oversized truck carted her overnight to Brittany. I had to meet Customs in the Zeebrugge docks - an adventure in itself in those pre-GPS days.

I  had picked up a new, yet to be released in Australia, BMW 535 in Munich, drove into Belgium, spending a few days in Brugge, the well named Venice of the North, before heading to Paris to re-connect with Marcus, our fellow shipmates, Brian Wales, stepson Jeremy, Peter Kubale and then girlfriend Suzanne, already in Douarnenez. A few days R&R in Paris, then the long, but fast, drive into Douarnenez, where we had rented a house on a farm nearby. In those early days of mobile phones, we could not contact the others to locate our accommodation, had no idea where it was, were tired, hungry and thirsty - not necessarily in that order, as it was probably 10pm and dark. When Grant asked “What do we do now?” I well remember, with him promptly agreeing that we drive to the waterfront, find the restaurant/bar with the brightest lights, loudest music and best cars parked out front.

Mission accomplished, except for accommodation. While struggling with a pay phone to call the house for directions, I asked a woman for assistance, as the person who answered had no English, spoke rapid fire French and I was running out of coins. To my surprise, she said “Wait a moment Mr Couta, I will be with you after I pee!”

Annie Ravarch was a teacher at the Convent, fluent in English, an accomplished Dragon sailor, was on the organising Committee of the Festival and aware of our presence in town, perhaps due to us wearing Australian Rugby tops I had sourced for the trip. We obviously bought her a drink or two and as the place was closing, had no accommodation, had no idea where it was anyway, we followed her home, where we stayed the night.

At breakfast the next morning, we met her family - a son, two daughters and an adopted brother and sister, orphans from Peru ”my little Incas”, she fondly called them. It transpired she was a widow, her violent and drunkard ship’s captain husband had been killed by his crew and tossed overboard. The Incas father was implicated; the mother could not afford to keep them, hence kind-hearted Annie adopted them. (Twenty years later, in 2008, I caught up with the family again, with the exception of Gwenola, her elder daughter, who had a torrid love affair with Grant and soon after arrived in Australia - another story or two there!) 

We eventually found the house, one of two on the property, the younger family moving in with the parents to generate extra income over summer, which was our comfortable base for a fortnight. We were one of 747 boats in the Festival, now at Brest 2000 strong boats, but had obviously won, amongst others, the Marco Polo award for having travelled the furthest. We were treated like rock stars, with two dedicated car spots on the bluestone jetty, the other being Kube’s Renault he had bought for his extended stay.

Douarnenez is a quaint fishing village with narrow streets running down to the quay, reminding me of the Cornish Loo and Polperro. In the way Queenscliff is to Geelong in Victoria, Douarnenez and Brest are paired.

The cavernous fish market on the jetty, along with most of the commercial harbour, had been emptied to accommodate the myriad of craft from all over Europe. Each day, when we weren’t eating lunch on board, the market became a huge food hall, with Breton oysters, langoustine, coquille St Jacques, smoked, raw, fried fish of all types served with lemon wedges. On board, lunch was usually the ubiquitous baguettes with ham and assorted cheeses, washed down with Gamay. JESSIE’s thwart made a great table.