19 thoughts on “Miss Picton”

1. Pingback: LASSIC WOODEN TOURIST LAUNCH – MISS PICTON (Mitre Peak)  | waitematawoodys.com #1 for classic wooden boat stories, info, advice & news – updated daily – 14+ million views

2. Any idea what happened to her after working in Milford sound?

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3. I remember George Clough and “Miss Onahau” (named after Onahau Bay in the Grove Arm of Queen Charlotte Sound.) Jim Horrey had the “Charmaine” (Later re-named “Miss Picton”) and Dick Mason “Miss Portage”

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4. My Uncle, George Clough was a share holder in Queen Charlotte Launches company at Picton.
   His vessel was Miss Onahau which was powered by a GM diesel, (very high revving) and on which we spent many happy hours cruising the sounds during the school holidays. Us older ones often filled in as helmsman sometimes to give Uncle George a break. My Aunt who was Elisabeth Clough, was my fathers eldest sister.
   In my adult years i was stationed at Picton as Ministry of Transport , Resident Traffic Officer, for several years. I am now an Octogenarian currently residing in Lower Hutt
   Robert Wilson.

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5. I now own the sister vessel ‘Donald Sutherland’ which is still powered by the original Gardner 6L2. Still runs well and in regular use.

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6. Can someone please send me a good copy of this photo so I can enlarge it . It probably has my father in this picture . Or if you have any other boat pictures of the boats he owned from 1928 till the late 40,s in Picton Cheers Martin Steele

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7. No, it was a “six-cylinder Gardner Diesel engine fitted with electric starter” after all.
   She was built “with the latest ideas of Mr. C.J. Collings on the bridge deck style”. Those remarks relate to TINOPAI, but MISS PICTON was a clone of TINOPAI.

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8. Or perhaps a Kelvin?

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9. The newspaper reports are scanty, but say that she had the same engine as TINOPAI, a “57bhp crude oil engine”. My guess is a Gardner.

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10. Not for sure, but many of the commercial launches in the Marlborough Sounds were repowered with 71 series “Jimmies” after WWII, mostly 3-71s, 4-71s and 6-71s.

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11. Aha! Just as well I didn’t put money on “Miss Mitre” then, and obviously my vague memory of her originally being a private launch was even vaguer than I thought.
    Queen Charlotte Transport’s other launches were “Miss Onahau”, “Miss Portage” and “Charmaine”, the latter being renamed “Miss Picton” after the departure of the subject of this thread.

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12. Still is a beautiful spot, though no longer isolated. You can get there by road now, from Picton or Havelock via Linkwater.

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13. Does anyone know what she has been powered with through the years?

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14. I don’t think Collings and Ford were happy neighbours in St. Mary’s Bay at a personal (and professional) level.
    MISS PICTON’s owners were
    1. M T H Steele, launch proprietor Picton 1933-1942
    2. Mervyn Kenny launch proprietor Picton 1942-1948
    3. Queen Charlotte Transport Ltd 1948-1953.
    She was never a private launch, always a licensed passenger vessel.

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15. Perhaps I conveyed thew wrong impression with my above comments — I never doubted anything that was written — was just noting various similarities.& wondering if she had ever lived in Auck., at any time, with the tuck inscription — That is a beautiful spot, & if it is still the same today, would love to visit myself, & obviousy no doubt a Collings & Bell build of the boat, with Harold’s wonderful & almost always accurate input that would be above question — just the camera angle gave me that thought having had a a bit to do with S F 30s boats of that era. — KEN RICKETTS

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16. She was “MISS PICTON AUCKLAND” because she was a British Registered Ship, registered at Auckland. The Register also records that her name was changed to MITRE PEAK on 20/7/1953. I think Chas. Collings would have spat the dummy at his work being described as “Sam Fordish”.

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17. (Thought I’d already entered this, but it disappeared into the interwebby thing.)
    The Portage was then a guest house (Later a hotel) in Kenepuru Sound, not a settlement. The other buildings in the photo were ancillary to the guest house. That’s definitely Portage in the photo.
    To get there, Miss Picton must have steamed down Queen Charlotte Sound to Cook Strait, round Cape Jackson, on into and up Pelorus Sound to get to Kenepuru Sound. The “six miles from Picton” mentioned in the original post would have been from Picton to the head of Torea Bay, from where a (then rough) road went over the hill to Portage – you either walked it or arranged a ride in Portage’s transport, a Model A ute.
    I’ll make a wild guess and say that Miss Picton was probably still a private vessel at the time of the photo.
    My own (highly fallible) memory says she was renamed Miss Mitre when she went south to Fiordland, rather than Mitre Peak, but I won’t go to the barricades on that one, Harold. .

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18. It’s interesting that the MISS PICTON has the word “Auckland” under the name on the tuck, & the beautiful bay looks really inviting, & rather like perhaps somewhere on Waiheke, as well as Picton. — Am bound to say I’ve never seen her, or heard of her before — facinating lovely boat, Looks a little 1930s “Sam Fordish” in the sheerline at the bow, the way the pic has been taken– great to find out about her – KEN RICKETTS

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19. She was launched on December 7 1933, a welcome job for Collings & Bell in the depths of the Depression. She was motored down the East coast to Picton. In 1953 she was renamed MITRE PEAK and used for tourist work in Milford Sound.

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