MAJOR ACCESS UPGRADES AT MILFORD CREEK LED BY WOODEN BOAT ENTHUSIASTS

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MAJOR ACCESS UPGRADES AT MILFORD CREEK LED BY WOODEN BOAT ENTHUSIASTS

 Interesting day yesterday on the water, gave Dave Giddens a hand taking his woody motor yacht – ALLERGY to the Slipway Milford for a haul out .

For all the wrong reasons the day started bad eg late leaving her waterfront berth meant we were time poor re the Milford Creek tide / access and the forecast was for deteriorating conditions as the day went by.

ALLERGY is a big girl – approx. 58’ LOA and a beam of 14’ and two good sized masts. Saving grace less than 4’ draft.

Well with an outgoing tide, a NE up the bum that was gusting 20>25 knots we ordered up the bridge to be raised and lined up the fairway poles.

I believe no one captured the run, which is just as well. Short answer is we made it – but:

1. We both shook hands once under the bridge

2. Every skipper of a vessel moored in the Milford Marina should thank ALLERGY for pruning the Pohutukawa trees on the bank

3. A small donation is probably due to Project Crimson 

4. The Slipway BBQ won’t have to buy firewood for a few months

Lastly –  FOSTERS deserve a medal for their mast work 40 years ago – nothing budged 🙂

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3 thoughts on “MAJOR ACCESS UPGRADES AT MILFORD CREEK LED BY WOODEN BOAT ENTHUSIASTS”

  1. When Ngatira was getting the big fix-up up north and we needed some pohutukawa floors a timely storm in downed a giant specimen off the cliffs west of Little Shoal Bay. I spied it every time I drove home from work. A call to the council – and I was told if it was no longer living or detached from its original position it’s all yours. Well I was down there like a robbers dog with my MDF patterns and a chain saw. Managed to obtain four good crooks that fitted. We lost one on the trip back to Birkenhead wharf, it sank like a lead balloon but more like a freshly sawn green pohutukawa limb. Two I fetched by hand at low tide and attached two 20 litre jerry cans to float them and waited for the tide to come in. Then walked them back to Little Shoal Bay where I towed them up the beach and under a generous branch of another pōhutukawa so I could winch up onto the trailer. Quite an excercise but good fun.

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  3. Well you certainly chose your weather wisely -unlike some of us., who always seemed to pick rotten days for exercises like that. Or does our fearless leader commune with the Gods and just order the weather to suit? A day or two later would have lessened the experience for the crew. Drenched rats and all that.

    Strangely this story kindled the neurones in my old noggin and brought to mind tales of the occasional forays that Percy Vos would make in days past.

    He would charter (or maybe borrow in return for kind favours) a Blue Boat for a time from Ma George. They’d load up with food (and libations doubtless also); and, most importantly, some chain saws and fuel. There would have been reports of downed trees on handy foreshores and it would have been noted.

    They’d have a trip to an island foreshore or two in the harbour to retrieve some good Pōhutukawa logs for future boatbuilding. Old foreshore trees tend to creak and groan at times and drop there to die and dry. Their bendy boughs were what boatbuilders wanted.

    They’d return with a goodly haul of suitable structural Pōhutukawa timber for future use at P Vos & Co. Knees is always needed in varying sizes and their were always stacks of them in the timber rack.

    I don’t think it would be done these days without some furore.

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