Category Archives: 1900’s

A Recount Of Our Classic Wooden Craft DNA 

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Grace under sail
CLICK The Headline – Grace Under Sail to view

A Recount Of Our Classic Wooden Craft DNA 

Recently I was sent a link to an article that appeared in the New Zealand Geographic magazine back in 2000 – in fact issue 45 , Jan-March. The article was headlined – GRACE UNDER FIRE, written by Vaughan Yarwood with supporting photos from the late Henry Winkelmann and more recent photos ex Hamish Ross and Paul Gillbert.

The stars of the article is the 42’ 1908 Logan built gaff rigged cutter – Rawene, and her then skipper Russell Brooke.

This is a brilliant insight into the early days of boating in and around Auckland’s Waitemata Harbour, I’m sure there will be some mix ups re dates, skipper/craft names but overall we get to see and read the history of these magnificent craft, a lot of which are still sailing today.

Have a read, its only 10>15 minutes, longer if if you linger over the photos 🙂  – even a die-hard motorboat owner like myself found it a fascinating read.

Kaha – Help Wanted

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KAHA – Help Wanted

Back in January 2022 WW was contacted by Geremy Hinton who advised he and his father had acquired an old wooden motor-sailer named – Kaha. All they knew about her was a possible build date in the early 1900’s.

The top photo shows Kaha as found / purchased.

Since early 2022 they have been undertaking an extensive refit, as seen in the photos below.

Geremy and his father would like to learn more about Kaha, so today woodys we are reaching out to see what the collective WW minds can come up with.

NZ Antique & Classic Boat Show 2023 (Nelson Lakes)

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NZ Antique & Classic Boat Show 2023 (Nelson Lakes) 

Today thanks to the camera of Michael Brownee we get to take in the amazing woody craft and spectacular scenery at Lake Rotoiti, South Island for the 2023 NZ Antique & Classic Boat Show that was recently held (March 4>5)

Michael has captured the essence and spirit of the event beautifully , if he not a professional photographer , he should be 🙂

I attended the show 3>4 years ago and it should be on every woodys bucket list.

As always – click on photos to enlarge 😉

Three Minutes Of Wooden Boat Porn

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3 Minutes Of Wooden Boat Porn

Last month I bombarded you with a several photo galleries of the 2023 Australian Wooden Boat Festival.  As part of the wrap up of the festival, the organising crew have pulled together a 3min short film that utilises a lot of aerial film footage. The video gives us a wonderful overview of the festival, the Hobart harbour and waterfront – if there is any saw dust in your blood – Hobart February 2025 needs to be circled on your calendar. As festival director – Paul Stephanus says “This festival is one of a kind” . And its the largest event of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere and surprise surprise woodys – its free, no charge – we like that.

Find a comfortable chair and prepare to be wowed.  

TIP: To enlarge screen size – scroll over the screen above and click on the icon I have highlighted below

RSVP (boat name & approx crew #) TO waitematawoodys@gmail.com

Woodys On Tour – Hobart – Australian Wooden Boat Festival – Day 5

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Woodys On Tour – Hobart – Australian Wooden Boat Festival – Day 5

Hello Again Woodys  Felt slightly guilty this morning when I called home to advise Air NZ had cancelled my Hobart > AKL flight. Next available – 7 days away…. A little bit of online work and I found a flight out of Sydney on Thursday night. So 2 more days in Hobart 🙂

One big plus – I get to see the very cool kiwi singer- Marlon Williams live in concert. 

Anyway back to the boats – today is an extension of yesterdays gallery – there is just so many woodys to see. 

FYI – WW viewing numbers spike when the weather is bad and people are at home, so yesterdays numbers were approaching an all time high. Today (Tuesday will be another bumper day)

Boat Of The Day – HEATHER BELLE, a 24’6” gaff rigged pilot cutter, built in 1990 by Andrew Wilson to a Lyle Hess design. She is a sister-ship to Larry Pardey’s – SERAFFYN.

And compulsory food shot – lunch = seafood chowder 🙂

LAKE ROTOITI 2023 PARADE OF CLASSIC & WOODEN BOATS – 150+ PHOTOS

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LAKE ROTOITI 2023 PARADE OF CLASSIC & WOODEN BOATS – 150+ PHOTOS

As has become my norm for Waitangi holiday weekend early on Saturday morning I pointed the car south and made my way to Lake Rotoiti in the middle of NZ’s North Island. 

2023 marked the 26th anniversary of the event and after a horror week of ‘once in a 100 years’ rain storms I had concerns that the parade might be postponed or cancelled. Well woodys as you’ll see from the above photo gallery, my fears were redundant.

The day started overcast with some light drizzle but this passed thru before the parade kicked off at 11am. Numbers were down a little from last year but conditions were perfect on the lake. 

Enjoy the gallery above – if you’re craft is featured above and you want a high res copy of the photo, drop me an email at the address below. Apologise if I missed your boat or if the odd photo is a little out of focus – just me in a run-about jiggling the throttle, looking out for other boats and holding the camera 🙂

waitematawoodys@gmail.com

My pick of the boat I’d most like tied up at my imaginary lake jetty is – ELLEN (#14), 26’ in length, built in 2004 in strip planked cedar from a plug taken off an old abandoned hull found in Kopu. Thought to be a ‘Milkmaid’ design by Bailey & Lowe. Powered by a 29hp diesel.  In my eyes just perfect. Photo below

Special thanks again to Dave and Glenys Wilson for the loan of a boat to get me out on the lake.

As always – click on photos to enlarge.

Lastly I never tire of the sound of big V8 (5.7L)  water exhausts. Shawn Vennell, the owner of Judy H, was lining me up for a prop shower – a few words of warning as to what my reaction would be, made him change his mind 😉

TURN THE SOUND UP

Classic Woody Summer Cruising – A Game Of Two Halves

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WOODYS AFLOAT

Classic Woody Summer Cruising – A Game Of Two Halves

Happy New Year Woodys – WW is back ‘live’ so no more oops boating photos 🙂

On Saturday when I was reviewing and editing the above photos I struggled to believe that we had a xmas/ny cruise, but as they say the truth is in the photos 🙂

I decided to break todays story into two parts:

1. Raindance related

2. Woodys Out & About 

Mostly from my camera but assisted by Barbara Cooke (Bay of Islands), Mark Edmonds (Waiheke), Russell Ward, Jason Prew (upper harbour) and Alan Gilder (Woody Bay Rakino)

Raindance’s cruise / tiki tour mainly consisted of bouncing between Rakino Island and Waiheke Island. Left on 27 Dec and the weather was just stunning with crystal clear, warm water. On 01 Jan the forecast was starting to look very average and most concerning was all 3 weather platforms that I follow were saying the same thing. So early morning on 02 Jan we made the call to up anchor and head home. Turns out that was a good call because for the next 5+ days if it wasn’t raining it was drizzling non-stop + ugly seas and high winds.

So woodys the second half of our planned cruise was sent at home enjoying good food, wine, movies and watching almost every wooden / classic boating video on YouTube.

Very grateful we had 6 days of great weather before we pulled the pin. As an old salt told me once – when it comes to happy family boating – better to have a handful of fabulous days than an abundance of average days – very sage advise.

Enjoy the gallery.

UPCOMING ON-THE-WATER WOODY EVENTS

Circle the calendar:

28 January – Mahurangi Regatta launch parade – more details closer to the day

25 February – Stillwater Picnic + Dockside Raft-Up – more details closer to the day

Classic Wooden Boats At Waikawa Marina

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Classic Wooden Boats At Waikawa Marina

Following on from last Mondays story where we shared Dean Wright’s recent Southern trip and a gallery of photos from the Havelock marina todays photo gallery comes to us from the Waikawa marina. Some stunning woodys and remember – click on photos to enlarge 😉

A lot of woodys that are new to WW and they will morph into WW stories in their own right.

Enjoy 🙂

13-12-2022 INPUT EX MARK MCLAUGHLIN

The big bridgedecker with 4 ports is RAHEMO (launched as Strathmore), built by Dick Lang.

Others I can positively identify are (from the top):

VECA (Arthur Sang)

VAGABOND (Joe Jukes)

?

?

?

RAHEMO/STRATHMORE (Dick Lang)

HUNTRESS (possibly McManaway designed/built?)

VARUA (Bob Swanson)

OSPREY (Harold Saunders)

PALOMINO (Bob Swanson)

TOANUI (Roger Carey)

Yacht ANNA JANE (?)

NUKUMEA (American “Bartender” design by George Calkins)

YVONNE (Bob Swanson)

PEARL (?)

Unknown fishing boat

KATOOMBA (Dorman Engineering, Nelson – not wood, built in Corten Steel!!)

Unknown (possibly Bruce Askew?)

CORYLUS (Bruce Askew)

TAREPO (launched TAREPA)

ARCTURUS (McGeady)

? (looks like a McManaway or Morgan fishing boat design?)

? (under the covers)

CRISTINA (Athol Burns)

PURUATANGA (launched as MARIANJO)

Most of these have featured previously on WW, so a quick look in the search bar will glean more details if interested.

Classic Wooden Boats At Havelock Marina

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Classic Wooden Boats At Havelock Marina

Back in late October 2022 Dean Wright was in Blenheim attending John Gander’s significant birthday, all birthdays are significant but the ones with ‘0’s’ in them are more significant.

While down south Dean did some marina mooching and todays photo gallery comes to us from the Havelock marina. Nice to see a couple of our bigger northern woodys now safely tucked way down south – Turongo and Durville. Sad to lose them from the Waitemata but if we were keeping score I think we win more than we lose 🙂

A lot of craft unknown to WW and will probably morph into WW stories in their own right. As always click on photos to enlarge.

Classic Wooden Launch UHURU – Free (almost) To The Right Person

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Classic Wooden Launch UHURU – Free (almost) To The Right Person

Now despite what CYA luminary Chad Thomson tells his toadies when they meet once a month in the telephone box in Myers Park – I’m actually a nice person and todays WW story is proof 🙂 Several weeks ago I as contacted by John (Jacky) McElwee who owns the launch Uhuru, John has reached a stage in life where owning a classic wooden boat is just too much of a challenge and he has asked me to help find the next custodian for his bridge decker – Uhuru.

The back story goes like this – built c.1900’s, using kauri planks and measuring 32’ x 9’ beam and a draft of 3’. She was built to do the cream run on Lake Rotorua, which she did for approx. 40 years, her next owners, 30 years, were the Nicol family and John has had her for 20 years – some impressive times there, must indicate she is a sea friendly boat. Nathan Herbert might be able to chip in and explain her special hull shape for shallow water running.  Current powered by a 1992 Nanni 43hp diesel. Obviously needs some TLC and possibly a few dollars spent here and there, but its afloat and the motor runs. 

Now woodys here is the deal – if your are a genuine straight up person and have a real passion for classic wooden boats – John will probably give you the boat, but I’d like to think that a ‘gift will ease the process of letting go of a 20 year relationship 🙂

Seriously interested parties in the first instance to contact John via email –   jackymcelwee0@gmail.com

REMEMBER – WOODY BOOT SALE – TODAY – 10AM – 5 OMANA RD MILFORD – CASH ONLY