Category Archives: 1930’s

RESTORATION OF A NEW ZEALAND CLASSIC WOODEN YACHT IN AUSTRALIA – ROXANE 

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RESTORATION OF A NEW ZEALAND CLASSIC WOODEN YACHT IN AUSTRALIA – ROXANE 

Back in May 2018 we ran a great story about a gent named Keith Dawson that was celebrating his 105th birthday and we learnt of Keith sailing to Australia back in 1937 onboard the Tercel brother built 26’ yacht – ROXANE. Link here to that story below –https://waitematawoodys.com/2018/05/13/roxane-a-105th-birthday-party/ make sure you read the comments section – lots of chat there.


Now fast forward to early Sept and WW is contacted by Ralph Finch from Queensland in Australia – a summary of Ralphs notes to me below –
“I’m in the process of purchasing the little boat called Roxane that you have on the WW site.  Roxane has sat in a back yard in Townsville for last 25 years partially restored. I’m beginning the process of completing the restoration.I’ve read snippets about her history and would love to fully document the history and contact past owners and descendants and anyone previously connected. Roxane is now 90 years old and my intention is to eventually get her back in the water and sailing again.The centenary would be an exciting maritime event for both New Zealand and Australia I think.”

“I have already begun cleaning up and restoration work. The photo of her on the transporter was taken about 20’ish years ago as she was removed from the Townsville Slip Ways to go to the owner’s house where she sits till this day. I am very excited to take this project on and eventually build a website dedicated to her with as much history as I can find. It’s important to me to trace and document all those connected to her. If you know any of those people or descendants, could you please let them know that Roxane is still alive.
She does have a brand new deck, cabin and cockpit. The cabin has been extended to just in front of the mast. The  owner has also built a new timber mast and boom.
I completed clearing away 20 odd years of rubbish from on, and around Roxane yesterday and took some clear photos.”
WW will follow this project and Ralph has promised to keep us updated. In the mean time as mentioned above he would love to hear from anyone with links to the yacht.  

NGATAKI – JOHNNY WRAY’S HOME BUILT CLASSIC YACHT

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NGATAKI – JOHNNY WRAY’S HOME BUILT CLASSIC YACHT

You have to applaud the Ponsonby Cruising Club for their new initiative to get people interacting with boats on the water. Last Thursday (Aug 22) the club held their first ‘Featured Vessel Series’ , the name could do with some improvement 🙂 Simple idea – they host a vessel at one of the berths outside the Westhaven clubhouse and people can board and chat with owners / crew. Then afterwards there is a presentation upstairs at the club on the boats history.

The PCC kicked off with the famous (infamous) historic yacht – NGATAKI, from the Tino Rawa stable. 

Unless you have been living under a rock, you’d know that NGATAKI was the yacht made famous in Johnny Wray’s cult classic book – ’South Sea Vagabonds’.

If you haven’t read the book – put it on the Fathers Day list – its a cracker. Myself and a lot of others reread it every few years, it reignites my passion for NZ and our wooden boating community.

Read the book to learn the link to why there is a bowl of oranges on the deck 😉

CHECK OUT DATE FOR NEXT PCC FEATURED VESSEL SERIES AT THE LINK BELOW

https://www.pcc.org.nz/fbs

CLASSIC WOODEN BOAT – MOVARIE – A Peek Down Below

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CLASSIC WOODEN BOAT – MOVARIE – A Peek Down Below

The 1938 launch – MOVARIE II has in recent years made as many appearances on tme as it has on WW.  We know that the bridge decker was built by W&G Lowe, is 40’ in length, with a 11’ beam and draws 5’. Powered by twin Ford 80hp diesel engines. The launch started life as a game fishing.

Numerous WW story – lots of detail and photos of her over the years – best I post a link to all of them –  https://waitematawoodys.com/?s=MOVARIE&submit=Search

Once owned by Russell Ward so must have been a goody back them. These days there are a few issues, reflected in the current tme listing having $5k start price.

RSVP – waitematawoodys@gmail.com

Wooden Boat Beached at Sulphur Point – 1930’s

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Wooden Boat Beached at Sulphur Point – 1930’s

Todays photo comes to us from the McLeod collection at the Auckland Library Heritage Collection via Nathan Herbert. We see a launch in the configuration of a tram top + dog house, has to a 1920’s build most likely a flat top with the later (1930’s) additional of the tramtop and dog house.

The photo is tagged ‘ Launch beached after storm at Sulphur Beach, Northcote (Auckland) , 1930/39.

Can we put a name and builder to the boat.

CLASSIC WOODEN BOAT APACHE – Looking Very Sad

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Kawau Island

CLASSIC WOODEN BOAT APACHE – Looking Very Sad

Earlier in the week I was in Thames and dropped down to the Thames Sailing Club marina. I have covered on WW before most of the residents that inhabit the marina.

 One that caught my eye was the1939 launch – APACHE, she appeared to be ’stuck’ in her mud berth i.e. I visited at low and mid tide and she had not risen with the tide.

APACHE has made several appearances on WW and sadly is looking very tired and in need of a new caretaker, there was a 4sale note on her window. 

From previous stories we have learnt that she was probably built by a Mr. McCallum, with the help of a Lou Burn. 

In 2020 Bryce Strong sent in several photos of her – the b/w photo of her above before the addition of the rear dodger, seen in the cockpit photo. Byrce also later supplied the colour gallery of her looking very smart. Ken Rickets supplied the last photo showing (L>R) GAY DAWN, ALOFA, APACHE at Kawau Island.

MOANA SOS

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MOANA – SOS

Yesterdays winner of the quiz to name the launch – TEINA , John Dawson returned the favour and sent me the above photos of the launch – MOANA.

John commented that it was on tme late last month with a $1 reserve. According to the listing she was built in 1930, is 33’ in length and powered by a Ford 40hp engine. Located in Rawene, Northland.

As we can see she is looking very sad and probably beyond restoring.

Keen to hear what became of her and any known history.


ARANUI – Can You Help Locate This Wooden Boat

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ARANUI – Can You Help Locate This Wooden Boat

During the week WW was contacted by Peter Pickett in regard to a classic launch named – ARANUI, built c.1920>30. I’ll let Peter tell the story. 

“Don’t know if you can help us but several of the families descended from our Grandfather, Jim Ross of Cambridge (in those days  a co-owner of Cambridge Transport) are trying to locate his beloved ARANUI a former and possibly current waitematawoody, in a new guise. Grandpa Ross also crewed on the legendary ARIKI 

We believe ARANUI was built around 1920 to 1930 but we are not sure of the original builder or owner. The Yates family (of seed fame) owned her up until around 1950 when Grandpa JW Ross purchased her. He kept her on a double mooring at Westhaven. ARANUI was originally powered by a 6 cylinder Ailsa Craig petrol engine, but in the late 50’s Grandpa re-powered her with a 4 cylinder Fordson diesel. Our fathers were regular crew but few of the remaining grandchildren ever got to go on board as our grandfather passed away in 1961. We were mainly a little on the young side to be of much use prior to 1960 but most of us are life-long boating enthusiasts and own boats of varying descriptions. 

We believe a Mr Fisher may have purchased her in the early 60’s and taken ARANUI to Whitianga, where she was possibly moored up the river somewhere. We have heard that the Yates family may have re-purchased her at some stage before or since and may even own her still, but the latter aspects are unconfirmed. 

We are extremely keen to track her down again and dependent on various factors, may even consider purchasing/restoring / displaying her. Condition is not necessarily an issue as she could become a display in a Museum created by one branch of the family, that being the Ross Bros Muscle Car (and heaps of other stuff) Museum in Cambridge. Its mighty spectacular and there is an ARANUI  space if that is the best remaining option. 

We would greatly appreciate any help you can offer in this search, and look forward to hearing from you. Cheers, Peter R Pickett, on behalf of the Ross, Peake and Pickett families.”


So woodys can we solve the mystery of what became of ARANUI 

01-07-2024 INPUT ex MITCH PASCOE (via Baden Pascoe)- Yes it used to moored in back bay, Whitianga. Owner by a guy called Des Fisher ,a block layer ,who lived up by Coghill Street . He had a Mk1 Vanguard car made into a Ute .

Used to go out and stray line big snapper , they were always in washing machine bowls stewing in their own juice with no ice in the sun . I think it had a Ford in with exhaust out the side ..

01-07-2024 INPUT ex HAROLD KIDD – She was owned around 1920 in Coromandel then by W.H. Stevens of Tauranga in the late1920s until 1937. It’s possible that she was rebuilt from the hull of a large auxiliary mullet boat ARANUI built 1912-3 by David Reid.

MYSTERY YACHT AGROUND WINNER – Hugh Gladwell with the correct name – NGATIRA. Amazingly 95% of people said LITTLE JIM and gave the location as Rangitoto Island. NGATIRA’s owner STEVE HORSLEY supplied the photo, Steve was given the photo from Ian Littler, his father owned NGATIRA from 1916-1919. Photo is thought to be the aftermath of the 1917 storm off Devonport somewhere. Burgee in the letterbox tomorrow Hugh 🙂

CLASSIC LAUNCH – MARISTELLA – Sinks, Catches fire, Goes on the rocks……

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1953
2015
2020
2023
2024

CLASSIC LAUNCH – MARISTELLA – Sinks, Catches fire, Goes on the rocks……

The 40’ Sam Ford 1936 built launch – MARISTELLA has made several appearances on WW, one story back in 2019 (linked below) created a lot of chat in the comments section. https://waitematawoodys.com/2019/08/27/mystery-launch-27-08-2019/

Chatting to Nathan Herbert yesterday prompted me to do a deep dive in the WW files and jackpot I came across some correspondence from Murray Bridge back in Jan 2020. Murray’s family owned the boat for approx. 20 years (1959>1999) and he sent me a clipping of an article from Boating NZ. Reading the article it appears that MARISTELLA has been a very lucky boat, if she was a cat she would have used up a lot of her nine lives 🙂 

In her past life she joined the sub-mariner club when she hit a uncharted submerged rock in Queen Charlotte Sound, was successfully re-floated and refitted. Then on another trip caught fire in Bluff, again repaired. And later ran aground on rocks near Mana in Wellington. I have included an enlarged section of the BNZ article below – click image to enlarge.

The good news is she survived all those oops and is still with us today as seen in the above photos. The real reason for the story today is her newish owner is in Nathan’s words ‘rejuvenating’ the boat and needs a pair of opening portholes (approx. size = 8.5”), so we are doing a shout out asking if anyone has some gathering dust. FYI – when we ask for help locating fittings its for woody folk deserving a helping hand, not owners that are doing $100k+ work at professional yards. WW points them to https://www.toplicht.de/en/

SAMPLE ONLY

ROTHESAY SOS

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2018 ex Paul Drake

ROTHESAY SOS

The 33’ launch ROTHESAY has recently popped up on tme, back in July 2018 WW reported that she had changed hands and there was a plan to restore her. Based on the photos above that hasn’t happened and now her ‘owner’ and interested parties are trying to find a home for her. According to the tme post ($1 reserve) she was built in 1930 and has a Ford 40hp engine in her. I will not attempt to ID the builder, a Nov 2013 WW story (link below) with input from Harold Kidd, talked at length about several vessels named Rothesay. https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/11/15/the-rothesays/

It will be a big challenge but if there is a woody out there looking for a project, this could be it. Boat location is Rawene on the Hokianga Harbour, Northland.

THE REVAMP OF REHIA

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THE REVAMP OF REHIA

Early last month we ran two stories on the 1938 Colin Wild built launch – REHIA and her upcoming refit at {the} Slipway Milford yard. Links to those stories below. 1st Report  https://waitematawoodys.com/2024/05/03/classic-launch-rehia-gets-a-birthday/

2nd Report https://waitematawoodys.com/2024/05/10/rehia-2024-refit-report-2/

Jump forward to last Saturday morning and she is sliding down the rails looking rather grand. It is always a big ask ($$) to bring these craft back to better than as launch presentation. But the feel good factor when you walk down the dock or row away from her in a bay is priceless.

There is a saying that I believe originated from Frances Herreshoff that goes like this “if as you walk away or row away from your boat, you do not look back at her, you own the wrong boat”

Over the last 2 years her owners have had one major focus – to retaining/ restore all her classic characteristics and charm. Well done to the Telford family and the team at the yard.

A few minutes before REHIA was launched my RAINDANCE also splashed after a brief haul-out for a face wash and bottom shave. Sitting for 2 months on her marina and with the engine not working, RD had a very impressive beard + a plastic bag around the prop 😦

(photos ex Jason Prew, Joe Telford, Alan H)

UPDATE 20-06-2024 LOTS OF WORKSHOP / HANDS ON PHOTOS HERE https://www.facebook.com/share/p/MtAdzgzeQt1oSUgG/