Category Archives: 32′>34′

CLASSIC WOODEN BOATS FOR SALE

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Buying or Selling a Classic Boat
Without sounding too much like the late Jacinda Ardern (“be kind”) – when people ask me about classic wooden boat ownership, I normally say that owning a woody has a positive effect on your life i.e. you end up forging a life you don’t need to escape from.

So woodys in the interest of your mental well being listed below a sample of some of the boats that are currently berthed at the virtual Wooden Boat Bureau Sales Marina. There are others for sale, some owners request privacy. To read more about the Wooden Boat Bureau – click https://waitematawoodys.com/2019/12/01/wooden-boat-bureau-advice-for-buyers-and-sellers/
The Wooden Boat Bureau is uniquely placed to offer impartial, up-to-date market information and objective advice to both sellers and buyers. So if you are looking for a wooden boat or considering selling – email us at waitematawoodys@gmail.com

Or call Alan Houghton 027 660 9999


SELECTION ONLY – 50% of Listing Are Private

NGARUNUI 🔻 48′ 1959 Jim Young- Asking Price TBA

Learn more – https://waitematawoodys.com/2025/12/08/classic-wooden-launch-ngarunui-a-peek-down-below-now-for-sale/

MARGARET ANNE 🔻 45′ 1960 Oliver & Gilpin – Asking Price TBA

Learn more – https://waitematawoodys.com/2025/11/10/classic-42-launch-margaret-anne-4sale/


MANURERE🔻 43” 1937 Miller & Tunnage – Asking price $136,000

Learn more – https://waitematawoodys.com/2024/06/03/manurere-a-peek-down-below-4sale/

ROMANCE II🔻36′ 1919 Bailey & Lowe – Price by negotiation

Learn more https://waitematawoodys.com/2023/11/20/quick-classic-launch-4sale-romance-ii/

KURANGI🔻35′ 1960 Builder tbc- Asking Price – TBA

Learn more https://waitematawoodys.com/2023/10/06/kurangi-2/

ANTARES 🔻36′ 1949 McGeady / Supreme Craft – Asking Price – $55,000 $45,000

Learn more – email waitematawoodys@gmail.com

RESTLESS 🔻40′ 1920 Alden/Tercel – Asking price – TBA

Learn more https://waitematawoodys.com/2023/03/19/restless/

MAHANUI 🔻42′ 1977 T Atkinson – Asking Price – TBA

Learn more https://waitematawoodys.com/2022/10/28/classic-42-sports-cruiser-mahanui/

ALLERGY🔻 58′ 1985 Denis Ganley / Pete Culler – Asking Price – $110,000

Learn more https://waitematawoodys.com/2022/10/21/allergy-aucklands-most-livable-woody/

SOLD – Selection below, some names withheld at seller / buyer request:

ADONIS     45′ – Owen Woolley – 1965 launch

AROHANUI            48’ – Donovan/Hacker – 1965 launch

ATHENA     25′ c.1950 Couldrey launch

AWARIKI 32′ 1967 Owen Woolley launch

BALLERINA    28′ – Lidgard – 1951   launch 

BONDI BELLE 45′ 1901 CHARLES BAILEY JNR.

CAPLIN     35′ – Anderson & Sons (UK) 1937/8 -Gaff Yawl yacht

CASTAWAY            33’ – Dick Lang – 1947 launch

CENTAURUS         42’ – Bailey & Sons – 1967 launch

KAILUA                  36’ – Salthouse – 1960/1 launch

KOKORU               39’ – Jack Morgan – 1960 launch

KOTARE                 24’ – Kingfisher Boats – 1954 launch

LADY ADELAIDE    35’ – Dick Lang – 1922 launch

LADY PAMELA       59’ – Pelin Warrior – 1986 launch

MAHANUI               42’ – Keith Atkinson – 1977 launch

MANA-NUI 39′ 1913 Harvey & Lang

MATAROA 36′ Joe Slattery 1928 launch

MONTEREY 33’6” 1946 Lidgard bridge-decker launch

NGARO                   45’ – Lidgard – 1953 launch

PIRATE                    42’ – Leone Warne – 1938 launch

POCO LENTO         33’ – Roy Parris/Bagnall – 1979 launch

RANUI 48’ 1948 Lidgard

WAIKARO                33’ – Roy Parris/Bagnall – 1978 launch

WAIMIGA                 36’ – Robertson Boatbuilders – 1968 launch

SEA FEVER 34′ Salthouse – 1958 launch

SEQUOIA 36′ 1938 Lewis McLeod launch

SHALOM                  48’ – Keith Atkinson – 1973 launch

SILENS 38′ Harvey & Lang 1912 launch

TARANUI 36′ 1965 John Gladden Motor-salier

VANESSA 48′ 2005 Robbie Roberts Passage Motor Yacht

Arcturus- New Owner Update

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ARCTURUS – An Update
Recently WW was contacted by Annie Bryce who along with her partner bought the 33’, 1952 McGeady launch – Arcturus a couple of months ago. Annie advised that they have put her on the hard and sanded her hull back which was in good condition, re-painted and anti-fouled Her topsides have been painted and they are addressing a few window issues. The engine has had a few minor repairs and the next stage is a full interior re-do.  Annie commenced that Arcturus is a lovely launch and they are keeping her in the Sounds at Waikawa marina.


Annie would appreciate any information the WW readers may have on Arcturus, its a mystery how an Auckland boat ended up so far south.


You can see and read more here from a 2019 WW story https://waitematawoodys.com/2019/03/18/a-mystery-launch-3/

Classic Wooden Boat Picnic – 20 photos

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John Dory
Arohanui
Eileen Patrica
  • Kereru
John Dory
Lady Crossley
Centaurus

Classic Wooden Boat Picnic – 20 photos

Firstly I need to thank Predictwind for Saturdays forecast, 100% on the button, as usual. One woody at the picnic didn’t come by boat based on the forecast published in Saturdays NZ Herald newspaper……………….. I suspect they also believe the horoscopes in the same paper are factual.


The morning started off a tad eerie with a sea mist blanketing a lot of the sea area off the east coast – but this burned off late morning and we then enjoyed perfect weather. The NZH and coastguard weather forecasts saw the numbers of launches attending drop to 12 but great to see so many turning up by car. Also very fine to have 3 past CYA chairman in attendance – Steve Cranch, Rod Marler and Peter Mence.
The waterfront based Stillwater Motor Camp is an idyllic setting for a gathering of classic wooden boats – deep water wharf access to raft up to + a tree shaded lawn. After some interesting docking (too many dockside expects) we had the launches tied up and everyone then decamped to the lawn. Special thanks to Mark Edmonds (Monterey) for again coordinating the venue.
A lot of the group had not caught up since the CV-19 lock-downs so it was good to swap stories and boating plans for the upcoming summer.


There has always been good camaraderie on the water between boaties and its something that we foster at Woody Classics Weekends – proof of it in practice is seen below in the photo of Rod and Fiona aboard Arohanui taking Murray Deeble’s Waikiore under tow. Towed him all the way back to the entrance to Milford Creek, where another woody – Jason Prew had ventured out in rather unpleasant conditions to get Waikiore back on her Milford berth. Well done to everyone.

Message for Murray – “should have bought a Yamaha” 🙂

Next Woodys on the water event – November 8th – Riverhead Tavern Lunch Cruise

Arethusa’s New Woody Wheelhouse

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ARETHUSA’s NEW WOODY WHEELHOUSE


Back in late 2019 Arethusa’s Bay of Islands owner Dean Wright, a professional photographer by trade, and well known to WW readers gave me the heads up that the 1917, 33’ Bob Brown built, ex gaff rigged cutter, was in for a treat – a new wheelhouse. Since then I have been pestering Dean on a regular basis for photos, even threatened to drive up and take them myself 🙂 Problem was, the mans a perfectionist and didn’t want to send anything in to WW until it was all shipshape. Well woodys as you can see from the above, its very shipshape, in fact in my eyes – perfect. Well done to the team. I asked Dean to tell use about the project, so I’ll hand over to him. Remember you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them – Enjoy 🙂


“Over the years we’ve got keen on changing Arethusa’s wheelhouse to be more in keeping with her age, so at 102 she’s undergone some cosmetic surgery 🙂

We lost 8″ inches of headroom in wheelhouse when we installed the Gardner, so we’ve gone up in height 6 inches and forward 8 inches and gone for more traditional upright windows fw’d.

Boat builder John Gander did the job in his Waipiro Bay workshop. He started by taking patterns off the existing wheelhouse and fw’d cabin top. He replicated the curve of the fw’d cabin top in ply and built the new wheelhouse around that in six sections. He also laminated the new wheelhouse roof, allowing for a good eyebrow fw’d and a smaller one aft.

John learned his trade at Roger Carey’s yard in Picton in the 60’s and 70’s, where beautiful work boats with great looking wheelhouses were the order of the day. John built one of my favorite Carey designs, Hinewai for his own boat and we’ve replicated her fw’d opening half window on Arethusa. 

Once the wheelhouse was complete, we hauled Arethusa at Ashby’s in Opua and got to work with the skill-saw. In no time we’d reduced her to a convertible. We were lucky for Northland’s drought everything stayed reasonably dry and also that we got everything closed in and back in the water before Covid shut the yard down.

I’m in awe of how boat builders can build something like this away from the boat, then fit the pieces with a minimum of shaping. Fitting and gluing the six sections to the existing house went really smoothly.

The wheelhouse is built from 2″ Iroko. This is the first outside varnish we’ve had on Arethusa, we hand brushed 2 coats of Cetol as a base and six coats of Schooner Yacht Varnish.

Over lock-down, the apprentice made new interior joinery, gone are the Warehouse plastic drawers and chipboard frame 🙂 Moved the batteries under the new bench unit so we can now stand at the wheel. John laminated me up some lovely curved trim for the front of the oven unit. Our old manky plywood dash got an upgrade to kauri and the old wheel got a fright with a good scrub and a varnish.

Outside we made nav light boxes and dorade boxes.  We had to move the aluminium framed front hatch fw’d, a more traditional looking one in Iroko is on the to-do list. The liferings also got a birthday.

Here’s some before and after pics and also some that I hope will give some idea of the process. Thanks John for all your incredibly skilled design and build work, we’re really stoked with it.

We’re always keen to learn more of Arethusa’s history, especially the 1955-2000 period in the South Island. If you have any stories we’d love to hear them.”

Links to previous WW stories on Arethusa
https://waitematawoodys.com/2019/12/11/arethusa-new-wheelhouse-project/
https://waitematawoodys.com/2017/12/31/restoring-installing-a-gardner-in-arethusa-revisited/
https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/11/01/arethusa-winsome/

RSVP waitematawoodys@gmail.com

Building Lady Beryl > Kailua

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Building Lady Beryl > Kailua


During the recent sale process for Kailua we uncovered the above collection of photos when Lady Beryl, as she was named then, in the shed at Salthouse Boatbuilders.

The one thing that stood out was how original she is today under the name Kailua (photos below)Very happy that the new owner is Auckland based and a very good classic wooden boat family.

RSVP waitematawoodys@gmail.com

Quest

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QUEST
Earlier in the week, we featured the ex work-boat Quest II, this prompted John Gander to send in the above photos of the 33’ Quest, built by Roger Carey in 1959, her beam is 9’9” and she draws 4’6”. 
Roger built Quest to be his families boat, but later sold her to a Southland farmer who then in 1964 sold her into commercial fishing. John understands that Quest fished the waters about Stewart Island. In the 1970’s > 1980’s period she also fished the waters off Southland.
 
Sometime in early 2000 she returned to Picton, where John took the photo’s of her in the marina at Waikawa in 2008. John commented that she looked to be well kept and in a tidy condition, her engine a 5LW Gardner. She was then lifted from the water onto the hardstand and as the photo taken in 2013 shows she has deteriorated with her hardwood planking drying out with considerable shrinkage. 
 
John remarked that doesn’t like to look at Quest now that she is in such a sad state, having been fitted with a tight fitting cover and John fears that with lack of ventilation her condition will deteriorate further.
(special thanks to Dean Wright for facilitating getting the story to WW)
 

Lake Taupo Launches At The Landing

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Lake Taupo Launches At The Landing
The above photo comes to us via NZ Vintage Postcard fb and is captioned – The Landing, Taupo and is possibly from the 1930>1940’s period.

A question for Paul Drake – is the boat ‘closest to the channel‘ your 1914 Bailey and Lowe launch – Romance  ? If so, that would date the photo post 1931.

Can we ID any of the other boats?

Input from Paul Drake – Yes the launch nearest the channel is ROMANCE, still at Taupo and owned by the Drake Brothers. She arrived ex Napier post 1931 earthquake as a flush decker, and had her cabin raised when acquired by Jack Taylor and put to work as a commercial boat, probably in 1932. The counter stern boat is KINGFISHER. Thomas Ryan ran the 60 foot steamer RMS TONGARIRO ( Bailey and Lowe 1899 and built at Taupo) until 1925. She eventually rotted away on the foreshore between the Boat Harbour and Acacia Bay – photo below at the Taupo Wharf, before the 2 storied cargo shed was built , so quite early on in the 1900’s.

Tongariro

Input from Nigel Drake – The boat between Romance and Kingfisher looks to be Waihora, about 23 feet in length and probably a Couthard built boat, (not to be confused with the Brin Wilson built Waihora). She was on the lake for a long period of time and ran for hire under local identity “Tabby” Tabernacle.
POHUTUKAWA 
Lock-down = less going out = more fires, so collected a load of firewood today, life is easy when there is an arborist in the family 🙂
While at his yard, I spotted this magnificent pile of Pohutukawa logs, the coffee cup is there to give you an indication of the size of the 12 logs . A huge tree came down in a recent storm, blocking a road so out with the big chainsaws. Not destined for firewood, I’m told a few coffee tables and bar tops.
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Fiesta – A Peek Down Below

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FIESTA – A PEEK DOWN BELOW
At the weekends Woody Clevedon cruise I got the chance to have a look aboard Gordon Love’s launch – Fiesta. I first spotted the woody back in late December 2015, anchored in Rocky Bay, Waiheke.
Gordon has owned the launch for 15+ years and Fiesta is a Panmure river rat 🙂
Fiesta was built by Phillip Lange at Hoppers Landing, Wade River in 1964. Build is strip planked 1”x2” kauri, with mahogany coamings. Specs are 32’ x 10’6” x 3’4″.
When launched she had a 6 cyl. Ford Trader diesel engine, this was updated with a 120hp Ford D series in 1986. She is still very much in ‘as launched’ configuration and is a very room launch.
I cruised alongside her on the way back from Clevedon on Sunday and she looked to be a good sea boat with a nice turn of speed.

Classic Wooden Boat Cruise – 72 photos

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S/S Romany

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Arohanui

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Trinidad

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Matira

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Ann Michelle

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Lady Crossley

Raindance CCC trip Aug2020

Raindance

CLASSIC WOODEN BOAT WEEKEND CRUISE TO CLEVEDON  – 72 Photos 

Lets be honest, a large chunk of 2020 has been very average – locked marina’s, no on-the-water boating and cancelled events. After spending the weekend on-board Raindance, cruising up the Clevedon river and over-nighting with 12 other woody boats at the Clevedon Cruising Club, I realised what I had missed the most was the sense of fraternity that comes with being in a space shared with people who love the same things as I do – woody boats. 
 
The trip up the Wairoa River revolves around a tide window, so it was a very early start for some of us, helped by coffee on-route, the smart ones left on Friday and were enjoying breakfast in a bay as we were sliding down the Tamaki Strait. We were meet at the river entrance by CCC member Barrie Abel who ‘piloted’ us up the river – no opps, so thank you Barrie.
 
Awaiting for us at the CCC wharf was Russell Ward with his steam boat – Romany. The gent deserves a medal – all day Saturday and Sunday morning he was taking the CCC members and families + the woodys for rides. Romany is coal fired and as Russell tells everyone getting aboard – “if its metal – its hot, if its varnished – its dirty 🙂 . I’m a big fan of Romany, but the star was Cooper the English springer spaniel – I could have taken him home.
 
After some wonderful ‘air-traffic control’ we managed to get everyone either alongside the wharf or rafted to another boat that was alongside – soft bumper fenders along the entire wharf makes for very civilized berthing. However – no names, but one woody had to leave the Saturday night BBQ to check that their diesel fired on-board central heating outlet wasn’t roasting the fenders 😉
 
The day was very leisurely with most people enjoying a dockside lunch and CCC members dropping down to view the boats and people having steam boat rides. One woody took the opportunity to buy some fuel from the club’s dockside bowser, seems he forgot to check the level before departing, staring to become a habit……….
In addition to the activities afloat we were treated to some eye-candy in the car park – a stunning 1947 Ford Coupe and a replica 1945 Fairliner Torpedo speed boat.
 
Come 4pm we invaded the CCC club house for the main event – as always amazing hospitality from the club and to use that old saying “a good time was had by all”. It was announced that our visit will be a compulsory event on the club’s annual calendar – so woodys – no excuses for missing out next year. Date to be advised.
 
Check out the outdoor heater – a piece of kiwiana and it worked a treat.
 
Overnight it was a tad nippy, with several re-filling the boat water bottles in the early hours of the morning. But we woke to a stunning day and departed at 10am for the trip home.
 
And the Clevedon Coast Oysters were divine – photo below was my lunch – another set were dispatched as a appetizer – 8.5/10 – not Bluff but on the day as good 🙂
Special note of thanks to David Cook (Trinidad) who is my sidekick pulling these events together 🙂
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Tides Out 🙂  (photo ex Alan Good)

CCC tide out

LADY JANET (Poco Lento)

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PL Refit stage 2

PL 2019

LADY JANET (Poco Lento)

The 31’ woody Poco Lento started out in life back in late 1970’s as your typical Roy Parris kauri planked launch, then in 1991>92 master boat builder Geoff Bagnall undertook a major refit to make her more liveable.
Geoff B is a talented man and has a reputation of creating Tardis’s e.g. boats that are bigger on the inside than they appear on the outside.
When I first boarded Poco Lento I was amazed to learn she was sub 32’ and powered by an underfloor Ford Lees 115hp engine. I was even more taken aback with fit-out  – auto pilot, power anchor winch, bow thruster, hydraulic steering, on-board shower, fridge, freezer, pressurised hot water, stand-alone galley, electric toilet, high-end engine sound proofing, holding tank and a lot more –  she really has been a rolling restoration with her owner undertaking a major project every year. The 295L fuel tank allows her to cover a lot of distance when cruising.
 
Now I’m not a fan of the name, if she was mine I would be reverting back to her as launched name – Lady Janet.
The gallery of older photos show her arriving for the re-fit and the work-in-progress + a young looking Geoff Bagnall 😉