Category Archives: Military

Valsan

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valsan2

VALSAN

Today’s photos, from the Tudor Collins collection, are of the 1938, 45′ Lidgard built bridgedecker Valsan. Harold Kidd commented previously on ww that Valsan was built for Alex Harvey Jr as a 38 footer with twin 90hp Grays. She was lengthened (as were so many of these big bridgedeckers) to 45ft by the time she went into NAPS as Z10 in 1942-3, possibly during the time she was being repaired after going up on the Castor Bay reef in February 1940. Peter Annan bought her when she was de-mobbed in 1944 and renamed her Lady Edith. Annan had been the long-term owner of the big Logan cutter Thelma. In 1948 Annan sold her to Arnold Baldwin who changed her name back to Valsan.

Lots of photos of Valsan on ww, just enter Valsan in the ww Search box to view.

Ex Naval Motor Launch

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Ex Naval Motor Launch

Today’s post features an ex Navy survey launch, its name is hard to read but appears to be Penguin. She was built in 1944, is approx. 34’6″ long & powered by a 6 cyl. 100hp Ford D-series diesel. As they say in the modelling game – she was rather nice bones, quite a looker & I expect with a bigger engine there would be rather more zoom zoom than the current max of 10knts 😉
As you would expect from a Navy build, its built like the proverbial brick s_ithouse i.e. Australian hardwood.

Any woodys served on her & or can enlighten us on her past?. Home these days is the Marborough Sounds, photos ex trademe.

03-09-2016 Input from Russell ward

Below is the provenance of Penguin, scanned from Bob McDougall’s fine reference NZ Naval Vessels.

The pic of her on Lachlan with the flurry of activity (and look at the size of those davits! In contrast with the wiry matelots) dates from 1950 and is a well known RNZN picture.

The radial davits were replaced by Whelan type that swing out at the turn of an Admiralty Patt over engineered bronze caused switch. Luxury!

In passing, look at that cut out in the skeg. She’d turn on a dime in confined waters with a kick ahead as did Sam Ford’s bridge deckers that were similarly done. Many boats of the time were like that.
Penguin i001

Penguin i002

Rotomahana 4-Sale

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ROTOMAHANA 3

ROTOMAHANA 1

ROTOMAHANA 4-SALE

While searching for details on a launch the other day I went to cross reference some Bailey & Lowe boats & discovered that the 1923 Bailey & Lowe launch Rotomahana had not appeared on ww.

Today’s post is a gallery of photos from my files & owner John Prior emailed in by Ken Ricketts. Enjoy 🙂

Harold Kidd Input

As identified by Chris Leech the b/w images with her flying the DYC commodores burgee were taken when she was owned by Humphrey Duder, then Commodore of Devonport Yacht Club. The 401 number was her WW2 reporting number. She was never impressed into service for patrol work. Bailey & Lowe launched her in December 1923 for A. McDonald (NOT A.B. Donald) as EDWINA. Duder changed her name to ROTOMAHANA when he bought her in 1936. Very like a shortened ROMANCE II in styling.
06-07-2016 The photo below show Rotomahana after the recent (2016) repaint.

Rotomahana 2016 b

Rotomahana 2016 a

 

Strathmore > Rahemo

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strathmore rahemo

strathmore rahemo

STRATHMORE (Rahemo)
details ex Harold Kidd
Strathmore featured on ww back in August 2014 when she was for sale, the other day Nathan Herbert pointed me towards a collection of photographs from the marine photographer Tudor Collins . The two photos above of the 1936 Dick Lang built Strathmore are in my eyes stunning, she certainly was a very smart launch when launched. Lang built her at  St. Mary’s Bay, Auckland for R.W. Butcher of Hamilton. She was 42’x10’9″x3’6″ and powered with twin 90hp Chryslers. In 1938 she was bought by the Todd family of Wellington and motored down via Tauranga and the east coast in December 1938. The Todds renamed her Rahemo. She was in NAPS out of Wellington in WW2 as Z76.

For more details & photos from her past & ‘today’ click these links

Rahemo #1 Post

Rahemo #2 Post

Look What The Postie Delivered Yesterday

Flag

For a long tome I have been a little envious of the classic launch owners that had a NZPBA/AMYC burgee. These club pennants were flown by owners of the oil launches that were becoming popular in the 1910-20s. The club was called the NZ Power Boat Association & founded in 1905. The name changed to the Auckland Motor Yacht Club in 1939 and then morphed into the RNZYS in the 1960s. The jewel in the crown of the AMYC was its sponsorship of the Kawau Island Yacht Club and the facilities at Smelting House Bay. There is a sign on the workshop wall at Greg Lees Boat shed at Sandspit (below), that supports the Kawau link.
The AMYC burgee was identical to the NZPBA’s.

The sender of my AMYC burgee was Rick McCay (Luana). Rick has uncovered a cache of these burgee’s which are available to classic aficionado’s owning a vessel of appropriate age. $59 + $5pp. Applications for purchase including vessel details, initially via email to me at waitematawoodys@gmail.com

Note: Unlike the Classic Yacht Association which allows its burgee to be flown from anything & by anyone – the supply of these pennants will be tightly controlled & policed 🙂

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Awa Awa

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Coralie Hilton - JM

AWA AWA
photo ex Coralie Hilton collection via Gavin Bedggood

Today’s photo (if we believe the caption on the back) is of the launch Awa Awa, built for a ‘Judge Marten’, most probably by the Deemings Yard in Opua, Bay of Islands.
The photo was taken from the beach at the Deemings yard with Opua in the background.
Coralie Hilton was the daughter of a marriage between a Deeming man who married a Bedggood woman (Gavin’s side of the family). Coralie died recently, aged in her 90’s.

Any woodys able to confirm the launch is Awa Awa & her build details etc ?AWA AWA
photo ex Coralie Hilton collection via Gavin Bedggood

09-06-2025 INPUT ex GREG PHILPOTT – press clipping below from the Northern Advocate dated June 15 1926 recording the death of James Martin, confirm his ownership of AWA AWA. And the vessels war time use in Auckland by the Defence Dept.

Mataroa (Kenya)

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MATAROA (KENYA)

As they say in the boxing game – Mataroa is the real deal – a 1928 Joe Slattery launch, named Kenya when launched, she measures 36’ LOA & was originally built for Mr Heard of Heards Confectionary. On trademe her owner claims she is a Collings & Bell but that is incorrect – read a lot more about her – build details, war history & more on the link below.

https://waitematawoodys.com/?s=MATAROA&submit=Search

Powered by a Ford 90p diesel, she will cruise effortlessly at 8.5 Knots. You will see from the photos that she is over due for some TLC but boy-o-boy the bones are there & for sale at $15k – that’s a lot of boat.

I have included below a photo from her early days, you will see how smart is was & could be with a little work.

Someone has to scoop her up.

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Paikea

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PAIKEA - 1970s

PAIKEA
photo ex Fraser Chapman

While Paikea has appeared on ww a couple of times (nearly 2 years ago), the above 1970’s photo emailed to me by Ken Ricketts was just too good to just add to one of the existing posts, so here she is looking very voom voom. Harold Kidd has advised that in her day she was good for 20 knots, read below.
Harold Kidd Input

PAIKEA was built by Collings & Bell for A.H. Court and launched on 26th January 1921. She was fitted with a 120-150hp Model M Van Blerck 6 cylinder petrol engine (not a straight-eight Packard as is often said). PAIKEA had Chas. Collings’ “concave-convex” type of hard chine design which he made famous with his various FLEETWINGS and whale-chasers. Indeed she was a refinement of the FLEETWING whose image appears in the Collings & Bell section of WW.

PAIKEA was good for 20 knots and can still do it with her present big Iveco/Fiat, as I experienced not long ago at Sandspit. She goes like hell and stable with it.

Alf Court sold her to Hec Marler in 1925 and he sold her to R B & S S Wilson just prior WW2. She was in NAPS during WW2 as Z17.

Hec Marler had great taste in boats – having once owned the 1905 Arch Logan yacht Rawhiti, one of NZ’s most stunning classic yachts.

You can view a gallery of historical Paikea photos here   https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/09/16/paikea-2/

OLIVE (Tokatea > Enna De > Waitika)

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TheOlive(Tokatea)&ErnestinWhite

OLIVE (Tokatea > Enna De > Waitika)
photo & details ex Baden Pascoe

Today’s post is of the very stunning small seiner, Olive, built for Morgan Hayward by Ernie Harvey. Morgan owned or was a partner in one of the Thames “Fish Sheds” as they called them in the old days. (Shortland Fish Co Ltd). Olive was later purchased by Sanfords.
Baden thinks in the above photo, Ernie is the man under the boat with braces on.

I’m not sure if she was christened Tokatea when launched or if that was a later name change. Tokatea is the name of the mountain ridge between Coromandel town and Kennedy Bay. In the 1870’s Tokatea was the site of extensive gold-mining activity.

Baden does not know her launching date & is keen to learn more about Olive & what became of her.

Input from Harold Kidd

Lovely image of OLIVE. According to Chris Rabey, who knew her well, and please amplify these comments, Ray, Ernie Harvey built OLIVE in 1934 at Thames (I would have thought a shade earlier, perhaps). Anyway she was registered as suitable for wartime purposes as OLIVE in 1940 No. TS21 owned by L.M. Hayward of Thames with a 44hp Kelvin and dimensions of 43’x11’x4′.
She became TOKATEA much later when bought by the Government as a Fisheries Patrol vessel. Later again (about 1965) Bert Subritzky bought her and renamed her ENNA DE after his wife, the former Enna De Vera Davenport. I think it was then that Chris was on her.
I identified her, with Chris’ help, derelict at Lake Dunstan in 2008 and later at Oamaru in 2011, renamed WAITIKA.

SANYO DIGITAL CAMERA

Below is a photo of Ernie Harvey on his 80th birthday.

Ernest-80th birthday

Photo of Olive/Tokatea at Thames c.1950’s ex Geoff Brebner

Tokatea

05-03-2016  Input from Baden Pascoe

Fore foot is exactly same profile as boat in photo. Just remember she has been built up, note the change in angle of tumble home, a sure sign of an extra plank.

23-05-2016 Photo below of Tokatea at Whangarei 1952 ex Geoff Brebner

Tokatea Whangarei 1952

Mystery Launches 13-01-2016

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Mystery Launches
photos ex Harold Kidd

The two photos above are of the same place and probably taken at the same time period (if not consecutively). We have the 1942 Vos built, ex NZRN (ML410) ship La Reta* alongside in one, can we ID the location & the other boats?
The wee clinker with the Seagull is very cute.

* to read more on La Reta link this link https://waitematawoodys.com/2014/03/20/6468/    there is a great tale there from her later years when she was operated as a day fishing excursion vessel from Princess Wharf launch steps 🙂

Vagabond – Sailing Sunday

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VAGABOND – Sailing Sunday

Story alert ex Frank Stoks

Frank who owns the classic vessel Atatu sent me a link to this very cool story that appeared in ‘The Marlborough Express’ newspaper on the 28-12-2015, written by Kat Guggan.

Marlborough woman Viv Murray’s 1926 yacht, Vagabond, has been passed through generations of her family.
Viv said that she has grown up with it, her grandfather had it built and when she was 5 years-old he handed it on to her father, so we started cruising the sounds.
Built in Wellington, Murray believes her grandfather based the design of Vagabond on boats the Americans were building at the time, having seen similar styles in boating magazines from the era.
She and her brother, Rick Holmes, have made alterations to the boat, including an extension to the cabin, but kept its decor largely the same.
“It’s still in the old style … we have changed a few things but we put in old-fashioned things rather than modernising it,” she said.
Vagabond was kept at the Port Nicholson Yacht Club until about 30 years ago.

Click the link below to read the full story – it’s a great tale 😉
http://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/cruising/75483136/on-the-water-viv-murray-spends-a-lifetime-cruising-the-marlborough-sounds.html

Harold Kidd Input

VAGABOND was primarily a launch, a motor sailer, or at most an auxiliary like her later near sister NEREIDES. Both were built by B.J.L. (Joe) Jukes at Balaena Bay, VAGABOND for Arthur Moody Holmes (Jock’s father I believe) in late 1925 and NEREIDES for C.H. Mitchell, launched in October 1926 with 28-36hp Ailsa Craig power.
VAGABOND had a 45hp Thornycroft in 1937 but that replaced an earlier unspecified 24hp unit.
She was in NAPS as a patrol vessel 1942-3.
Both these Jukes boats were built for Cook Strait work. No wonder they have survived so well.
Arthur Holmes’ first boat was the little keel yacht NANOYA in 1907 and he was a staunch Port Nick sailor for many years until his death in 1963.