Todays gallery of classic Bay of Islands wooden boats was snapped by Dean Wright , owner of the majestic woody – ARETHUSA. Dean was un-route to hauling ARETHUSA out for her annual TLC.
For top to bottom we have – AQUARIUS (1955 Supreme Craft), MAHARATIA (1947 Roy Lidgard), POSEIDOM (1965 Owen Woolley), and the last boat, the bridge-decker, is MANU (1913 Bailey & Lowe) a mystery, but looks familiar , hopefully we can put a name to her.
Make sure you check out WW on Monday, we have an epic trip report from John Oates who recently attended the 2025 Port Townson Wooden Boat Festival.
Being a professional photographer, BOI woody Dean Wright is seldom without a camera near by, which is a bonus for us. Over last weekend (Kings Birthday) Dean was out enjoying the bay on his classic woody – ARETHUSA and took the above photos.
First up is a stunning open day boat that Mike mentioned that he had seen out a few times on the Kerikeri River and at last got close enough to take a photo.
The Gladden yacht – is WINTERLUDE, owned by Bram Cone. I’m told she is as impressive down below as what we see in the photo.
Lastly the very smart Salthouse launch – TAPUI, owned by Mike and Robi Quilter. Mike is a life member of my good bastards woody club, having taken a chainsaw to the flying bridge that was on TAPUI when purchased . See and read more here https://waitematawoodys.com/2015/09/04/tapui/
Has been a few weeks of back to back woody boating activity, so today is a case of slowing down – So when the WW email inbox pinged with a note from Bay of Islands woody photographer – Dean Wright, my eyes lit up. As always Dean was sending in some great photos from mooching around the Bay of Islands aboard his magnificent woody – Arethusa .
Todays are from Deans weekend trip to Mimiwhangata and starting at the top we see one of my favourite workboat woodys – the Roger Carey designed (1954), built by Curnow & West Nelson Boatbuilders craft – Souvenir in Deep Water Cove.
Today I’ll doing something very un-boating related – but to me very chilling out – 1st one to guess what that is, its an inside project – wins a WW burgee – entries via email only to waitematawoodys@gmail.com . Closes off at 6pm.
Bay of Islands Summer Mooching + Anniversary Weekend Cruising
Todays gallery of classic wooden craft comes to us from the camera of Dean Wright, taken while he was cruising the bay on his woody – Arethusa.
From top to bottom the craft are:
• Ranoni – Army Bay
• Enterprise – Opunga Cove
• Arohanui – steaming past Cable Bay, Urupukapuka
• Arethusa – Whangamumu
• The Logan yacht – Iorangi – Whangamumu
• Alofa – Whangamumu
• Valhalla – Whangamumu
• Rampage – Whangmumu – an early 2000’s Robertson Boats sedan launch ( lengthened and repainted)
• Mary of York – Ben Tomb’s leeboarder
2024 MAHURANGI REGATTA – Classic Launch Parade & Sunday Gathering At KAWAU ISLAND
The countdown is on for one of the worlds best and biggest classic wooden boating events, the Mahurangi Regatta, organised by the Mahurangi Cruising Club.
Sadly due to the freakish weather the 2023 regatta was cancelled, but plans are in place to make 2024 on-the-water and ashore at Scotts Landing bigger and better.
The Classic Wooden Launch Parade is one of the highlights of the weekends activities – followed later in the day by a serious ‘old school’ boaty BBQ ashore at Scott’s – including a massive marquee for the 20 piece dance band.
On the Sunday, most woody launch skippers head to KAWAU ISLAND and the plan is to gather later in the day for a few sun-downers at the newly refurbished Kawau Boating Club.
Bay of Islands woody Dean Wright sent in the above photo and video of a very salty woody trailer boat, Dean took the photos on Saturday as Momo cruised back up the Kerikeri inlet.
If the background noise in the video doesn’t match what you would have expected from Momo – relax, you ears aren’t playing up – Momo is powered by an o/board. The noise is coming from Dean’s woody – Arethusa’s Gardner 4LW.
Would love to learn more about Momo.
A bonus for the Gardner nuts – link below to a past WW story on Arethusa, which backgrounds the restoration and installation of the Gardner 4LW in Arethusa.
Big thank you to all the woodys that attended the Boat Boat Sale at The Slipway Milford on Saturday – a lot walked away with a WW cap and burgee tucked under their arm 🙂
Regular readers of WW will be familiar with Bay of Islands photographer – Dean Wright and the stunning images he shares with us. Dean and partner Deb are the custodians of the classic woody – Arethusa, which has one of the best back stories of all the craft in your fleet. The 33’ Arethusa was built in 1917 by Bob Brown and started life as a gaff rigged cutter, 105 years later she has the features of a commercial ex work boat – but a very swish one 🙂 Link below that shows some of the transformation – and being such a looker she has made numerous WW appearance, but today we bring to light a somewhat unknown (to most of us) event in her life – I’ll let Dean do the intro to the above photo essay :- https://waitematawoodys.com/2020/09/07/arethusas-new-woody-wheelhouse/
“Deb and I were down south recently and did the Farewell Spit Bus trip. The tour operators were able to tell us approximately where Arethusa ran aground all those years ago (late December 1955).
They dragged the boat to the other side of the Spit and relaunched her, about 1.2km’s. An excerpt from book at the Spit lighthouse keepers house: “She was sailing between New Plymouth and Nelson and the crew thought they were heading between the lights of Farewell Spit and Stephen’s Island when they ran aground. Obviously they mistook the light on Cape Farewell for that on the Spit, and, as the Cape Farewell light had only gone into operation in 1951, they may have been unaware of its existence.”
The press clipping above in the Christchurch Press ran the headline – ‘The Arethusa – A Total Loss’ – well they got that wrong – well done to everyone that invested the funds and time to help Arethusa become a centenarian. If anyone knows more detail of her time in the South Island, Deb and Dean would love to hear from you.
A STORY FOR THE ENGINE HEADS Over the break two diehard woodys sent in some photos of what a lot of woody boaties consider to be the holy-grail to marine propulsion – Gardner engines.The top 3 photos shows classic yachty – David Glen standing alongside the Gardner 6L3 in the ex workboat – Faith. Link below to uncover more on her. https://waitematawoodys.com/2019/04/06/faith-the-milford-slipway-opens/ In the second group of photos (ex Angus Rogers – MV Centaurus ) we see the Gardner 4LW in Dean Wright’s woody – Arethusa, nice wheelhouse too – again WW link below for an insight into the repower. Also lots more to read / view on Arethusa by using the WW search box. https://waitematawoodys.com/2017/12/31/restoring-installing-a-gardner-in-arethusa-revisited/
BOATS OF THE LAKE – REVIEW As most of you know, I’m a big fan of the annual Lake Rotoiti Classic & Wooden Boat Parade on Lake Rotoiti, North Island. During the recent CV-19 lock-downs past commodore David Wilson, his wife Glenys and member Lois Palmer teamed up to pull together a book detailing some of the history surrounding the LRC&WB association. The hard cover, 4 colour printed book is full of beautiful photos taken at events spanning the 25 years, plus many stories about locals and their boats around the lake. I tucked a copy away for Xmas / NY reading and if you have any interest in classic wooden boats, I give it a big tick and encourage you to buy a copy, details below. Link For Orderinghttps://form.jotform.com/213318234322849
Make sure to check in to WW tomorrow (Monday) we have a brilliant story on the woody – Callisto
Woody Cruising In The Bay of Islands #2 Today’s gallery are again from BOI woody and pro photographer Dean Wright’s camera, Dean snapped the photos above of – Centaurus, Lady Ellen, Mana Rose, Kualani and his own classic woody – Arethusa seen at dusk. The gent in the very smart sailing dinghy is Angus Rogers, owner of Centaurus.
The 50’ Kualani is a newbie to WW and the BOI – Dean did some sniffing around and learnt that she was built by P. Jorgensen & Sons boat builders of Picton. When built she was powered by twin Gardner 5LW engines, looking at the photo of her, there are two very impressive exhaust pipes up top, which might suggest something with a tad for HP than the Gardner’s delivered. FYI – link here showing some (not sure if its all) of the Jorgensen built fleet https://jorgensenboats.nz/boats/
Below is a spec sheet of Kualani as she was built (no mention of the year), we have moved on a lot in terms of being PC, the reference to the bollards in the ‘ Deck Hardware’ section – would get you in a lot of trouble there days 😉 Also below is a photo of Kualani in Waipiro Bay, Gisborne – dated January 2020.
Dean Wright recently slipped the lines on Arethusa and has been mooching around the Bay of Islands. Today’s gallery of photos includes the very salty looking Adventure in Deep Water Cove, also there was the Auckland woody – Callisto. Also featured is Andy and Brenda Bell’s Monowai III and Jim Ashby’s Olga, Dean commented that Olga is a serious bit of kit. She sure is, looks like you could go anywhere in her. Would love to know move about Olga, can anyone give Jim Ashby a nudge and ask him to send WW some background on the boat.
Lastly we see the remains of the burnt out Fleming 55 being lifted from the bottom between Moturua and Motukiekie Islands on Saturday (13-02-21), post the lift Dean saw the barge heading out to sea – probably for a deep water burial, anyone able to confirm? Photos of the boat fire here https://waitematawoodys.com/2020/12/31/summer-woody-boating-in-the-bay-of-islands/
The only downside of Dean’s reporting is we never get to see photos of his stunning woody – Arethusa 🙂 see below
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.”
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