4hr scenic tour

October 14, 2020 Leave a comment

Last Sunday I dropped the DeckHardware RIB Cadence in the water at Bayview.  It’s something I’ve been meaning to do for quite some time now, go for a tour around Pittwater and have a look back in time at the water in which I learnt to sail. The RIB of course was the perfect boat to do it in. I’m lucky that it’s now all set up that it’s easy to launch and retrieve singlehanded.

I started off by going anti-clockwise, first up into the upper reaches of Newport an area that was pretty much mangroves in the 50’s and early 60’s mucking about as a kid.  As time has gone on, all of it is now fully developed with many a home and wharf building out the land and the water.  I can remember picking up my first Manly Junior crew by boat as he lived on the opposite side, it was either that or  a pushbike for him. Continuing around and remembering the old  Newport pub, where our parents would be inside whilst we played on the carousel, that’s now a multi story carpark rather than the drive through to the bottle shop.

Then into Crystal Bay, where again it was all mangroves where kids could run amuck  and we did!  However this time it was stopping to say Hi to a couple of old salts, one on  the end of his jetty and the other in the cockpit of his lovely yacht. It was good to stop and say an all but brief ‘G’day’ to Hugh  Treharne and Ken Beashel, both legends of the sport of Sailing and certainly don’t need any introduction. Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club has certainly grown and changed with the times, as kids we used to climb the trees where the main clubhouse now is. One boat spotted on the marina was Patsy a Swanson37 that I did my first Mooloolaba race on in ’81. Still in the Yaffe family ownership, Daniel who I sailed with for a number of years was on board with his family and about to head out for the day. It was good to catch up.

The major change to Pittwater over the decades is the sheer number of boats on  moorings, the area that we leant to sail on in the 60s is full.

Heading north past Salt Pan Cove, and on a mooring  was a rather familiar Adams10. Yet more memories although they’ve made many changes to what I thought was the best A10 deck layout.  Then into Clareville and there was the old Swanson42 Tawarri,  as a teenager I did a RSYS Cruise on board with the Lewis family, spending a week aboard racing offshore and up to the lake.

Up to Barrenjoey and across to the western side brought more memories of camping at Resolute Beach with our Manly Juniors and walking up to West Head. Then on into  Coasters Retreat or  the Basin as many know it and more camping  and overnight memories.

Then it was around the corner of Longnose Point and into Towlers Bay. There’s a lovely beach on  the Northern side where we spent a week with the girls on Indulgence after a Coffs Harbour Race one January. We literally had it to ourselves but the other day it was packed , times have changed.  Next up was Lovetts Bay and then Elvina Bay, where there was once  plenty of bush and now there’s houses right round both bays. Still going at 4knots [the speed limit] and heading up McCarrs Creek, for a change [not] the water was full of ‘jelly blubbers’. The constant thud of hitting them with a centreboard, didn’t matter what I was sailing. Another boat that I was surprised to see, was a little Primaat called Tainui. Tainui was built by Bill Burrows, an old sailing foe of my Dads. Many a JOG race was had against her in the 60s. Bill also made the mast for my fathers first yacht  Temeraire, so there’s the connection.

I finished up my tour of Pittwater by going past Church Point and Bayview, looking at where we used to live and how things have changed. Surprisingly the houses are still there, they haven’t been updated. Only the addition of solar panels to Church Point was noticeable, but Bayview is still the same colour some 5 decades later. It was a great day, something I’d been wanting to do for some time.

Next up however, it’s back on the MHYC start boat and running a regatta for the  Sydney Farr40 Fleet this coming weekend.

Filed under DeckHardware, JOG, MHYC, Offshore sailing, Race Official, RIB Tagged with ,

The early offshore years and trailer yachts

October 26, 2016 Leave a comment

I started offshore sailing on Temeraire, my Dads JOG boat that he built on the front lawn at Newport during the mid 60s. I was still just in my early teens and an overnighter to Bird Island out of Pittwater was a regular occurrence. We also did a few trips down to the harbour where Dad sailed with his mates in events there. Several times, it was my responsibility to bring her back to the mooring at the Alfreds. I was able to ‘borrow’ Temeraire and go away for a weekend with my mates ‘up the creek’, overnighting at Halletts Beach, Refuge Cove and down Jerusalem. These were in the days prior to having a drivers licence and we all enjoyed the freedom as well as the responsibility. Two of us even took her to Lake Macquarie, joining in with the RSYS Squadron Cruise.

This would be the first of many Squadron cruises. The first racing was with Ash Gay on his Endeavour26 ‘Emma Chisit’. Ash was a seasoned racer and his crew consisted of three young blokes, Richard ‘Bluey’ Chapman, Ian Sanderson and myself. The following year it was aboard Tawarri a Swanson42 with the Lewis family. The next one was with Max Tunbridge and his family on ‘Amazing Grace’ a Bonbridge27 that he built alongside his panel beating works at Pymble.

The next Squaddie cruise was sometime later, Kevin Brightwells Farr6000 Blue Bayou. Heaps of fun that one, especially the spinnaker run up the coast surfing the wake of the larger boats. When asked if we would sail back in a southerly, I said “no, we’ll go back and get the trailer”. In the end we motored the whole way back to Pittwater as there was no wind.

I did my first ‘serious’ offshore regatta the SCOR at Mooloolaba on Bacardi a Cole43. This was my first real big boat experience and I learnt heaps as a 19year old. During my short period living in Queensland in the mid 70s, most of my time was sailing my boss’s Triton24 on the Brisbane River with the occasional foray out to the bay and Tangalooma.

Returning to Sydney after 18 months working up north and back into building Lasers again, from there I went to work at Sydney Sailboat Centre with Geoff Pearson and David Bray retailing a range of off the beach boats, multihulls and trailer yachts. It was during this period that I met Robyn and we settled down as a couple. Her Father John had bought Defiance, the original IOR Mk3 S&S30 built by Doug Brooker, updating from a Compass30 . Needless to say sailing on Defiance was a given. We sailed 3-4 days a week almost year round split between Defiance and the many Trailer Yacht events of the time like the Sea Spray Magazine Pittwater Islands Race.

defiance

In January 1980, we sailed Defiance in the Australian JOG titles. We didn’t place but had a great break in the week before our wedding.  I sailed Defiance in many events, the RSYS Squadron Cruise was one. I broke the boom pulling the vang on coming down Pittwater, it was a race that afternoon to replace it as the following day was the Lady skippers day. John (Robyn’s father) and I worked flat out but we were sailing the next day with Robyn steering. We also started in a MHYC South Solitary Race, however due to electrical problems and being unable to do a radio sched, we retired to Pittwater.

We campaigned the Farr6000 with Marita Wilmot before Marita and James as well as Robyn and myself started families. These were great times, towing the boat up to Lake Macquarie and down to St Georges Basin. We created a bit of a stir as a crew and there were many competitive sailors who didn’t like being beaten by the girls. One overnight race, I was asleep below and they overtook the opposition and won the race! In another, with the wind blowing hard enough to put a reef in the mainsail, we set the spinnaker for the downhill ride. One of the opposition saw us under control and set theirs and immediately broached whilst we sailed away.

farr-6000

Robyn and I went to New Zealand to compete in their TY Nationals at Napier in 1979. Sea Nymph gave us a brand new Farr6000 and we set it up on the figures from Sydney. Our third crew was one of Tony Bouzaids daughters and in the invitation race we were leading the fleet by a distance. Being the invited Aussie sailors and not wanting to finish the race in first place [an Aussie sailors Hoodoo], we pulled out and went ashore for a rum. Needless to say, the Kiwis were all over our boat to see what we’d done to it but we’d de-tuned the rig. We finally finished in third place from around one hundred competitors. The opposition included many World champions and a Gold Medallist, we were ecstatic with the result.

We sailed a Status580 one year in the Pittwater series, but the Farr6000 was our favourite. I was also asked to campaign a Blazer23 when they were first launched, however as both my crew were now mothers I had to get a new crew. Robyns’ younger siblings Jaime and Shelly joined on a few occasions. In one race down at Lake Illawarra, Shelly stepped on to the keel when we put the mast in the water. Being a dinghy sailor she thought that was what you did! We raced hard.

Around the same time MHYC ran a Two Handed series in which we competed in Defiance. John Dibble and I the first few years and then Jaime Dibble and I sailed together. These events saw many top boats of the day compete including other Half Tonners Beach Inspector, Newspaper Taxi and Industries, One Tonners like Diamond Cutter and Salamander11 and in one year the entire Admirals Cup team of Ragamuffin, Police Car and Impetuous. Top flight racing at its best although two handed and didn’t we have some fun. Worst was having to pack up at the end of the day – absolutely exhausted.

farr-out-edit

 

When John decided to sell Defiance and buy a Farr1104, FarrOut, Jaime and I continued the two handed sailing and like before, good fun but hard work, especially given the competition at that time in the IOR One Ton class. Somehow we got around the track in all of the two handed races without any issues. One of the things about being shorthanded is that you have to plan ahead for the next leg. There was generally no time to sit on the side and have a breather.

Filed under Assorted, JOG, MHYC, Yacht Race Tagged with ,

Time for a little reminiscing

October 5, 2016 Leave a comment

I’ve been told that my first time sailing was being put in a 505 spinnaker bag whilst still in nappies. Dad [Peter Yeomans] was a lifelong sailor having grown up at Vaucluse and sailing VJs at the local yacht club. He then continued sailing 14’skiffs whilst studying in the USA where he met my Canadian born mother.

Upon returning to Sydney, they settled at Newport and Dad was sailing at ‘The Alfreds’ with George and Tim Clarke in a Dragon, KA44. In the early Sixties he started building his first yacht on the front lawn and at the same time building me my first Manly Junior Pipsqueak. Needless to say I learnt heaps about building boats whilst helping Dad, be it painting and varnishing, the other end of a copper Rib rivet or steaming the ribs in an old 44. I sailed as much as I was allowed as a kid growing up and this continued when we moved to the waterfront at Bayview.  Dad sailed Temeraire in many JOG events both out of Pittwater and Sydney Harbour where I often joined him as a crew. I can remember on one occasion, Dad dropping me and a couple of school mates off at Lavender Bay to sail her back to Pittwater, we would have been 16 at the time.

 

I sailed two MJs, updating Pipsqueak to Leucothea when the Mk2 design came in. From there I crewed on many yachts at RPAYC, midweek and Saturdays whilst sailing F11s at RPAYC, then Fireballs and 505s at BYRA. Upon leaving school I started work at Performance Sailcraft Australia building Lasers. Initially we unpacked containers of boats from Canada before the moulds arrived from New Zealand which had started production before us. Naturally sailing Lasers was a must and over the next 7-8 years I competed in many events in Adelaide, Melbourne, Brisbane and Yeppoon also including many NSW country regattas like at Wallis Lake near Forster. My first Aussie built boat was 14127 and the last of many, 70000. These were great years and many of my opposition have become lifelong friends.

I delivered new Lasers up and down the east coast, although one trip was made to Darwin. PSA had two specially built trailers, one held 6 boats and the other 10. With another employee Les,  we towed the larger of these to Darwin in mid ’75, six months after Cyclone Tracy demolished the city on Christmas Day. It was one of those eye openers, I hadn’t been there before, nor had I really experienced or seen the power of nature. Les and I arrived around Midday and the locals wanted to go sailing, so we did. Unpacked the car and trailer and went sailing. We had written on the outside packing before leaving – Instant fleet just need water. Tick.

I spent a year working in Brisbane in the mid-70s and continued sailing Lasers and whilst there bought one of the first Windsurfers to Queensland. Upon returning to PSA in Sydney and then working at Sydney Sailboat Centre, I met Robyn and as they say, the rest is history.

I moved from RPAYC to MHYC and commenced sailing both inshore and offshore on a variety of yachts. Robyn and I started campaigning a Farr6000 which SSC imported from NZ. We had a lot of fun over a couple of years with our third crew Marita Wilmot.  Soon a change of occupation gave me added days on the water and I rarely missed a Wednesday for 20 years.

 

 

Filed under Assorted, Inter State Trips, JOG, Yacht Race Tagged with , , ,