A true story

[Stiletto]

.

A couple of you noticed I hadnt been around for a while until recently. This story tells why.


A True Story



I bought my trimaran 'Stormbringer' in 1997. I had been doing some sailing on an old gaff cutter that my mate owned, and then when I moved north to Kaitaia I joined the crew of a Ross 930 in club racing on Doubtless Bay.
I had found myself enjoying sailing a fairly fast boat compared to the old cutter, and with the sale of a property, had some money to spend on a boat. I wanted to sail fast and couldnt afford a fast keeler. A trimaran seemed like a good solution as there were a few old Pivers around that appeared cheap and seemed to get along quite well in the right conditions.


I started scanning the boats for sale columns in the papers and after a while saw a Piver Stiletto 34' trimaran for sale in Auckland,


The vendor told me she was moored in Okahu Bay and I arrived there early, keen to look her over.


There were several tris moored there, but one was sleek and not at all boxy like the other Pivers that were there.
I found myself hoping it was the red sleek one that the guy was wanting to sell.


The owner arrived, and sure enough it was the one I fancied that was for sale. She differed from most Pivers in that the main hull was double diagonal ply bottom with a round bilge and small chine near the stern instead of the more common full chine design. It was somewhat like the Scheel hull designs I had read about in Wooden Boat.
Also, unlike what I knew of other Pivers, she had a daggerboard about the size of a bedroom door instead of some sort of a keel, the housing of which had a table top that sat on it when the board was lowered.


She had a variable pitch propellor fitted but no inboard engine, as the owner explained he didnt want to reinstall the 16HP or so petrol Sachs Wankel that was originally fitted. He was using a borrowed outboard on a homemade bracket on the back. He included the Sachs motor which I picked up later, in the deal.


As I was pretty green to all this I had the owner give me in writing a statement that in his experienced opinion the boat was safe to sail up the coast to Mangonui.


After checking her over thoroughly and a couple of sails around Auckland harbour where she showed good pace against some Young 88s; and a haulout where I checked over the hull the deal was done. I hadnt even wiped my rose tinted specs.






The owner introduced a mate of his that was selling a 9.9 Yamaha longshaft electric start model that had started well and sounded OK in the drum of water he had her in to show me. A small glass dinghy which easily stowed aboard came with the boat as did lifejackets, charts, and cutlery and dishes etc. I went shopping for a handbearing compass but ended up buying a handheld Garmin GPS 38 instead. I bought a heavy duty battery for the Nav lights.


She came with a Main, 2 jibs, a smallish spinnaker, and a beautiful big genoa that went from the headstay to the aft of the outer hull, usable up to no more than 15knots I was told.


I arranged for my mate Tony who was a self employed architect, and who had sailed on his Dad's Lotus 10.6 to take a few days off to help me sail her back to Mangonui.

[Stiletto]

The trip home


I stayed my first night on her in Okahu Bay ready for an early start the next morning. After a bit of a wait for my mate to turn up, ( he had called in to the office on his way to the boat) we got under way a couple of hours later than originally expected.


Getting away from the moorings and into the harbour, the motor wouldnt rev out after about 5mins running, but
never mind, we were out in the breeze so we hoisted the main and started the journey north. I would check the motor out later.
We got her moving, and once well clear of the shore decided to hoist the big genoa as the breeze was fairly light from a sou -westerly quarter veering west a bit.


The sea was fairly flat and as we passed Rangitoto I set course for the Tiri Passage which it looked like we could lay without tacking. There were no fancy instruments, just a compass and a sumlog with a brand new cable , and a radio just inside the main hatch. After a bit of fiddling around with the sails I was happy with how she was getting along, somewhere between 10 and 13 knots . A tri in the groove is a joy to sail and life was feeling pretty good right then withour coffee mugs sitting on the cabintop.
There was a gust of wind that I first noticed as the burble of water at the stern turned into a hiss and she took off.
Wow, none of the surge and then go of a keeler, just go. I looked astern and saw a wake that looked like that of a speedboat. Two guys with grins from ear to ear is a nice way to spend time on a boat.
This increase in wind must have lasted about quarter of an hour and then as quickly as it had come, it was more gentle than before.
I glanced at the speedlog and the needle was jammed right up against the stop past 15knots. I later found that we had broken the new cable . Pity I hadnt recorded it on my new GPS, but I was new to all this.


We made or way up the coast in softer and softer winds and put into Tutukaka for the night,where the outboard did the same thing all over again, and we coasted up to the Bay of Islands after a slow start the next day.


No more fast sailing on that trip, just steady moving along getting to Mangonui on dying winds and an outgoing tide with a dickey outboard. We waited for the tide to turn and made it onto an empty mooring, shifting the boat the next day to my mooring further up the harbour.


I removed the outboard and took it home to diagnose and fix the problem. It turned out that a loss of oil pressure was causing the engine to go into limp mode. After much shagging around I fixed it. I am sure the seller knew it was faulty, but buyer beware and all that. At the time I bought it second hand longshafts werent easy to come by at short notice.

[Stiletto]

10 June 1997
At the same time I bought the tri I had bought an investment property in Whangarei and was staying in it and working on it prior to letting it . While I was there I was checking out second hand cars to find a replacement for my wife's
old Honda . I called her at work to tell her that I had found a suitable one, but her employer said she was not available and would get her to call me as soon as possible. I asked where she was and her employer seemed somewhat evasive but she would get her to ring me ASAP.
The phone call finally came and everything turned to ****e. My wife could barely talk, her 20 year old son, my stepson, one of twins had been killed in a head on collision with a milk tanker. I packed up and headed for home.
That was the longest two hour drive of my life.

I didnt do much sailing for a while , but went over and stayed on the boat occasionally for a bit of peace and reflection. Faye seemed to want to grieve on her own, along with the surviving twin brother.



I got into a rhythm of working during the week and sailing on Doubtless Bay on the weekends. Typically a mate and I would go out for some fishing and end up with some sailing around the bay unless the fishing was very good.
Another mate had moved to Mangonui with a view to buying somewhere on the bay. He was a self employed computer guru and we spent many a weekday sailing when we chose to take some time off. The workaholics live in the cities right?


My wife chose to go and live in the other house, taking my then 8 year old son with her. The surviving twin was living in Auckland.

[Stiletto]

I was enjoying sailing my tri, but was also starting to realise that there were drawbacks to tri ownership too.
One drawback was that there were no multihull cradle facilities in our area, and also the nineties economy was slowing down here in the north. If I wanted a haulout I would have to make my own cradle and hire a large crane which was expensive compared to the 50 bucks haulout fee on a rented yacht club cradle.


The drawback of glass over ply construction was starting to show as some of the glass over the ply had let water in , starting rot. Because this tri was built for performance originally, the decks were glassed quarter inch ply over stringers spaced around 6” apart. The outer hulls were the same thickness but with strengthening pieces on the insides between frames.


The closed spaces inside the wingdecks were also a haven for rot.


I had replaced the fourstroke Yamaha with a borrowed longshaft evinrude, and then bought a second hand longshaft 8hp yamaha which I took off and locked in the cabin each time I moored the boat. What a great little motor that is, I still have it.


After some years of patchups I made a static cradle and had a crane lift my tri out onto the Mill Bay hardstand at Mangonui. Money was still tight, but the club rates for the hardstand were pretty reasonable. Work was picking up and I took a week off & got into stripping the aft half of the decks off and replacing them.


Oh dear! There was a lot of rot in the rear crossmember and wingdecks. An estimated eight week part time job turned into eight months through a very wet winter. Just like so many other boatowners I found out that I had hopelessly underestimated the time required. The wingdecks were constructed like a wooden aeroplane's wing with thin stringers every 6” or so .Rebuilding them took time. I had to get the boat off the hardstand before the End of year holiday season, so she went back into the water with the aft half of the decks replced ,glassed and painted, and the cockpit and aft crossmember rebuilt, glassed and painted. The whole hull was repainted and the waterline raised 3” to better avoid weed growth on the transition zone between sea and water.


I had immensely enjoyed the process of doing the work , putting up with the not always friendly jibes about how long it was taking was a pain though.


I did a lot of weekday sailing as I had changed my work from builder to more of a jobbing carpenter, I wasnt getting any younger and found there was a niche for the kind of flexibility a one man bad can provide.


A few more years went by frequently using the boat as a daysailer .


I had a small sore on my arm which was taking a while to heal , so I went to the doctor who said it wasnt melanoma and gave me some ointment for it. It didnt trouble me but never quite disppeared. After about 18 months or so, it started to grow rapidly and the doctor ( a locum) said he would make arrangements to have it surgically removed immediately. I asked him if it could wait a week as I has a lot of work on to complete. I had the preliminary appointment with the specialist who said it didnt look malignant and my glands were OK. I set an appointment for the following week.


I turned up for my outpatient visit to the local hospital and was put in a gown and ushered into a room with a table covered in black vinyl just like the guys on death row get for their injections. Great for the nerves.
It was excised and taken away for analysis. All this at no cost to me. ( the joys of a reasonable public health system).


A week later I had the follow up interview where the specialist informed me that it was malignant but they got it all and I was OK if I covered up from the sun. I left feeling a bit freaked out, and remain nervous about going out in the sun .


About the same time my buddy and crewmate had moved away to Auckland and let out his house.


The boat was starting to show her age again, particularly since a flock of terns had taken up residence on her wide decks. They are hard little buggers to get rid of.
I found myself going over to her less and less . I would go over to her after rain and pump the bilges, but hadnt taken her out because she was awkward to get on and off the mooring by myself.
I faced the reality that she was going backwards faster than I could cope with, and in spite of all my former work, probably had been going backwards ever since I had bought her. I had learned the hard way that maintaining boats is about maintaining surfaces (along with rigging etc.) and there is a hell of a lot of surface on a trimaran even if not that much of it is in the water.


I advertised the boat for sale as a project, although there was some interest no buyer eventuated.


I started marshalling resources for another haulout and repair session.


By this time Faye and I were going through a property settlement so any spare money was going to lawyers and the financial adjustment I would have to make.


Autumn this year I got a phonecall from the harbour warden telling me that my boat was looking a bit low in the water. I loaded my dinghy into my ute and went over to check her out. When I got there she was on her side with one hull completely submerged and the main hull fully awash. God I felt awful, but went and rang the insurance company. A mate who lives in Mill Bay said he would dive on her and see what happened. He said there were definite signs of collision on the sunken hull. We recovered a couple of charts and some lifejackets that floated around the cabin.
The next day I met with the insurance assessor who rowed out for a look with some recovery guys . After poking at her a bit he said that the claim wouldnt be honoured because of some soft deck. My friend who dived on her is a JP rang him and said that he had seen evidence of collision, Too bad said the assessor.
That was it, no insurance. I had read the fine print and couldnt really argue. In the interests of any future insurance I withdrew the claim rather than have a refused claim on my record.


She was on her side on her mooring and I had to come up with a means of recovering her. The recovery guys offered to do it for a price that was too high for me, at least straight away. I would see what else I could organise.I rang the harbour warden and he gave me the name of a fisherman that owed him a favour, but he wouldnt do anything because my boat was in amongst others and the liability to him was too great given that I now had no insurance.
I tried another fisherman but his boat and skipper were staying out as they were onto some good fish.
I was running around and getting nowhere. I could organise the shore side of things but couldnt get any help on the water without paying thousands I didnt have. I had heard that the mooring barge was heading our way ( it serves the northeastern harbours) I rang the proprietor and explained my situation, whereupon he said that he would be able to help with his rig and would head straight to Mangonui once he had finished the job he was on.
I was starting to buckle under the stress.


Iwent home and good friends invited me to dinner. I gladly accepted, they kindly listened to my tale of woe and fed me well. I arrived home to nine messages on the answerphone. She had broken off the mooring and semi submerged had headed out of the harbour on the outgoing tide. The harbour warden had tried towing her with his launch but the line had broken.
The harbour warden, the regional council harbours master, the radio station and some crazy bitch who wanted to dump on me about it had all left messages.
The regional guy said that the harbour warden should have notified them as they have teams to sort such things out.
We agreed that there was nothing I could do that night and he told me a notice to mariners had been issued.
First thing the next morning I rang the harbour warden, a sprightly 82 year old ex spitfire pilot who has been doing the job for years and asked him what he wanted me to do. He said nothing, he thought she would probably wash up on Coopers beach or Cable Bay. I later found out that a local boatie had tied an anchor to her to stop her drifting.


I was then about to phone the regional guy when a local man rang up and asked if he could have her if he salvaged her. I told him yes if the authorities were OK with that. I rang and cleared it with them and organised to meet him at his work premises. I typed up a bill of sale for one dollar so it would be his and went over and showed him the bill of sale. He said he didnt have any cash on him as he had been in the water. I threw two fifty cent pieces on the ground and said look! There's a dollar! He snatched them up and presented them to me with a flourish. We signed both copies of the agreement along with his employee as a witness, and the wreck was his.( I had no idea as to the legality of all this, but knew it was definitely a sign of good faith.) He had conducted his salvge operation with an old 13'6” fibreglass fizzboat with about a 50 horse outboard on the back. Relief flooded over me and I went home sadder, guiltier, and wiser.


I was amazed at how lucky I was that she had gone past some pretty expensive boats in MillBay , ignoring them in her bid for freedom. When I got home I heard that it was the fortieth anniversary of the Wahine disaster. I felt some sort of cosmic parallel.


When she had broken free the mooring buoy had come adrift and was recovered and returned to me. The next day my mate dived to look for my mooring line. When he found it, it was still attached to the bronze bollard on a piece of foredeck about 18” wide by 30” long.


If there is any moral to this story it is this: If anyone finds their boat is not being used enough, move it on to somebody who will use her. By the time I tried to do that it was too late.

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

.
Thanks, Stiletto.

I feel for you on both counts. Done a boat the same way, and done a marriage too -- although thankfully not so tragically.

Thanks so much for being brave enough to share your story with us, and thanks for staying here in our community despite your trials.

Mike
.

[R.I.Singer30]

Thanks for the story. A parallel universe here also. ;) Some day I hope to have the time to type it out. DanL

[willmarsh3]

My condolences for your stepson.
As for the boat things work out the way they do for a reason - sometimes the reason doesn't come clear until later, IMHO.
Thanks for sharing.

[Thorne]

Many of us who have owned older wooden boats have had similar experiences -- always good to see encouragement given to those owners who have stopped sailing their boats: SELL THE DAMN THING!

Somebody else out there will love it, particularly if you haven't allowed the unused boat to decay too much.

I lost a restored pine over oak banks dory to termites, should have sold it the first season that I stopped using it instead of letting it sit for 5 years. Never knew the little buggers could fly, but here they can...

[J P]

Thanks for sharing the recapitulation and my condolences for your losses. It's a good and timely reminder for me to pay attention to what is important in my life and direct my energy that way.

ok, so what is "a JP"? I feel like I should know this. :rolleyes:

... to a bright future and fast sailing, cheers.

[John B]

Grant , I had noticed you weren't posting but I didn't feel I should pry.. I thought maybe you were taking 'time off ' the forum as we all should from time to time.
Really sorry to hear about your misfortune with the boat but it pales by comparison to the rest.

Well, I guess you've a weight off you with the tri gone, you've got the skills and I imagine there's a new boat in the future for you .So best of luck and thanks for the true story, hard as many parts of it is.

[The Bigfella]

Phew. A lot in there Grant.

Time for a smaller boat perhaps?

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

.
JP -- Justice of the Peace: a non-stipendiary quasi-legal functionary whose main task (in their JP capacity) is witnessing third-party documents.

Essentially JPs are private citizens without legal training who used to be freely elected to the role by the legal fraternity, but now (in Oz anyway) have to buy their way in. Those initials after one's name still carry a certain cachet though, so some people are still willing to put themselves up for election.

There are a few in most communities, and they're generally citizens of good repute, having high community standards. But I caught a JP swearing a perjured affidavit earlier this year. She'd have been in Really Big Trouble had I been able to prove it....

Mike
.

[Stiletto]

Thankyou for your understanding. It has taken me some time to come to terms with the loss of my boat.
I had got to grips with the other stuff because it was further in the past.

Re the JP comment: JPs here fortunately still have Quite a lot of respectability and credibility. My friend who dived on my boat mentioned the fact that he was one to the insurance assessor to add credibility to his claims of what he had seen underwater, rather than just being perceived as a mate of mine trying to help me out.

A smaller boat is indeed probably in my future.

[PeterSibley]

Thanks for the story ...instructive .

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

JPs here fortunately still have Quite a lot of respectability and credibility.

Please don't get me wrong, Grant. That is the case here too. By no means was I intending to denigrate JPs in general. You don't get to be one by being a ratbag -- you have to be able to demonstrate a high degree of upstanding in the community before you're able to be elected to such a position.

But it makes it doubly unfortunate when you come across a rotten apple, as I did.

Mike

[AlanL]

Hi Grant,

So sorry to hear of your losses. Northland is a wonderful place to live and at the very least, you are probably in one of the best locales there are. Good luck for the future, and...

summer is here :)

In a way I guess I am saying there are times when we must count our blessings.

All the best
Alan

[py]

Thanks for sharing-you have a way with words.There's something about an old tri that's just that bit irresistable isn't there? I lusted after one for many years. She eventually came up for sale, and I snapped her up for $15,000. Soon found she was way too expensive for me to keep up with, got a job in another country, tried to sail her there, but turned back for a whole lot of reasons. Sold her a year or so later for $30,000-which is less than I'd spent overall, but not too bad. And I guess I came out somewhat wiser for the experience. (Although I then bought an even bigger more expensive boat which I couldn't really afford, managed to survive through that, and am now thinking about doing the same again! Still married, and have 4 children in rude good health. Counting my blessings! And living in fear!

[Lew Barrett]

I always wondered why you were Stiletto, but thought of the knife, not the boat.
Thank for offering up this story, Grant. It clearly took some consideration and courage to commit it all to writing, but is one that I'm glad you shared with us.
Every time I read about you fellows in the South Pacific, I pine to visit, even if only once in my life.

[J. Dillon]

A sad but interesting yarn. It points out that we must decide when to let a boat go and let another owner come in and take over. For most of us a difficult decision for one to make.:(

JD