A 15ft Wooden Sailing Boat
I don't know how many boats I've had but I did tell a little white lie today: "I never saw a boat I didn't love". Pig course I have, but mostly I can find something lovely about each sail boat because like dogs and teddy bears, they "don't answer back, & they don't tell you that you look fat".
Anyway, after lurking for a few weeks, I went to inspect a 15 ft. timber clinker dinghy in pea green & varnish. I had bugger all money for such a thing, but I hoped to offload a bike to help me out should I decide to go ahead with the purchase. In my mind I knew that a half-century old dinghy was likely to have issues. So I harboured, some misgivings & there was the rusted out trailer to throw into the deal. I could barely afford the boat let alone a basket case in need of rescuing.
As I went through the gate and saw a gleaming pea green clinker hull before me, all my objectivity melted into the concrete. I had to have this boat! The owners kept urging me to check her out, lift the bilge boards, get underneath, check the trailer. Yeh, I did go through the motions, but I was looking through very rose colored glasses. I could no more find fault with her as I could my own mother. The owner, Denyse, pleaded with me to "look at this rust here!" I could tell immediately, the first was wholly on the light bar and was not structural.
Denyse spoke kindly of old George who built her. How he towed her behind a matching car; a ute with green plywood canopy. She openly revealed that she only bought her for her beauty & that she had never got her wet. Never wet in 10 years? I'll fix that I thought.
Denyse & her husband Dennis openly said they "know nothing about boats", but described how they vanished her after they bought her & always kept little Jacaranda under a tarp in their carport. As caretakers, they could have done her no greater service.
To my great & good fortune Denyse had been warning each prospective buyer that the trailer was "too rusty to use". She reported several conversations where these people agonized over ways of transporting the whole shebang. None had concluded that a $100 a day car float would suffice. By showing up & assessing it in person, I learned that the light bar indeed was completely rusted out. While structurally the rest of the trailer was fine! Throughout my life I've always tried to play fair & forgave often been burned. But sometimes through persistance, you can have a win & today Jacaranda fell into my lap. I had unwittingly flattered Denyse by continually saying how beautiful & well kept the boat was, & I was rewarded by her coding men to take her care over. She quickly reduced the selling price by a great deal, because, as she knew the boat was appreciated. All those romantic notions about wooden boats are true.
But the jolity continued & the husband Dennis exclaimed: "There's another mast somewhere". I jumped for joy hoping to discover a well garnished wooden spar only to see him point towards the aluminium boom laying in the bilge & saying: "Oh there it is!".
But really they were a lovely couple & I spared no energy in thanking them for their excellent boat stewardship efforts. "She has aged beautifully" I cooed.
I also found Jacaranda's history really interesting. Apparently she was a very local boat & had been built by George Mallam, "just up the road" in the 1970's. He could often be seen towing her behind his ute with matching green timber canopy. They frequented the waters of the Myall River system as well as Port Stephens. Having done this for decades, they etched themselves into Tea Gardens folklore. It is known too that George sailed a small boat to Queensland, threshold his wife drove the coast in the ute. There was conjecture as to whether this was that same boat & she certainly appears capable of such a feat. The rare presence of a bilge pump on get leeward gunnel certainly lends weight to the possibility. At least in my mind, Jacaranda has been to sea.
But people age, as do their boats & in 2013, aged 91, George made the decision to sell his beloved sail boat.
Denyse bought her for one reason:"she's beautiful".
Denyse, herself the grand- daughter of a boat builder, encouraged husband Dennis to give her a coat of varnish & for a decade more she was kept clean & dry, well sheltered from the weather. Bingo! I paid much less than her real value, but Denyse was "pleased to see her go to someone that will look after her". Bless her.
With her boxy deck house & strong build, she's probably more Tinkerbelle than Swallows & Amazons, but for me, she's just right.
