Yacht Race Was Thrill Of A Lifetime

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30958, 14 January 1966, Page 2

Yacht Race Was Thrill Of A Lifetime

Miss Annabel Wigley, the only girl member of a crew in the recent Wellington-to-Akaroa yacht race, was broken into seafaring promptly. She had never been to sea before she left Pigeon Bay in the Entreaty on its way to Wellington for the race.

The 34-footer ran into rough weather soon after leaving the Pigeon Bay heads and a few hours later Miss Wigley took her first watch. During the first day out she suffered the first discomforts of seasickness. “I knew nothing about the sea. in fact, I had always been a bit scared of swimming in it But I felt perfectly safe in the yacht and not a bit afraid of the huge waves,” she said yesterday. Looking tanned and refreshed after two good nights sleep on land again, Miss Wigley described the trip to Wellington and the race to Akaroa as an experience of a lifetime. “I might never get an opportunity like it again. It was wonderful,” she said. During the race it was her job to cook for the five men in the crew and help them with the minor jobs of sailing. She was not required to stand any watches. “We had calms and storms during the race and the winds were never very steady,” she said. “It was not easy to drink a cup of hot coffee and there were a few scalds. Most of us felt a bit off with seasickness about two days before entering Akaroa harbour.” An outdoor girt from a mountaineering and ski-ing family, Miss Wigley is used to “roughing it” and the only thing she really missed was her daily shower. “I always felt sticky with salt, even after a wash in sea water,” she said. The well-equipped Entreaty had a modem pressure stove, but no-one felt like big meals during the race. “We had bread and cheese, boiled eggs, packet soups and tinned fruit mostly,” she said.

The yacht was placed j fourth on handicap. “We had a wonderful crew; and there was a great team spirit aboard from the skip- i per, Mr David Gould, down,”: she said. Before the trip to Wellington, Miss Wigley had sailed many times in Timaru har-i bour and around Pigeon Bay, | but never to sea. The 19-year-old fine arts student re-; placed a crew member of the Entreaty, who was unable to go, and proved so capable on the voyage to Wellington she was invited to stay aboard for the race. “Frankly, I don’t think a woman is strong enough physically to be a crew member in a sea race," she said “Cruising is a different matter. There are not all those changes of sail. I would now i love to go on a world cruise.” But not she added, in an all-woman crew.