THIRTY-DAY TRIP ACROSS TASMAN

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 154, 25 March 1939, Page 12

THIRTY-DAY TRIP ACROSS TASMAN

Strange Yawl Reaches Auckland PROVISIONS RUN LOW Trying Experience For Crew Of Two By Telegraph—Press Association. AUCKLAND, March 24. Flying a tattered ensign of the United States of America, a strange yawl slipped unexpectedly into Auckland Harbour late this afternoon. She came from Sydney, and the voyage across the lasman took 30 days. On board were two very hungry young men, one a Netherlander and the other Swedish by birth and a naturalized Australian tor the last eight or nine days. They had been living on potatoes, fried onions and pancakes, made of flour and watei. All other supplies were exhausted.

The owner is the Netherlander, Mr. Frank Dona, and the Australian-Swede is Mr. Oscar Strom. Each said lie had suffered from sickness because of their restricted diet, which was relieved only briefly when they put into Spirits Bay and found there a solitary camper who gave them a loaf of 'bread and a couple of apples. Both also bore on their legs severe abrasions caused when they were flung about their small craft by the heavy weather that, together with irritating calms, prevented them from reaching Auckland on the date thej planned, March 8. Mr. Dona said the depression caused him to put into realization a dream he had already cherished and u ith his brother Pete he went to Seattle and began to build a boat. The task took him a vear. When his yawl was finally launched in 1935 he named her Mane after his mother and set sail for Alaska. A year ago the two brothers left Honolulu and sailed to Tahiti, going thence to Samoa, Fiji, and finally to Sydney, where they stayed three months. On' February 22 be set sail for Auckland. “Meanwhile,” lie said, “my brother Pete had decided to stay in Sydney where he found work. So we parted after sailing for more than three years together. I took on Oscar and here I am, though it took so long to get round that devil of a North Cape that I began to despair of reaching here.”

Head winds and then calms were the Marie’s lot for the whole of the voyage. Good progress was made for the •rst few days, but then they ran into a storm, and were hove-to for five days, in which time they were taken northward, far off their course. Then for three days the Tasman was as peaceful as the Waitemata, and they stayed almost where they were. After that there were more head winds and they lost a greater distance than they gained. The Marie sighted’ the New Zealand coast almost a week after they had hoped to be in Auckland. They tried to sail round North Cape and were foiled by more head winds and calms. Finally they were forced to use the auxiliary engine with which the Marie is fitted. Mr. Dona had shipped 44 gallons of petrol when he left Sydney, and he had intended to reserve it for harbour work, but the rapidly diminishing supplies of fresh food decided him to draw on the engine to get past the cape. For the last few days they bad rationed the water to a few “fingers” for drinking and to a splash for washing. The Marie is only 34ft. long, with a beam of lift, and a draught of Oft.