OCEAN EPIC

Hokitika Guardian, 19 March 1932, Page 6

OCEAN EPIC

SKIFF CROSSES PACIFIC.

WONDER VOYAGE FROM SYDNEY

SUVA, March 3

Never since the savage tribes from the. Far East broke into the Pacific, and with their eocoanut compass threaded the mysterious seas, until they settled in Fiji, Rarotonga and finally New Zealand. has. such a; story of the sea been unfolded as happened yesterday afternoon, when a little sailing boat slipped through tlie reef passage and came to anchor in the entrance of Walu Bay, Suva.

It was some time before the Customs authorities and the police realised that her© was; a lone man who had sailed over .2500 miles in a cockleshell of a sailing skiff (as he described his craft), just 18 feet long, with mainsail and jib and with" only half a deck. Tlie owner and crew of this craft is Fred Rohe lie, a native of Windau, Latvia, who after 20 years in Australia, longed to see his homeland, and with scant cash ventured forth from Sydney in this small.sailing craft, without any seafaring experience and full of trust in himself and in his ability to win through.

Home-made Instruments,

Earlier adventures, like Pigeon in his small vessel ’ tlie Seafarer, bad seaworthy craft and; scientific instruments, but Rebelle had none. His sextant was blade by himself, out of a bit of fret saw marked into seconds, with a Bo,s Scout glass and a small thumb screw. His chart was. home-made and only gave park of the Fiji group, so that he ieport'ed to; the- Customs that he had found .an unexplored island, which later turned out to lie Ono-i-lau. His patent log consisted of a piece of wood with a tin ‘(twister” as a tail, and. the rope aas fastened to a clock, partly relieved of some of ifs works, so that every minute, recorded on the clock meant one knot of'speed. “Yes,”, chuckled Fred, “and it brought me'to' within seven miles of Fiji.” His commissariat consisted ot flour, 'rice, sugar, tea, etc., in tightly closed tins, and his water supply was only 20 gallons held in kerosene tins, some hapjpily r coated with bitumen, which kept the water sweet, but the bare tins rusted so that after some time, the water went bad.

But the.greatest wonder of this wonder voyage was the fact that when halfway to" Suva, the centre board dropped off. aird the little craft; only drawing two feet would not stand up to the wind, and lie bad to run far out of his course, down near New Zealand, so as to catch the wind from the south, and then he hit the 18ft 'meridian and ran elite north, feeling rightly that lie would s'ui'fely strike.some land.)' ;

Landed on an Island

The navigator left Sydney on Decem-

ber 30 and arrived in Suva on March 2. Running short of water he had lancleft on the island of Yanutlia, where he was

hospitably entertained by the natives, who supplied him with fruit and water. Asked' how he had fared, he said he had never .missed three hot meals daily. He .had,even cooked fresh bread by steaming thp, dough. He had a small hood of canvas, on the after-end of the small deck.,Here just abaft tlie mast he lias a small (homely compass screwed into the deck.; A pocket-chronometer completed, his; “scientific” outfit.,

A Vi,til a jnew fin on his boat he hopes to, sail .for Samoa, Honolulu and Los Angeles in two or three weeks. Fred ..Rybelle is a quiet, slow speaking man, who neither drinks nor smokes, and his great love is poetry. During the voyage lie said lie had read Longfellow, frontways and hackwavs, and then a ]l over again.

He encountered three storms during the trip, one being the hurricane that ran down near tile New Hebrides, and yet the Elaine never shipped a sea. ‘’‘Yes’’" added Ihe adventurer, “and ? believe 1 was right in the dead centre of it as the wind suddenly stopped for iih hour and then blow with great, force from the opposite direction.” "To look at the boat, causes one to wonder liow i(, came through. The Voyage' faults as tin ocean epic.