INTREPED VOYAGERS REACH QUEENSLAND

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 210, 24 November 1927, Page 11

INTREP ED VOYAGERS REACH QUEENSLAND

BATTERED B\ v STORMS ON 2.000-MILE TRIP IN 3i>-FOOT YAWL

I MATTERED by gah?s and seas. * the 35-foot yawl lona sailed resolutely from New Zealand to the Queensland coast. For about a month her crew of two Auckland men did not see land and they confess to having been “played in” when the 2,<XDo»mile voyage ended.

With the idea of shell-fishing tui trading in New Guinea, two Aucdtland men. Roy Tango and Leslie Eide, le££ I Auckland in the lona, a 35-foot yawl | formerly known as the Gallant, on September 3. Nothing was Y.eard of them after they left Mongonui on September 13 until a cable was received from Mackay. Queensland. DARING VOYAGE In: letters to bis mother, K;dt la s described the during voyage. After “hittir\g the trail” to the North C.no from Miongonui, the yawl ran in 10 gale had to put into WluUuwhiw i for five days. There the crew cui each other’s hair, did the washing ;.r. t was entertained by the local schoolmaster. On September 21 the lona headed lor Norfolk Island, but she met <i winds. “For two days we punch- d on in a howling gale.” says Eide. “l c after that we .had a great sail v. : a the wind free." The idea of going to Norfolk was gjven up and a e m>was steered for tV«' Queensland « • “We sighted larwd last Sunday, li first we had seen since we left New Zealand,” he says, in a letter dat« i Mackay. October 3?. “Both of us were played out. and we ran for the nearest bay, which proved to he 115 miles from any port. We struck a | and trees beyond, filled with nil kinds of birds and butterflies. We found two turtles on the beach.” UP THE COAST. Contrary* winds kept the voyagers in the bay for a few days. They explored the country afoot. Hide says that he has not worn shirt a r shot s for 20 days, and he is as brown and tough as a salamander. When the wind changed the lona ran up the coast, logging 45 mi&'s on a Saturday afternoon and 70 mil<\s on the Sunday. At Mackay, reached on October 17. the ship was visited by the doctor, Customs officials and a police sergeant, whose uniform <\f “khaki with the hat turned up at the side” appealed to Eide. Mackay ho* describes as “a great village full of dust, pubs, motor-cars and snappylooking houses built on stilts.” The voyagers profited by Queensland hospitality, visiting a sugar plantation

where they were loaded with raspberries, strawberries, paw-paws, oranges, greens, jam and sugar. TROPIC ISLANDS With the sail spread again Bide was fascinated by many islands “with white sandy beaches and coconut palms, Lnd all kinds of trees holding queer-looking birds.” They took on a load of coconuts, the milk of which Eide predicts is to become the main drink and did some fishing. Two green parrot-fish were caught. «’aliing at the Lindeman Islands, they were presented with a shoulder of mutton by the owner. Bowen, which was reached on October 28, is described as “the rot'.enest, most miserable one-eyed dump of a. farmyard with a dozen palms along ;» beach covered with beer bottles and dirty kids.” Cows, horses, goats, fowls, children, drunk and two i »torcars were gathered on the wide grassgrown main street. Rats had been caught from a barge at Townsville, which reminded Eide of New Plymouth. At Palm Islands, a home for aborigines, they were shown round and given supplies. The lona arrived at Cairns on November 9, and the crew is thinking of laying the ship up at Mossman until the hurricane season is oyer, in two months* time, and getting jobs in a sugar mill.