AUSTRALIA
In Australia yachting has had, and in some places still has, a hard fight to assert itself against the exciting sport of horse-racing. The oldest yachting community is that stationed at Sydney, New South Wales, where the two leading clubs date back to the years 1863 and 1867, viz. the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, and the Prince Alfred Yacht Club. Yacht-racing, however, was carried on long before those years, and perhaps owing to the fine piece of water, some twelve square miles in area, enclosed within Port Jackson Heads, which lends itself to aquatic pursuits, yachting here has taken greater hold of the inhabitants than at any other place in the Southern Ocean. No finer boat sailers exist anywhere than at Sydney. There are a goodly number of yachts connected with the Port, and no money or care has been spared to keep the Sydney fleet up to date. Both Messrs. G. L. Watson and W. Fife, jun., to say nothing of other well-known designers, have from time to time given a helping hand towards furthering this end. The classes, however, which give the most sport, and which can draw together 5,000 or more onlookers during a racing day, are those that include the open boats. These are altogether a speciality of Sydney.
The limits of the three principal classes are—for the
First Class.—24 ft. length, with not less than 7 ft. beam, and 3 ft. depth.
Second Class.—19 ft. length, with not less than 6.5 ft. beam, and 30 in. depth.
Third Class.—17 ft. length, with not less than 5 ft. beam, and 20 in. depth.
These boats are all centreboarders. When in Australia the writer was shown the 'Victor' as the finest example at that time of the large class. She was 34 ft. long, had 8 ft. beam, and a depth of 3 ft. A description of her was given in 'Hunt's Yachting Magazine' some years ago. She was built of colonial cedar, and of ½-in. planking. Her frames were of bent elm, the sternpost and knees of tea-tree, while her keel was of tallow-wood. Her draught aft was 21 in., and forward 2 in., with the crew of sixteen men on board. She carried a racing centreboard of ¼-inch plating, 9 ft. long, and 6 ft. deep, with a double drop, allowing the plate when lowered to hang with its length horizontal to the keel. For ordinary occasions the racing centreboard was unshipped, and a smaller one substituted in its place. No dead ballast is allowed in these boats, and two air-tight or cork cushions are carried under the thwarts, because no boat is permitted to start for a race unless she possesses sufficient buoyancy to keep afloat should she happen to turn turtle or capsize. The 'Victor' was fitted, like all the boats of her class, with stringers running fore and aft, about two feet from the gunwale, which allowed the crew to sit double-banked, the outside contingent on the weather gunwale, with their feet under the stringer, the inside on the stringer itself. When shifting from the starboard to the port tack, or vice versâ, both outside and inside men go over at the same time, the inside men becoming outside, and the outside of the previous tack becoming inside. The 'Mantura' and 'Craigielee' are also fine specimens of the 24-feet class. Photographs of these two boats under way are hung in the billiard-room of the Royal Clyde Yacht Club House.
The wood these boats are planked with is fine, hard, durable stuff; and lends itself, when finished off, to the formation of a beautifully smooth surface, which readily takes a good polish. This colonial cedar is used for deck-fittings, &c., and takes the place of mahogany with us. New South Wales is certainly very bountiful to yacht-builders in its supply of timber for all purposes connected with their trade, though New Zealand has to supply the pine-wood for yachts' decks. For floors three native woods are employed—honeysuckle, white mahogany, and tea-tree—while iron bark, so well known for its value in the building of whalers, is excellent for knees and suchlike. All these woods offer strong, naturally grown shapes, and forks of the most acute angles. Spotted gum is generally employed for bent timbers; another wood is found in the tallow-tree, which is very suitable for keels, owing to its hard yet oily nature.
From its position the harbour suffers from uncertain winds, but should there be a clear sky and a hard north-easter there need be no fear that the racing will not prove of the very best. The regatta course forms an obtuse-angled triangle, and as a short stretch has to be taken across the mouth of the harbour, it not infrequently happens that a very uncomfortable sea has to be negotiated before the second buoy can be rounded for the run home.
Hobson's Bay is a much larger tract of water, being close upon ninety miles in circumference. It is not, however, navigable in all parts owing to extensive shoals. These, though very much in the way of navigation, help to form a kind of breakwater to the anchorages off Sandridge and Williamstown, which are open to southerly and south-westerly winds, and would accordingly, but for them, be often swept by very heavy seas. The principal yacht club is the Royal Yacht Club of Victoria, established at Melbourne; but there are numerous small yacht and boat clubs scattered about the colony at various towns, such as Sandhurst, Bendigo and Ballarat, where there are lagoons or lakes varying in size from three to many miles in circumference. The Albert Park Yacht Club, at Melbourne, is a good type of one of these inland institutions. The yachts or boats employed on the Albert and Ballarat lagoons range from 14 feet to 30 feet over all, They have great beam, and because the depth of water is as a rule shallow, have rarely over 4 feet to 5 feet draught. Good sport is obtained out of them, and races are continually taking place.
At Geelong, which is a fine natural harbour about forty miles from Melbourne, and off the open anchorages of St. Kilda and Brighton, yachts are moored during the season, and at these places are to be found any number of yachting enthusiasts.
The club course is a very good one for trying the respective merits of competing yachts, and many an exciting race has been sailed over it. Intercolonial regattas have been held, which have proved great successes, and for these, owners of yachts of 40 tons and under think nothing of working their way from port to port over an expanse of a thousand miles or so of ocean. The yachts built in the colony are framed and planked with the wood of the red gum-tree, which is, in fact, the only wood the colony produces that is of any real value for the yacht-builder's use. It takes the place of larch or pitch-pine with us.
Both Adelaide, in South Australia, and Auckland, in New Zealand, possess yacht clubs, and are the homes of many keen lovers of yacht racing. The Royal South Australian Yacht Squadron, at the former place, has been in existence for almost a quarter of a century. The New Zealand yachtsmen can boast of possessing in their midst perhaps the finest woods in the world, and nothing can beat the kauri pine for decks, though in England and other countries it is generally known only for the excellent masts and spars that can be got out of it. A Scotch builder once reported that he found it very apt to twist and warp; but most likely the wood had been cut badly, for that is not the general opinion regarding it in the colonies, where it is almost invariably employed for decks. New Zealand, however, has been treated at length in the preceding chapter.