Capricorn II of Lyttelton

2007-11-21T19:26:00.001-08:00

I purchased Capricorn II of Lyttelton in 2003 and obtained a permanent live-aboard berth whilst refitting it for offshore single-handed cruising at Nelson Marina in the South Island of New Zealand.

Capricorn II is a 30' masthead sloop of Wagstaff design with a deep fin keel. She is very small but reasonably beamy for her length at 9' 6" but with a 6' 6" draft (2.04 metres) fully laden.

Apart from a few trips to Lyttelton near Christchurch, around Tasman and Golden Bays, throughout the Marlborough Sounds and to Wellington across Cook Strait, it took me until mid 2006 to bring Capricorn and her one-man crew up to standard to go offshore cruising.

Starting off as 6-berth (why on earth do designers say things like that? who are they kidding?) I redesigned the for'd compartment for all the gear which could tolerate wet conditions; sails, drogues, pumps and spare equipment such a yacht gear, food, clothing and bedding all in plastic bags. The bathroom and heads are also up forward with an overhead hatch so I can never imagine why anyone would want to sleep there. That's got rid of two berths, now for the quarter berths! Pity really, because when I was slimmer I always thought these were the best berths on a boat, but now I am my age and volume I find the cabin berths are more comfortable. So I stripped out the quarter berths, put spare tanks underneath and trays to take sliding crates for, on the port side, six months provisions (tinned food, etc.) and, on the starboard side, books, navigational equipment and reference literature next to the chart table. That left me with a double dinette berth in the cabin to starboard and galley to port; so out of 30' I ended up with a 10' one-berth boat to live in!

The boat itself was brought up to NZ Category One standard (required for departure under NZ registration) and set up for single-handed use, whilst I attempted to bring myself up to par on seamanship, heavy weather sailing, SSB usage and celestial navigation. Although Capricorn was brought up to Category One standard, to save money I registered her in Britain since I intended to cruise internationally. So Capricorn is registered in Cardiff, South Wales.

I became extremely interested in celestial navigation in the 1980s and still feel very strongly about the need for all yachties to know how to navigate without electronics; GPS and chart plotters are marvellous devices and easily seduce one into relying on them but not everyone can manage if they fail and astoundingly, unless I am mistaken, there are no regulations anywhere requiring a skipper to cope without them! Back in the 1960s all we had was a magnetic compass, speed & distance log and a sextant - all the rest was paper charts and mathematics. We had to learn coastal navigation and then basic celestial followed by the more complex techniques to get our YachtMasters certificates. Throughout the years I have become incredibly impressed and reliant on my GPS to the point where I carry spare GPS units and multiple laptops to act as chart plotters! The accuracy is wonderful but I often say to myself "What would I do if such-and-such failed right now?". To have experience of navigating without electronic aids is a huge comfort and I try to keep my old skills honed by practicing every now and then.

Unfortunately, when I was just about ready to set off, I broke my left fore arm in July 2006. It was a rather nasty break, both bones had to be pinned and it took a long time to heal because of my age (inside this overweight 60+ year old are two slim 30 year olds trying to get out!). In October I finally got the go-ahead from my superb surgeon in Nelson, lifted the boat out in November, rebuilt the mast (first rebuild since 1976), repainted the hull together with normal annual maintenance and dropped her back in just before Christmas 2006.

I decided to head off from Nelson in February, cruise the east coast of the North Island and head off to the SW Pacific from Opua sometime around the end of the southern cyclone season (May/June 2007).

Capricorn Cruising

Capricorn II of Lyttelton