03 Dec 07 Sailing across the Nullarbor
IT may well be the most expensive - and dusty - small-boat campaign in the history of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race.
Determined skipper Steve Humphries is now resigned to having to Truck his little 34-footer Huckleberry across the Nullarbor Plain after being left stranded off the coast of Western Australia this week.
Humphries has organised a Large Truck to arrive in the sleepy town of Esperance to transport his beloved yacht more than 4000km across the Australian desert to Sydney at a cost of about $10,000.
By the time Humphries arrives for the Boxing Day start of the 628nm classic he will have covered the equivalent of more than two Sydney to Hobart races - on the road.
But the effort will be worth it for the 56-year-old skipper who has long dreamed of contesting the Hobart race in his own yacht - one of the smallest in this year’s bluewater classic.
“I’m not giving up,” Humphries said from Esperance yesterday. “The way I feel about it is that the plan has always been to be in Hobart before New Year and that’s the plan I’m sticking to. This is just a little hiccup.”
Humphries and a delivery crew of two set sail from Perth last week. But after six days at sea - which included being caught in gale force winds up to 50 knots - he steered his little boat to shore.
With his fellow sailors now heading home, Humphries will wait for the arrival of the truck next week before escorting his yacht to Sydney.
“I’m not leaving my baby alone. I’m going all the way with her,” Humphries said. The trip is expected to take about four days - far less than the 21 days he had planned at sea for the delivery trip.
Once safe in Sydney, Humphries’ race crew of five, including 23-year-old son Forest, will prepare the yacht for the Hobart. And despite all his efforts in getting Huckleberry to Sydney, even Humphries has rated his little boat little or no chance of making an impressions in the race.
“She’s a 30-year-old boat. There’s no way a boat of that age has any pretensions of doing well. For us it’s just all about getting there.”
In January 2006 the round-the-world racer Brasil 1 was transported from Fremantle to Melbourne on a similar road trip after being dismasted in the Southern Ocean during the Volvo Ocean race.
The keel and mast were taken off the 70-footer for the drive and the yacht resumed the round-the-world race less than a week later.
Tags: Trucks for sale, Volvo trucks
