RAWHITI
RAWHITI DESIGNED
Arch Logan BUILT
Logan Bros 1905
LOA
54ft (16.5m) LWL
37ft 6in (11.4m) BEAM
9ft 8in (2.9m) DRAUGHT
7ft 4in (2.2m)
Above right: Rawhiti in Sydney Harbour, date unknown, under her original Fife rig
In 1990 Wayne Hurst was her second saviour when he undertook a major rebuild, unfortunately using modern glues, stainless-steel fastenings and lots of glassfibre. But nonetheless he did save her from the bulldozer which was the alternative serious option. Brent Balemi then bought her and sailed this beautiful classic in modern drag until 2003 with his wife and family. A couple of years earlier Greg Lee and his brother-in-law Sam Stubbs had seen her and thought she would be a great family yacht for their two young families to enjoy, before they began to consider any serious ideas about restoring her. A little later they went along to a shed party during the restoration of Tawera and were hooked on the classics. A year later Rawhiti was still in the yacht broker’s window and after some careful guidance by Robert Brooke, one of New Zealand’s leading yachting restoration experts, Rawhiti was theirs. Greg and Sam were then introduced to Peter Brookes, who in 1999 had returned to New Zealand from Maldon, England, where he had honed his skills on the restoration of a number of the West Solent Class (CB187) and Metre yachts.
34 CLASSIC BOAT FEBRUARY 2012
Kicking off a project on this scale is fraught with difficulties, but Peter was able to break down the task into bite-sized chunks in such a way as to give Greg and Sam the confidence that they would not get halfway through the project and run out of money. Greg retired as a lawyer in Auckland and undertook the design and installation of the plumbing and electrical systems, as well as being the chief researcher and gofer, not to forget the painstaking lesser jobs that a shipwright does best to delegate. Sadly, Sam and his family, for personal reasons, had to pull out of the project halfway through. Greg Lee and Peter Brookes were in many ways peas from the same pod. Both were meticulous in their planning and execution of anything they undertook and they quickly developed a close working relationship, demanding that every aspect of the project be undertaken to the highest standard.
It was accepted all along that there were going to be unforeseen aspects of the project, and sure enough not long into the schedule of work they came across a major setback when they found the stem timber adjacent to the bobstay fitting was cracked right through and in need of
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