BOATS AT THE CLUB
This is another in the series of articles aimed at providing you with an insight into new boats and other boats of interest at the Club. Contact Pat Catley through the Club if you are interested in having your boat featured here. The mast on Cygnet is deck-stepped with two sets of angled spreaders. The 9/10 rig has a high-aspect main and an overlapping genoa on a furler.The galley consists of a two burner stove, oven and grill and twin stainless steel sinks (very deep and vertical-sided) are mounted in the island unit amidships.While underway this layout provides lots of comfortable bracing positions for preparing meals. Cygnet also has a 120 litre fridge. The boat’s two-cabin layout means Cygnet has a big bathroom and a deep and large lazarette on the starboard side of the cockpit.The bathroom is big with a sink and toilet and includes a vast wet hanging locker and a hand held shower.The ETAP’s hull has a longish waterline and the waterline beam is almost 700mm less than the overall beam. The keel is a cast-iron fin with bulb and the rudder is mounted well towards the transom of the boat making her easy to sail. Cygnet has a 29hp Volvo Penta diesel which, at 2000 revs cruising speed, is very quiet, a further advantage of the hull-within-a-hull design.The helm position is excellent.You can sit centrally on the humped seat, stand with the leeward foot supported by the angled cockpit floor or, as the boat heels, move to the cockpit seat and because the stern is quite narrow, brace your feet on the opposite seat. ETAP Yachting was bought by Dehler in 2008 which unfortunately went into administration during the GFC and shut down the ETAP brand. Not many were sold in Australia due to their high price but there are quite a number sailing in Europe.Tom and Liz feel very fortunate to have found their ETAP 37s only as far away as Queensland!
CYGNET CYCSA member Tom Melville and his wife Liz are delighted with their ETAP 37s Cygnet that they brought into the Club last year from Queensland. A big selling point for Liz and Tom was the internal layout. Liz was immediately taken with the huge, almost pilothouse windows at the front of the main saloon which provide lots of natural light. Tom is over six foot tall and wanted a yacht he could stand up in. The ETAP 37s has standing head room of 6’6” in the main saloon, sloping down to 5’11” at the forward bulkhead. The extra safety associated with the ‘esky’ like construction was also a big bonus. The Belgian ETAP Yachting company built a range of quality yachts using a double-hull building method which produces a boat that is stiff, quiet, dry and yes, unsinkable. The gap between the two hull skins is filled with closed-cell polyurethane foam. The closed-cell format minimises water absorption. The idea is that if the boat is flooded it will float with the water at about the level of the settees in the main saloon. ETAP’s unsinkable criteria were adapted from a French maritime authority and states that, when flooded, the boat should have freeboard of not less than three percent of its LOA. The boat must also be capable of sailing when flooded and the righting moment must enable the boat to recover when the crew is on the leeward side and it is heeled to 90 degrees. An unusual feature of Cygnet is the mainsheet traveller. It can be removed and stored below. It fits onto two pegs and is held in place by cotter pins, the work of a few seconds to install or remove. This gives much more space in the cockpit while moored and entertaining guests or if sailing for pleasure rather than performance.
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As a boy Tom was lucky to have three uncles who owned sailing dinghies providing him with his first yachting experiences. He sailed on a Heron, a Flying Eleven and a Mirror but did not gain racing experience until later. In his teenage years Tom started windsurfing just as the sport was growing rapidly in the late 1970s and early ‘80s. He raced off Henley beach, on Lake Bonney and in Rose Bay at an intervarsity regatta. In the early ‘90s Tom crewed on Matador for Jack Nealy here at the CYCSA and loved it. A memorable night was a Twilight race where the Ferrari pit crew (from the Grand-Prix) came out on Matador on a windy and quite rough evening and all felt a bit green! Over the last 15 years Tom and Liz have had a series of runabouts which provided lots of fun on the water on the Coorong, up the Murray, on Kangaroo Island and in Coffin Bay with their children, family and friends. A trip to the Whitsundays a few years ago with cousins from Melbourne re-ignited Tom’s interest in keel boats. In late 2018 Graeme and Gay Footer were very hospitable and had Tom crewing on Marnico. In 2019 Tom also crewed on Rocksalt for Denby Steele together with Denby’s sister Kirsten and her husband Dave.Tom, Denby and Kristen have known each other since their indsurfing days back in the mid1980s. Liz had little experience of sailing before meeting Tom but had boating experience through scuba diving. She took part in the ‘Essential Boating Course for Women’ run by the CYCSA in March 2019 and found this course invaluable with Rod Hunter explaining a lot of sailing terminology and theory in the classroom.The hands-on experience on Academy 1 was a highlight of the course. When Tom and Liz saw an ETAP 37s for sale it piqued their interest. However, the yacht was in Tin Can Bay in Queensland.The owner, Mike, put Tom in contact with Kate and Joe, both CYCSA members who had been interested in the yacht previously. Kate and Joe had test sailed the yacht, but ultimately decided against buying it.They were very impressed with it however which gave Tom and Liz the impetus to fly up to Hope Island for a test sail. It was love at first sight!
