A Lifetime of Classics

With a lot more life behind me now than ahead, I find myself reminiscing lately and realizing that there has just always been a wooden boat in my midst. I will try to summarise how all these salty, soulful friends have played an important part in the fabric of my life; however each paragraph could be a chapter and some could be even be a book.

JANE COOMBS

I was very young when my father completed his navigation training on the clipper Cutty Sark at Greenwich, London, and went on to commission the 22ft clinker-built Kestrel named after my mother, “Francesca”. One of my earliest memories is playing in the mahogany shavings at the boatyard where she was built. Once she was launched, most weekends from spring to autumn were spent “messing about in boats” out of Birdham Pool in Chichester Harbour, on the south coast of England. Every winter was spent varnishing boat parts at home. The smell of the oozing, black tidal mud and and the frantic slapping of halyards on masts, can still, oddly, make me swoon with nostalgia. Back in the 60s most of the boats were still built of wood and we waved when we saw another. How things have changed!

My mother, a poor traveller in any mode of transport, never took to sailing. I think she found a great deal of truth in the saying that it was “long periods of boredom interspersed with moments of sheer terror”. She was an avid “armchair sailor”, however, and fully encouraged her loved ones to have adventures on her behalf. Unbeknown to me, she signed me up on an extensive waiting list with the UK Sail Training Association when I was 10. By chance my name came to the top of the list in 1976, offering me the opportunity to sail on the 134ft three-masted topsail schooner Sir Winston Churchill, from Bermuda to New York for the Bicentennial celebrations. At eighteen this was indeed an eye-popping, life-changing experience and by the time it was over all thoughts of following a career in art and design had entirely vanished in my wake. above: Our first day boat Bewitched below: Our family yacht, the Kestrel Francesca

Following a short, restless return to chilly England, I answered an advertisement in Yachting Monthly and set sail for Puerto Gibraltar in Spain that autumn on a 40ft Hilliard schooner named Moronel, with a wonderful bunch of arty folk. Despite stormy weather, we had many memorable adventures along the way and are still firm friends to this day.

Soon, I had my heart set on reaching the Caribbean so I set out on a rather ill-fated voyage on a 35ft teak doubleender called Nutkin that fell well short of the destination Tragically, after ten days of storms, blown sails and poor navigation, we were driven ashore on the Atlantic coast of Morocco in a terrifying bona fide shipwreck!

Luckily we three were all safe but I do not recommend arriving in an Islamic country sporting black underwear, a lifejacket and waist length blond hair!

Licking my wounds and against my mother’s wishes, I returned to Spain where I had the honour of assisting with the restoration of Conner O’Brian’s legendary 42ft Saoirse. She was the first yacht to circumnavigate the world by way of the three great capes between 1923 and 1925 in an age when only square-rigged grain ships were plying those routes.

Disappointment at being unable, due to timing, to join as delivery crew on the 1938 Ivanhoe, turned quickly to relief when three days later she was impounded in Algeciras and found to be carrying considerable amounts of drugs; all involved were sent to jail! Lady Fortuna was definitely watching over me.

At this time the beautiful schooner Marie Pierre (now known as Aschanti 1V of Vegesack) was the ultimate superyacht of the day based, in Jose Banus. I made a promise to my 20-yearold self that I would someday sail on this magnificent vessel but she proved to play an even bigger roll in my future.

Around the age of 21 I secured my first paid position as deckhand on a 65ft schooner Hawaita (apparently named for the first utterance on waking hungover after the post purchase celebration!) For that season in the South of France, I had no bunk when on charter so I slept in the bowsprit net and on the galley floor if it rained but I was utterly in heaven.

Whilst helping some friends on a Loch Fyne Skiff named Currach in San Antonio, Ibiza, I met my late husband, the legendary Kenny Coombs, and jumped ship on to his Norwegian gaff rigged ketch Hollandia. The next two years of my life were filled with many adventures from the Mediterranean to where we finally left her in Harlingen, Holland.

Not long after Kenny and I sailed into English Harbour in 1983, he was offered the position to captain the 117ft barque Marques. Impoverished at the time, we gave it long consideration but feeling under-qualified he turned it down. We were stunned to hear not long after that she had been driven under in a white squall north of Bermuda with the tragic loss of 19 of her 28 crew.( including several Antiguans). Lady Fortuna looked after us again.

In 1985 we took command of the beautiful 75ft Herreshoff schooner Vixen II and we were back in our element. It was also not long after this that I fell in love with the little 26ft Harrison Butler Cora at Antigua Slipway and she became ours. It has been a 35 year love affair that has bought me so much joy.

In 1987 the Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta was conceived aboard Aschanti of Saba (the aforementioned ex-Marie Pierre) over a few glasses of rum with Master Mariner Uli Pruesse and fellow enthusiasts. Uli became our dear friend till he sadly passed; the Regatta, meanwhile, thrived and our lives were shaped for the next 30 years. I also had my youthful aspiration to sail on this magnificent schooner granted numerous times.

Our next classic charge was the robust 80ft gaff ketch Vileehi, built in 1930. Now this paragraph about the two years spent onboard could well become a book one day, so bizarre was its nature! Sadly she sunk in 2019 in Port Saint Louis du Rhone but I hear she may have been raised and restoration begun.

After Vileehi, the sprightly 61ft Alden yawl Lucia A came into our lives and we were fortunate enough to take part in the entire Mediterranean classic yacht regatta circuit and feeder races two years in a row. She was a joy to sail and could take the fierce Meltemis and Mistrals when her narrower British rivals were being knocked flat in the water.

And finally there was the creme de la creme. Kenny was head-hunted to be Sailing Master on the 95ft William Fife schooner Adventuress, following a complete re-build at Rockport Marine, Maine. I proudly became the Minister of her elegant Interior. What followed was two years of great sailing, racing, entertaining and “harbour burns”, involving many local inhabitants who remembered her well from the early charter days as the Bermudan yawl Isobel. Dear Kenny passed away suddenly in October 2013 but she was the perfect, top notch last command for a great classic seafarer.

Since then Cora and I age together as gracefully as we can with a bit of patching here and there. Occasionally I guiltily consider perhaps switching to a more modern, easier to maintain replica, especially during yard periods! But will I …. really?

Whatever I decide I will always have a proclivity for wooden boats. I will be found lurking around traditional boatyards or seeking out the few wooden masts at boat shows. Long after my sailing days are done I’ll relish the conversations to be had with the genuine people that keep them alive. I may die with a varnish brush in my hand bringing out the beauty in some unique piece of wood. We don’t change. Our characters and passions are formed early and become condensed like an excellent, reduced French sauce.

I am very grateful for the connections I have made in life through wooden boats, the rip-roaring sailing and most of all Lady Fortuna for allowing me reach to reach this epoch safely.