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Rebuilding the Kalinda

A mid-life career change saw the restoration of a vessel with a long and varied history

Kalinda is one of a number of classic Halvorsen cruisers moored at the Kuring-gai Motor Yacht Club (KMYC). The Club occupies a magnificent headland intersecting Cowan Waters and Coal and Candle Creek among the natural wonders of Sydney’s Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park.

Kalinda is a 47-foot bridge deck cruiser redolent with the charm and style of the 1930s, although she was actually designed and built in 1950. Designated Job Number 977 by Lars Halvorsen Sons, the cruiser has a fascinating history that culminates as a luxury charter vessel with her current owner John Spry, and his family.

John also has an interesting history with boats, particularly with Halvorsens. It all started when he worked part time as a charter boat skipper on Sydney Harbour during the 1970s. He obtained his Harbour and River Master and Coxswain Certificates before setting up an electronic engineering business called Questek with two friends. Along the way John and his wife Debbie raised a family and owned a series of Halvorsens. 

TIME FOR CHANGE

In 2004 John sold his share of Questek, but realised he was too young to retire totally and decided to seek a new qualification. He was keen on woodworking and through his Halvorsen ownerships, he knew Russell Tyler, owner of the Cottage Point Boatshed at that time. Russell offered John a four-year Mature-Age Shipwright Apprenticeship, which he started when he was 57.

The final year project was a restoration of Sea Wave, a 30-foot Halvorsen. John found the experience enjoyable and won the prize for the highest average marks for the whole course! He commented, “It was a very interesting course and doing up the 30-footer gave me the courage and skills to later take on the Kalinda project.”

KALINDA’S BEGINNINGS

Shortly after being launched, cruiser 977 headed off to an international career on the 3 May 1950, accompanied by Carl Halvorsen and his family. Heading for the USA as part of an export drive, Kalinda travelled on the Kanangoora at a reported freight cost of $3,000 (about $85,000 in today's money). Landing in San Francisco, the cruiser and her illustrious crew were soon motoring down the Californian coast to Newport Beach.

The preceding year, Carl had taken the Harvey Halvorsen designed 60-foot cruiser Tooronga to Newport Beach where she had attracted a great deal of attention. Film stars including Bob Hope and Humphrey Bogart saw Tooronga before she was purchased for $50,000 by a Mr Sanchez. 

With 977, Carl was again successful and sold her in less than a week for $34,500. Car dealer Mr Cormier was the proud new owner and promptly named her Reimroc V — he’d owned four previous vessels also christened with his name spelt backwards.

Some years later, the Halvorsen was acquired by Ray Wilcox, owner of the Washington Asphalt Company and originally come from Reno — which perhaps accounted for his reputation as a gambler. The funds to purchase Reimroc V came from a big win in a Craps dice game, so he re-named his acquisition Hardway after a winning combination in Craps. Legend says Ray threw the winning pair of dice into the bilges of Hardway — during the rebuild, the dice were found and they remain aboard to this day.

Hardway was kept on Ray’s Washington property where it deteriorated as he aged. A Seattle boat broker bought it but failed to make full payment. Ray attempted to re-possess it and a legal battle ensued, but Ray died before it was settled. The boat was eventually retrieved by Ray’s family and sold in 1984 to Charlie Life.

A shipwright in Seattle, Charlie used the boat as a live-aboard. He restored the boat with love and care and made some modifications including changing the front cabin into an office. He also installed a furnace for winter and added a laundry, a dishwasher, a trash compactor and a cat flap for the family pet!

Nancy Bailey bought Hardway in 1991, and seems to have been quite the character, also living aboard with her Maltese Poodle. Nancy changed the boat’s name again and is quoted explaining, “I immediately changed the name to Redhead and yes, I’m a red head. I joked that I’d done things the ‘hard way’ all my life and ‘red head’ had the same meaning to me as ‘hard way’.”

“The name change was the first of several controversial decisions I made as skipper. I installed a fabulous hot tub in the cockpit, changed her canvas to a rich warm burgundy, removed the ugly beige curtains and installed pleated shades. I furnished her sparse interior with antiques and installed lavish deep pile mauve carpeting throughout. The ol’ boys on the dock were appalled! Charlie took great umbrage at my changes – imagine my audacity to change her from ‘salty’ to ‘elegant’! What an uproar – you’d think I’d changed the smile on the ‘Mona Lisa’,” she continued.

“After a year on Lake Union, living under a microscope where everything I did on my boat was discussed and criticised, I moved Redhead to Olympia in Puget Sound. However, the Olympia slip was not covered, and I realised upkeep would become labour-intensive, so I found a covered slip in Port Orchard. I moved my floating home there where we were very happy for the next three years. I even opened my own Yacht Brokerage ‘Bay Street Yachts’ using the silhouette of my Redhead as the company logo.”

In 1995, however, Nancy and her partner sold Redhead to buy a house. The boat was bought by the sons of Charlie Life and re-named Hardway. Both sons lived on the boat with their young families until they swapped it in 2003 for a Grand Banks 50 owned by Jack Wilkes, a pilot from Seattle. The two boats rafted up and the owners cross-decked their belongings along with exchanging boats.

 KALINDA COMES TO AUSTRALIA

In March 2007, the Spry family became aware of Hardway when Kitty (John’s daughter and source of this history) sent her parents a link to a website where the boat was advertised for sale. John’s research piqued his curiosity — the photos looked good and it was easy to see the Halvorsen cruiser had retained her character and most of her original fittings.

After emails and phone calls at all hours of the night, John eventually realised he needed to fly to Seattle. He was taken to a marina where John recalled, “I passed iconic names such as Chris Craft, Matthews, Elco, Richardson and Hacker, then at last the most iconic of all — Halvorsen! My first glimpse was of that unmistakable flared bow, that gently curving stem, then down the sheer aft to the tumble-home transom across which, in large gold letters, was her name — Hardway. In the dimness of an overcast morning, made even dimmer by the walled shed, I could make out the glow of fully varnished decks and cabin sides under a layer of dust deposited courtesy of a nearby road bridge. It was love at first sight!”

John put down a deposit but had to pressure the broker to slip the boat at short notice as he was due to fly out the next day. This was accomplished and John, an experienced shipwright, could check below the waterline.

However, many challenges had yet to be overcome. It took a great deal of time and effort for insurance and shipping, clearances to export from the USA and import into Australia, trucking from Seattle and more to be sorted. John tracked down others who had brought similar boats — one was a sister-ship to Hardway — from the USA and learnt from their experiences. By late May 2007, the Spry family were the owners, and a new era of the boat’s life was starting.

In June, John, Debbie and Kitty prepared the boat for shipping to its new home waters. They met Jack Wilkes and his wife Nora who related tales of their life aboard Hardway, and of their constant amazement at the ‘welcoming committee’ that would form on the docks everywhere she went — those welcoming her were always mesmerised by her beauty. 

For her last time on American waters, Hardway was cruised by the Spry crew to Seaview East Boatyard where a shipping cradle was made to secure the boat as deck cargo on its voyage south. The cradle was ‘overkill’ in design and construction to ensure Hardway would be fully supported. To meet Australian quarantine requirements, the boat was fumigated and then shrink-wrapped to protect it from sun, salt and pollution.

There were some last-minute dramas with the shipping as Hardway was bumped off the Hamburg Sud, bumped off another Hapag Lloyd ship, before John was told that the shipping line would not take the boat at all!

‘Plan B’ was to transport with another company — Swire — which had a ship departing 2 October from Vancouver, 400km north. On 1 October, the boat and its cradle were transported in the middle of the night on two trucks with a police escort. Alex Gow Surveyors supervised the loading and lashing down of the boat aboard the Pacific Future.

SHE HAS ARRIVED

The ship arrived in Newcastle on 12 November after being delayed by bad weather on the NSW coast. John was notified that the stevedores would be lifting Hardway off the ship at midday and he was able to go onboard earlier to remove the shrink wrap. 

Despite expectations to the contrary, the stevedores were fantastic and took the utmost care to ensure they had the lifting gear correctly placed to avoid any stress on the hull. After re-rigging several times, the ship’s crane lowered the boat into the water.

As soon as she was afloat, John, with his friend and fellow-shipwright Bob Lowe, jumped onboard with a water pump. They released the launching rigging before Hardway was towed away from the ship. As anticipated, her timbers had opened up a bit after being dry for so long and she began taking on water.

However, the inflow was a lot more than anticipated. John went below and found an alarming sight. “The once dry bilge was transformed into a set of rapids that would have done justice to an Olympic kayaking course. Water was nearly up to the floorboards and rising quickly.”

John brought the pump below. It started first pull, with an impressive flow of water going over the side. But it was not enough. Hardway began to drop at the bow, making it more difficult for the tow boat which had a 40-minute journey across Newcastle Harbour. While John kept the pump from blocking, Bob called the Water Police who had just left their base for a training exercise — which suddenly changed to a real-life emergency.

The Police arrived with two more pumps. The combined outflow of the pumps did the job and the water level started to fall. The Police boat was used as a crutch to keep Hardway afloat as she moved toward the haul-out slings waiting at the Noakes Boatyard.

Thanks to quick thinking and hard work, by 3:30pm Hardway was being lifted out of the water. The pumps were kept running until 8pm and then she was lifted onto the hardstand. By the next morning, her timbers had largely taken-up and she was back in the water with one pump running every half hour to keep the bilges under control. By sunset her own bilge pumps had sufficient capacity for the remaining leakage, and within 24 hours she was almost dry again.

That bow-down movement from the incoming water had kept the engines and electricals clear — the starter motors were removed and serviced just to be sure — and both engines were soon running and sounding good.

The next few weeks saw the Spry team getting the Halvorsen ready for the run down the coast. The crew at Noakes could not have been more helpful and accommodating. On the 3 December 2007, Hardway departed Newcastle for her KMYC mooring.

In early 2008, the Spry family renamed their Halvorsen Kalinda which is an Aboriginal woman’s name meaning ‘the sea’ or ‘lookout’. The family thought this appropriate as it reflected the boat’s connection with Australia and continued the Halvorsen tradition of naming vessels with a woman’s name.

RESTORATION BEGINS

In September 2008 an application was lodged so Kalinda so could be operated as a charter vessel. A mammoth restoration project then commenced to return the cruiser to her original layout while ensuring structural work was executed to commercial standards. All the ‘live aboard baggage’ fitted were removed and all internal spaces, including the bilges, were stripped and restored.

In July 2009, Class 1E approval was granted for the hull structure of Kalinda. Years of work followed to satisfy all the commercial requirements such as water-tight bulkheads, diesel engines, fire systems, mechanical bilge pump systems and new propeller shafts, plus, of course, the aesthetics.

The original engines, straight-eight Chrysler Royals, had been replaced by petrol run Chrysler Imperial V8s. John replaced those with Nanni N115 four-cylinder turbo-intercooled 115hp diesels. Fuel is carried in two new 300L tanks made with marine-grade aluminium. Fresh water is held in a pair of 800L tanks mounted to either side for stability. Kalinda cruises at 8.5–9kt with the Nanni diesels comfortably at 2,000rpm, while top speed is 11kt at 2,600rpm.

The interior timber was restored in Queensland Maple, the outside in Teak with Beech decks, while the hull was fastened under the waterline in silicon bronze. Help and support for the project came from Russell Tyler at the Cottage Point Boatshed. 

Finally, in September 2015, approval was given for Kalinda to begin Class 1E Operations — the dream had been realised!

Since then, Kalinda has successfully operated with countless charters for events such as weddings and for fashion photography. For more information visit www.sydneyclassicboatcharters.com.au.