(^10) CLASSIC BOAT AUGUST 2019
VARG 8 METRE
seams), he arranged for various deck fittings to be made
and he began to sand the mahogany brightwork in situ
until it became apparent that he couldn’t match Michael
and Warren’s extraordinary high standards.
Soon after the new boat’s launch on 17 November
2013, she was officially christened Varg at a party across
the water at the Port Cygnet Sailing Club. This was the
first chance for friends and various members of the
public to see for themselves the exceptional attention to
detail and high standards of craftsmanship throughout
the boat: the woodwork, the paint and varnish, the
deck fittings and the rigging details.
POWER CHANGE
The new Varg was initially installed with a Thoosa
electric motor. Although this would only give one hour’s
motoring from fully charged lithium ion batteries, Kraig
felt that would be enough just to get on and off the
mooring. However, soon after Varg was launched,
a terrifying incident led to a change of plan. Varg had
just finished taking part in a race off Kettering when she
was hit by a monstrous squall coming off the land (at
Bruny Island, down to leeward, it was later recorded
as peaking at 167km/hour) and was immediately in
trouble. Drifting rapidly towards Bruny, Kraig tried
to take control with his RIB alongside Varg but it was
soon “flipped over”. Luckily a motor sailor, under
power, made repeated attempts to get a tow line to
Varg and eventually succeeded. “We were incredibly
lucky not to lose Varg that day,” said Kraig.
At the time of the incident, the boat was so new the
engine hadn’t yet been connected to its batteries, but
Kraig felt afterwards that, even if it had been, it wouldn’t
have helped enough as the duration of the experience
would have necessitated using the engine for much
longer than one hour. So immediately afterwards, he
began to take steps to replace the electric motor, and
Varg now has a Nanni 3-cylinder 21hp diesel engine
- “the only one that would fit” – with an 80-litre fuel
tank. Kraig thinks the total weight of the engine and
fuel tank is not dissimilar to the electric motor and its
batteries and cables.
Since Varg was launched, Kraig and Carolyn have
had an enormous amount of pleasure out of her, mainly
racing and occasionally cruising in Port Cygnet, the
D’Entrecasteaux Channel and surrounding areas.
But the highlight came in 2017 when Varg embarked
on a great adventure in Norway – returning to her
“spiritual homeland” as the Tasmanian newspaper
the Mercury put it – to take part in the 8-Metre
World Championships.
Her owners were lucky enough to get sponsorship
from Wilhelmsen Lines who shipped the boat there
from Melbourne but there were a great deal of other
expenses too. Kraig said: “It was a hell of an exercise
in transportation logistics.” They found that Varg wasn’t
particularly competitive against most of the fleet which
had “young professional crews and state of the art sails,
and they had all removed their engines and propellers”
but that didn’t really bother Kraig and Carolyn as they
were “more than happy to have a really good Norwegian
party – and we were given one!” Carolyn described
it as “a wonderful experience” with Kraig adding
“it was worth every penny”.
My Tasmanian sail on Varg was all too brief. We
initially motored out of Port Cygnet, hoisted the mainsail
off Lymington and then motor-sailed to Beaupre Point
where the engine was cut and the headsail hoisted. We
then beat into a south-easterly 12-15 knot breeze with
Varg sailing like a witch. We sailed into Surveyors Bay
and tacked just before the salmon farm, out past Huon
Island and rounded Arch Rock. With some reluctance,
I then transferred to another boat so that I could take
some photographs of Varg in action.
As I watched Varg sail back into Port Cygnet under
spinnaker, she passed just a few hundred yards from
Norn, the boat which, for Kraig, had been “love at first
sight”. But after exercising considerable patience and
incurring not insignificant expense (“about four times
as much as everyone thought in the first place”), Kraig
and Carolyn now have a boat of which they can be
extremely proud, and somehow the unavoidability of
Varg routinely sailing past her progenitor adds to this
story’s allure.L-R: folding helm
seat; Carolyn at
the helm with
Kraig; backstay
sheave and
ensign socket