Boating New Zealand — February 2018

96 Boating New Zealand

t five-foot-two-inches Frank Wightman

was a short bugger. He also happened to be

a cable operator, naturalist, archaeologist,

hermit and lucky for us, a sailor and a writer.

His writing won no awards, nor was he

feted in literary circles, but he managed to

produce two books which are the most beautifully-written love

letters to an ocean there has ever been.

Frank spent a lot of time dreaming about his escape to

sea, spending over 20 years in the “march of the slaves” as he

referred to the shallow existence of a nine-to-five wageworker in

Cape Town. His escape from this “Amazon of frustration” came

in the most simple and concise way.

“At Noon one day I dropped my fountain pen – that symbol

of slavery – into the waste paper basket and capered down the

marble stair case into the sunlight.” That step into the sunlight

was to define the rest of his life and unleash one of the most

underrated literary talents the world has ever seen.

In 1936 Frank had met the famous single-hander Harry

Pidgeon as he stopped over in Cape Town during his first

A

feature

Sailor

Scribes

WORDS BY MATT VANCE

PHOTOGRAPHY SUPPLIED

If you’ve never experienced

the serenity, mystery and

romance of bluewater cruising,

Frank Wightman’s books offer a

rivetting substitute.

The

wind

is free