114 Boating New Zealand
ice boat!”
Countless times we have heard this compliment
about our Anna Caroline. We are proud of her; as a
true bluewater yacht she has kept us safe for close to
50,000 miles. In 2003 we bought her in Spain of a
New Zealander.
Larry needed the money and was done cruising. We took her to the
Netherlands and reftted her. Of course we kept the beautiful kauri
interior. In one of the drawers we found a little green man. We didn’t
know what it was, but kept it as a tribute to the former owner.
Te name Espresso didn’t work for us, so we renamed her Anna Caroline
van Staeten Landt. Te names of our mothers, combined with the frst
name Abel Tasman gave to New Zealand.
Ten we set of on our circumnavigation.
One important goal was to visit New Zealand and fnd out more about
the history of our boat. But it took us a while to get there: we sailed over
four years and visited 24 countries before fnally tying up to the dock in
Whangarei. After some well-deserved maintenance we left Anna Caroline
in the Town Basin, bought a car and set of on a roadtrip.
All available information pointed to Nelson, so that’s where we started.
Our yacht is a Bruce Roberts 44, with a centre cockpit and a hard dodger.After a few twists and turns, a Dutch couple’s quest
to find the kiwi builder of the boat they bought in
Spain 15 years ago has a happy ending.N
feature
Closing
the circleTWO
DEGREES OF
SEPARATION
WORDS BY JANNEKE KUYSTERS
PHOTOGRAPHY BY WEITZE VAN DER LAAN“