A part of History - The refitting of Lord Jim

As a yacht Captain, returning home to Australia from the Mediterranean, Caribbean and the USA for the past seven years, I quickly found work at Brisbane Ship Yard refitting a large sloop.

I was approached to captain a ship the “Lord Jim”, that was leaving after four years, the fellow who approached me joined as an unpaid deck hand and ended up as the only one left on board.

The vessel was at a marina Marina in the Whitsundays, Queensland. It wanted an available Yacht Captain take it to Thailand via The Great Barrier Reef and Cape York. The brochure looked great, as they always do.

It was an old steel hull ketch with aluminum super structure, riveted together, and built in the UK by Camper & Nicholson in 1977.

I gave him a CV and forgot about it till I got a call from the owner who was psychologist in the performance coaching business .Of course he was a very convincing man. I took the job.

After driving north for two days I arrived at the marina and saw the boat, I realized I’d been conned. The yacht was a mess.

The Boat was completely un seaworthy and most of the systems broken down. The Australian Cruise Permit was expired as well as the Ships Registration, the hull and crew insurance expired and the radio licenses expired. Also to this the safety equipment was way out of date.

The old Captain left two days later with the owners disputing his return ticket to England.

Being the relief captain Phuket I desperately started the rebuild paying bills using my own money to progress, the promised boat money and credit card never arrived.

About 2 Years later I arrived in Thailand. I even continued to restore the vessel to her past glory with all systems running and on a limited budget and lots of problems for several more months.

I am very proud to rebuild a part of nautical history of this great boat.

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