A year and a half after we took over APATIKI from her builder, the boat lost a mast 1300 miles away from the nearest land, while the second mast tried to free itself from the heel fitting.

Our journey with Apatiki started very peacefully.

We are a family with two young boys. Our smallest was just a year old, when we moved on board to live on Apatiki for the next few years.

She is a Wharram Tiki 46, made of Bruinzeel Hechthout Lloyds approved plywood and West System epoxy, and is equipped for us to be self-sufficient while sailing the oceans.

After about four years of construction in Belgium, Apatiki was launched in 2008.

Sunbird Marine had built her bi-plane rig with a flat sail profile of 50 square meters per side.

Her designer had sailed her twice across the Atlantic.

However, I found that the first aluminum spars were too flexible.

They sagged from the weight of the sails, causing lines to become slack, and in a seaway the entire bundle would jump up and down. For this reason, the spars were reinforced with sleeves.

However,  a mistake was made in the reinforcement process, which turned out to be my undoing when I crossed the Atlantic.

One spar broke, with only one hoisted panel, and slammed onto the deck.

I managed with my crew to recover the mast and lash it on deck.

The remaining mast had become loose at its base because the hole in the heel-fitting had widened.

However, we managed to lash it in place and carry on to Trinidad.

We tried briefly to repair the old rig, but it quickly became clear that we would have to redesign everything to get a reliable boat that would bring us safely to our destination, New Zealand.

Bertrand Fercot supported us with the design of a new set of spars, and patiently answered all my questions.

He was a great help and willing to share his experience with us.

The newly-designed hollow wooden masts were made of aircraft grade sitka spruce, based on the model of his boat Grand PHA.

The engineers from Tuchwerkstatt also helped to design the spars, and built two new cambered sails for us. Peter Lain, a boat builder from the USA, built the spars according to plan and when we set sail for the first time in 2018, it felt like switching from an VW to an S Class Mercedes (in terms of performance and handling - not style !) No more sails jumping up and down, no more bent spars and so much more power and performance. We were completely satisfied with the result (and still are).

Downwind, we sail away from most modern catamarans (though that is not important to us) and the entire boat now has more stability.

Obviously, it took some time getting used to, but I now have much more enjoyment with the cambered sails.

It took us almost a year to get the boat ready again, as we encountered numerous problems in Trinidad, but it has all paid off, and we have been living on Apatiki for six years now.

I had no experience with Junk rigs when I bought Apatiki, and it certainly hasn’t always been easy.

However, it was always an exciting challenge and an adventure. And that’s exactly what we were looking for when we set off from Spain in 2015.

Sadly, the time has come for us to sell Apatiki and start a new project. Our kids long for friends, and New Zealand is still closed.

Further Details:

• Spars, Sails and Motors replaced in 2018 by professionals
• Two 25HP Yamaha high thrust outboard Motors
• 9kw Lombardini Marine Generator
• 15HP Yamaha Enduro Dinghy Motor
• new 65l Domestic Fridge
• Pacific Windpilot
• Raymarine Autopilot
• new 50l/hr Spectra Watermaker (operates with solar)
• Boiler
• Lofrans Tigres 1200W windlass
• Victron 2000W sine wave Inverter, Battery Charger and Battery Monitor
• and much more

Currently cruising in Costa Rica and Panama