| Hi, My name is Frank Dinkelaar Born in Holland I came to New Zealand in 1958 and have lived here since. I am a member of the Naval Point Club Lyttleton New zealand. My boat 'Dynchela' is a 37.5ft ferro cement Richard Hartley design 'Golden cowrie' I have build her myself in the little town of Benhar, four miles out of Balclutha (nz) Launched in 1980 in Dunedin after six enjoyable years of spare time work, we have sailed her between the bottom of Steward island and the top of the South island (nz). She is based on a swinging mooring in Purau bay (Lyttleton nz) The almanac was designed rather then written as it involves mostly tables etc. It was a case of evolving slowly. It actually started as a few pages of instructions, which I wrote for myself and my son, as I found in actual practice that to rely on memorized celestial navigation was bound to fail most times. The instructions where written from the ground up, everything and all aspects had to be researched. The main concern was that the instructions would be interpreted correctly. The result was a manual that was easier to follow by an inexperience crew. The first edition had an anoying error. This errata was easily overcome, but at the time it was a shattering discovery and it shoved me back to earth with some force, it was the main reason for rewritting this second edition. My email address is As email is filtered, please start subject with Easy Nav94 To get a better view of the boat, right click and save as jpg The almanac was first published back in 1994 And today it is still being sold at: (Now also the publisher) Boat Books Ltd 22 Westhaven drive Westhaven Auckland New zealand Phone (64) 9 358 5691 Fax (64) 9 3585817 New: |
| Feb 2004, Back to the water again, ready and willing to take us for another two month trip to Stewart Island |