Wally Stright Continues Adventures Around World

Wally Stright is always traveling. and the airline strike hasn't held him up at all. The son of Mr. and Mrs. L. C Stright of Polk is now somewhere between Australia and South Africa on a ship that has carried its crew of five most of the way around the world.

One of the Strights' recent letters from the international hitchhiker tells of a 4,000-mile trip from Tabiti to Sydney, Australia. The Sandefjord, a 47-foot long yacht built for the Royal Norwegian Lifeboat Service 53 vears ago, was well  received in Tahiti.

The ship and its crew rated a picture on the front page of La Depeche de Tahiti, an island paper. The accompanying article explained that the Sandefjord had "an extraordinary history".

The yacht's present crew is carrying on the Sandefjord's tradition by making a trip which the Depeche describes as an exceptional and extraordinary adventure.

After three or four days of wandering around Papeete (the isIand's main city), Wally reports, "We went native... ate breadfruit, taro, poi, bananas done several ways, etc. But the best stuff we found is the raw fish."

Wally and a fellow traveler got the king's tour through the Royal Yacht Britannica, which docked in Tahiti for a couple of days. 

"The engine room was 'so clean you could eat off the floor," Wally wrote.

He and Fanie Louw, a former South African coal miner, spent two weeks helping an English man move his home after his lease expired, "By the time we left Tahiti, by looking at it, you would never know the house had been moved."

Although the crew members received no money for their work, "We had a very good lunch every day and got away from the boat for a while. Payment enough".

The trip following the Tahiti stop was a long, hard one. Sande took 49 days and 21 hours to cross to Sydney.  "Arrived with 15 tins of peas left. That was all," Wally said.

The ship crossed the international dateline on the way to Australia. "For the crew of Sandefjord, the day of April 30 never existed," he said.

After 31 days at sea, the crew was rationing teabags. The Polk ex-Navy man explained that the reason for the food shortage was the ship's money ran out. But after the crew docked in Sydney, Australians invited them |to one party after another. "'People here are great. Can't do enough for us,'" Wally wrote. 

The yacht still has quite a few miles to go on its round-the-world voyage. Sandefjord left Durban, South Africa, in February of 1965. Last September Wally made a short trip home to Polk with Fanie when the ship was being repaired in Panama. At that time they estimated they would be back in Durban next month, and they might make it if everything goes according to schedule.

Not everything has been smooth sailing for Sande's crew. Wally described what happened during one accident, when the bottom half of the mizzen mast snapped off.

"The shrouds immediately went slack and the mast started to fall backwards onto Fanie and the wheel. I was pumping at the time. I quickly grabbed one of the shrouds to try and stop it from falling while Fanie was doing his best to hold up the mast from inside the cockpit."

Luckily the crew all turned out on deck to lower the sail. The mast was secured and they reached Sydney safely. 

Before the trip ends Sande will look for adventure in the Great Barrier Reef, Thursday Island, Christmas Island and Mauritius.

When the voyage is completed, crew members will add narration to the 16mm commercial movie they have been filming since last February. And it is quite likely that, even when the film is on the market, Wally Stright will keep traveling, looking for adventure in other parts of the world.