I belong to an online forum for Westerly owners. We are all a bunch of fanatics regarding the seaworthiness of these legendary boats. The Centaur is at the "small" end of cruiser sizes, but it's accomplishments are still impressive.

I rarely have time to be able to read the volume of mail that comes with belonging to this list, but yesterday this one caught my eye. It was titled "Cenaturs go the Distance"

Here it is:

The folks who have been on this forum when I was here before will

know this bit of Centaur history. You have permission to skip it.

Around 1969-70 an importer in Seattle, WA, USA brought in some

Westerly Centaur kit boats. They had to be finished off in a

variety of ways one of which was engine installation. One in

particular rose to the top of Centaur history as follows:

1. Never had, to this day, an internal engine.

2. First belonged to the Fernandez family of Bainbridge Island (an

island/town just across from Seattle) named Yellow Rose

3. Sold to Tom Delius and Joel Cznick two young recent college

graduates who renamed the boat "Lookfar." They took the boat around

the world on the Seattle, Hawaii, Tonga, Australia, South Africa,

Panama, Hawaii, Seattle route. Tom got off part way round and Joel

added and later married an Aussie. They now live in the Melbourne

area and Tom still lives on Bainbridge Island.

3. Sold the boat to an Uncle who kept the name and resold it to

4. Steve Way a school teacher out of Tacoma, WA USA. Steve spent

summer sailing up to Alaska or up the Columbia River of Oregon and

then did a second circumnavigation following the same route. Each

summer when not teaching he'ld fly out and go a bit further,

singlehanding all but the final return from Hawaii.

5. I bought Lookfar from Steve and translated the name to the Norske

Se Fjern wanting something of myself but not wanting to make a major

name change. Didn't go near so far but managed to add a couple of

respectable trips to find polar bears and pineapples.

6. Tom Delius acquired the boat back from me, switched the name

back to Lookfar and his now grown up son Charles (Charlie) now has

it.

7. Steve Way has expressed a strong interest in buying it from

Charlie for his grand children.

Haven't heard if Charley is going try for a third

circumnavigation. ..but he did have plans for Alaska last I heard.

Adding in the various side trips and regular sailing in the Puget

Sound, US/Canadian San Juans and so forth this hull built in '69 is

most probably the class record holder for circumnavigations if not

total miles sailed. Adding it all up it's pushing or has surpassed

the 100,000 nm mark.

A strong testimony to the class and the design.

Next thing you'll ask what is the hull number? We don't know. Lot

of research on this but the records only use a number that was on

the mast which turns out to be someone else's hull number.

Which is why my new boat went through the entire ceremony and was

renamed Se Langt, another way of saying "Look Far" and a continuing

tribute not only to the Westerly twin keels but also to my fine

Viking heritage (paternal side.) (Actually born in the UK but me

mum's family came from Normandy with some bloke named William,

Normandy was settled by the Norseman and that's close enough for me.)

So in case you ever wondered.... that's the distance sailed by

Centaur's

Michael

SV Se Langt

Berwick 31