Davie Norris Boatbuilders
Christchurch, New Zealand
American Dream
Boating New Zealand Article
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When Jim Gregory was at
college in San Francisco USA, he raced with yacht designer Carl
Schumacher on one of his Express 37 designs from San Francisco to
Catalina: "I was hooked on boats from that moment foward,"
Gregory remembers... |
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| "The race
was mostly downwind, it was just so controllable, the best. It was a
performance boat and it sailed well in conditions. |
“Carl owned
several Express 27s and I sailed with him on multiple boats. He didn’t
ask me regularly but when he did, I never said no.” |
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Later at college, Gregory went
to the launching of a 50ft Schumacher yacht named Heart of
Gold — affectionately, Goldie. He set his heart then, on owning
a Schumacher boat, but over many years sailing with the designer,
they seldom discussed Gregory’s dream boat. “Neither
of us believed it would really happen,” Gregory says. |
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But Gregory did believe in
another dream: for he and his wife to take their sons Christopher
and Patrick out of school for a year and cruise to New Zealand.
Twenty years after he first fell for Heart of Gold, he was in a
position to buy a suitable boat secondhand but he found himself
sauntering into Schumacher’s office for a chat. |
The designer told
him about the quality of New Zealand-built boats and pointed out
that the exchange rate meant a boat built here wasn’t much
more expensive than buying secondhand in the States. He also checked
out another Schumacher boat built down under. |
“I’ve
sailed on a lot of boats but when I got on the New Zealand-built
boat, everything was finished to such a high degree. There was no
exposed fiberglass, no seams apparent. The deck to hull join was
as though it wasn’t there; it wasn’t like it was basically
stuck on with a bunch of epoxy. |
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"Everything was
painted and faired — you pull out a drawer where no one ever
sees and it’s perfectly finished.” And so, on Schumacher’s
recommendation, Gregory commissioned Davie Norris Boatbuilders
in Christchurch to build his boat, for he and his family to sail
back to the States. |
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With their sons’
schooling in mind, Gregory and his wife Debbie were adamant the
boat would have to be launched by 16 May 2001. Norris promised it
would be, and sent the Gregory’s weekly electronic images
showing progress. But Norris was wrong in his predicted launch date:
Morpheus, named for the Greek god of dreams, entered the water a
day early — virtually unheard of in boat launchings. |
Norris and Gregory
spent two and a half weeks commissioning Morpheus, but Schumacher
never saw the finished boat. He had died suddenly of a heart attack. |
Morpheus
To those of you who helped to put Morpheus together, a huge thank you!.
She is pretty darn close to perfect in our minds
We've enjoyed meeting all of you and appreciate the effort in getting this boat ready to cross oceans.
Jim, Debbie, Chris & Pat Gregory
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