Displaying items by tag: Mariette

17th April 2023

Classic Superyacht 'Mariette' Returns to Kinsale in the Fog

Fog may have shrouded the reappearance of the classic 33-metre superyacht Mariette off Kinsale Harbour County Cork yesterday, but there was no mistaking the silhouette of the two-masted gaff schooner.

Designed and built by Nathanael Greene Herreshoff in 1915, Mariette arrived in Kinsale after a one-day voyage from Falmouth on the English South Coast.

Mariette was built as "Project 698" by Nathanael Herreshoff, at his Bristol, Rhode Island yard, for prominent yachtsman Harold S. Vanderbilt.

She was part of a series of seven large schooners built between 1903 and 1905 by the Herreshoff shipyard. Mariette and her sister-ship, Vagrant, are the last of this series still in service.

Yesterday's arrival into Kinsale was not a maiden voyage to West Cork as Bob Bateman's photos below document; Mariette sailed in 17 years ago, cutting quite a dash at the Fastnet Rock in the summer of 2006.

(Above and below) Designed and built by Nathanael Greene Herreshoff in 1915, Mariette is pictured off the Fastnet Rock in 2006 Photos: Bob Bateman

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About Conor O'Brien, Irish Circumnavigator

In 1923-25, Conor O'Brien became the first amateur skipper to circle the world south of the Great Capes. O'Brien's boat Saoirse was reputedly the first small boat (42-foot, 13 metres long) to sail around the world since Joshua Slocum completed his voyage in the 'Spray' during 1895 to 1898. It is a journey that O' Brien documented in his book Across Three Oceans. O'Brien's voyage began and ended at the Port of Foynes, County Limerick, Ireland, where he lived.

Saoirse, under O'Brien's command and with three crew, was the first yacht to circumnavigate the world by way of the three great capes: Cape Horn, Cape of Good Hope and Cape Leeuwin; and was the first boat flying the Irish tri-colour to enter many of the world's ports and harbours. He ran down his easting in the Roaring Forties and Furious Fifties between the years 1923 to 1925.

Up until O'Brien's circumnavigation, this route was the preserve of square-rigged grain ships taking part in the grain race from Australia to England via Cape Horn (also known as the clipper route).

At a Glance - Conor O'Brien's Circumnavigation

In June 1923, Limerick man Conor O’Brien set off on his yacht, the Saoirse — named after the then newly created Irish Free State — on the two-year voyage from Dun Laoghaire Harbour that was to make him the first Irish amateur to sail around the world.

June 1923 - Saoirse’s arrival in Madeira after her maiden passage out from Dublin Bay

2nd December 1924 - Saoirse crossed the longitude of Cape Horn

June 20th 1925 - O’Brien’s return to Dun Laoghaire Harbour