Andrew Fagan: Swirly World: The Solo Voyages

By JANE PHARE

As epic sailing books go, Andrew Fagan's Swirly World is not a biggie. But neither is his bright-green yacht, Swirly World in Perpetuity.

And that's the charm of this book. It's about mucking about in boats, not having much money, sailing, getting wet and uncomfortable, coming back to dry land, going sailing again.

Quite why anyone would want to go solo sailing offshore in a 5.4m yacht just for the hell of it, is mystifying to the comfort-zone sailor. But the fact that Fagan makes an alarming leap from a junior centreboard champion to, years later, the proud owner of Swirly World (the yacht) and then sails offshore without so much as a warm-up expedition, is part of the fascination of Swirly World (the book).

Fagan, whom baby boomers may remember as the guitar-playing singer from the Mockers, takes his readers on his sea-sick, sleep-deprived and stormy trips around the Hauraki Gulf, Great Barrier, Sunday (Raoul) Island and eventually a return trip across the Tasman, creating a record for the smallest vessel to have made a return crossing.

In 1994 Fagan decided to enter the Solo Tasman race, run every four years by the New Plymouth Yacht Club.

With 7.62m the minimum length, Swirly World's 5.4m didn't qualify but Fagan persuaded the race committee to make an exception. On a shoestring budget, Fagan sailed the 1900km from New Plymouth to Mooloolaba, Queensland, travelling at walking pace, and back.

The trip was far from smooth sailing and he even managed a couple of mid-Tasman repairs to damaged mast stays. Serious stuff for one small man in a small boat.

Mixed in like sloppy bilge water is a Fagan dollop of life on the road as a Mocker, barely having enough money to buy petrol to drive the converted ambulance to the next gig around rural New Zealand. And there are Fagan wisdoms thrown in, no doubt dreamed up during hours, and hours and hours, spent on long, solo trips at sea with little sleep.

But Fagan doesn't mind mocking himself a little - everything from audiences who decide they simply don't like him up on stage to a delightful account of him fluffing the raising of his spinnaker at the start of the Tasman Race, before a riveted audience of onlookers.

Swirly World is a delightful read for anyone who knows the damp smells, the cramped spaces, the primus stove, the "Thunderbirds Are Go" era of sailing in undersized keelers.

He pays homage to the solo voyagers who have been before him - sea adventurers such as Adrian Hayter, Johnny Wray, Gerry Clark and David Lewis who had big influence on Fagan in his teenage years.

Curiously there is little mention of his partner, Karyn Hay, whom Kiwis will remember fronting Radio With Pictures on TV in the early 80s. The back cover reveals that Fagan lives with Hay and their two sons in a houseboat on the Thames but she features little in the text. This is very much a solo voyage for Fagan and a gripping little read when you're tucked up in a warm, dry bed which doesn't move.

* Jane Phare is an Auckland journalist.

HarperCollins $29.95