All Piss and Wind
Authors: David Salter
David Salter is an independent television producer and journalist who works to support his sailing habit.
Born in suburban Sydney and beginning competitive sailing at the age of 12, David studied Music and English Literature at The University of Sydney while editing the student newspaper,
Honi Soit
. He worked on
The Daily Telegraph
and
The Bulletin
before switching to television in 1967 as part of the team that founded the ABC's first nightly current-affairs program
This Day Tonight
.
After three years at the BBC in London, David returned to Australia and current-affairs TV, including a stint in the Canberra press gallery. He produced the 1976 Olympic Games coverage for the Nine network, then with Peter Luck co-wrote, produced and directed the Logie-winning
This Fabulous Century
historical series for Seven. He has been Head of TV Sport for both the ABC and the Seven network, and was Executive Producer of
Media Watch
with Stuart Littlemore for five years.
David has written, produced and directed a wide range of documentary programs and writes regularly on media issues for
The Australian
, and on sailing for
Australian Yachting
magazine. His last book was
Breaking Ranks
, an account of the HMAS
Voyager
naval disaster in 1964.
David lives in Sydney with his wife Elva, and cat Misty.
Also by David Salter
This Fabulous Century
The Australians
(with Peter Luck)
How to Insult Your Hosts
Breaking Ranks
(with Peter Cabban)
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including printing, photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian
Copyright Act 1968
), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Random House Australia. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author's and publisher's rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
All Piss and Wind
9781742754482
Random House Australia Pty Ltd
20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point, NSW 2061
www.randomhouse.com.au
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First published by Random House Australia 2006
Copyright © David Salter 2006
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication Entry
Salter, David, 1947â.
All piss and wind.
ISBN 978 174166 526 0.
ISBN 1 74166 526 4.
1. Yacht racing â Anecdotes. 2. Sailing â Anecdotes.
I. Title.
797. 124
Cover photograph by Rudolph Salter, 1951
Cover design by Christabella Designs
who waits on shore, and never complains
The master, the swabber, the boatswain and I,
The gunner and his mate,
Loved Mall, Meg and Marian and Margery,
But none of us cared for Kate;
For she had a tongue with a tang,
Would cry to a sailor âGo hang!'
The Tempest, II, ii
Between us there was the bond of the sea. Besides
holding our hearts together through long periods of
separation, it had the effect of making us tolerant
of each other's yarns â and even convictions.
Joseph Conrad,
Heart of Darkness
, 1902
Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing â
absolutely nothing â half so much worth doing as
simply messing about in boats â simply messing.
Kenneth Grahame,
The Wind in the Willows,
1908
I'
VE SPENT A LARGE
part of my life in, on and around boats â simply messing about â and an enormous part of that has been the wonderful fun to be had with all the people involved.
Yachties belong to a special community. You can't spend a decent stretch of time sailing with anyone and not get to know quite a bit about them â their likes and dislikes, their strengths and weaknesses. If you've gone to sea together, then it's quite literally a case of putting your life in their hands, and vice versa. Not many sports demand such a high level of trust between team-mates: that's one of the many aspects of ocean racing that make it so special. It's not just a test of skill and endurance, but of character as well.
Character is, I suppose, the real theme of this book â the way so many of us have largely been forged by our lifelong love of boats, wind and water. Much like myself, David Salter grew up with sailing and has been messing about in boats ever since. Like most of us â but more than a decade later than me! â he moved from tiny centreboard skiffs up through the ranks until he was racing to Hobart in crack yachts at the front of the fleet. These days we both
tend to take things a bit easier, moderating our competitive instincts with a medicinal mouthwash or three of Hardy's Show Port (available at all good vintners).
Not surprisingly, I first met David through sailing. It was the day before the Bond syndicate had to pack up Ben Lexcen's tremendous 12-metre
Australia
to be shipped to Newport for the 1980 America's Cup challenge. David, an independent TV producer, had said he wanted to make a television documentary about me for Channel Seven. I was the helmsman for that challenge, and this would be the last opportunity to film us sailing the boat before we all left for America.
So out we went into a stiffish late-summer nor'easter and thrashed up and down Sydney Harbour testing headsails and spinnakers. I noticed that David seemed much more interested in the 12-metre than his filming. He was dashing all over the boat, helping out with the runners and sail trim.
Once the filming was over we got to chatting. âSail a bit, do you?' I asked.
âOh yes, I love it,' David replied, beaming. âIt's always been one of my great ambitions to crew on a 12-metre.'
We'd just rounded the Manly East mark, hoisted a light kite and were now running very square back across the Heads. Time to test him out. âCare to take us home, David?'
Now, as any experienced skipper will tell you, the surest test of helming skill is having to drive a big yacht dead downwind under spinnaker. The slightest inaccuracy or loss of concentration can spell serious trouble. Most sailors would have gently declined my offer, but not David. He leapt onto the helm and stayed there all the way back to Rushcutter's Bay, including an uneventful gybe off Clifton Gardens. It was like breaking Araldite trying to pry his hands off the wheel. But the bloke clearly knew boats.
More than a quarter of a century later we're still sailing together. David crewed for me on the mighty
Police Car
, a brutally
uncomfortable sloop that dominated IOR racing in the early 1980s. We've cruised to Lord Howe Island and back in some of the worst weather I've ever encountered crossing the Tasman. David has done the foredeck for me in Etchells regattas and been a dependable bosun for more years than I care to remember on
Nerida
, our family's 45-foot gaff cutter. Some of these boats, and our adventures together on them, feature in this book.
The second string to the Salter sailing bow is that he writes with engaging affection, good humour and knowledge about yachting. It's always been a pleasure to pick up a sailing magazine and find an article that carries his by-line. David is equally happy describing a recent race to Southport or the loving work that's gone into restoring a classic yacht. He isn't afraid to tackle the serious issues of the sport, and obviously likes passing on some of his hard-won advice about the challenges of racing offshore.
However, for my money, the thing David does best is write about the unique history and characters of our sport. He's somehow able to capture that special conversational flavour of sailors swapping stories in the cockpit as they while away the last hours of a long, cold watch. Nobody tells a yachting yarn better. I've really enjoyed reading
All Piss and Wind
â even those parts of the book that have a bit of fun at my expense â and I'm sure you'll enjoy it too. There's nothing â absolutely nothing â half so much worth doing.
Safe sailing!
Sydney, 2006