Rainbow II - Kiwi Classic heads home

Chris Bouzaid, the original owner and skipper of the Sparkman & Stephens 36-footer, RainbowII, has bought her back and will return the yacht to New Zealand to be restored.   

Restoration work will be led by the man who built her in 1967, Max Carter, at the Percy Vos Boatyard in the Wynyard Quarter. She will receive new flooring and mast step, using New Zealand kauri donated to the Classic Yacht Charitable Trust by Origin Quarries' Gerard van Tilborg.  Bouzaid plans to donate Rainbow II to the newly established Maritime Museum Foundation in Auckland

Rainbow II notched up a string of major international victories in the 1960s.  After her historic win in the 1969 One Ton Cup off the German archipelago of Heligoland, Rainbow II was sold to an owner in Bermuda. Now, 43 years later, she is going home.

On the back of Jimmy Davern's 1966 Sydney-Hobart line-honours win  on Fidelis, this little yacht - along with her dedicated crews - was originally responsible for putting New Zealand on the international sailing map."  - winning 121 races over two years.  

Among the victories were the Whangarei- Noumea and the Sydney-Hobart races in 1967, Kiel Week  in Germany and the One Ton Cup in 1969. A month later, she won her divisions in both the Channel Race and the Fastnet Classic.

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