OUR PEOPLE
MATES UNITE TO CREATE FERRY SERVICE
BY CAROL FORSYTH
Bow loading M John Ward at the helm
apua is a small coastal village on the Waimea Inlet at the top of the South Island. At the mouth of the estuary is Rabbit Island, a popular destination for walking and cycling groups. Until the beginning of October 2011, the only access to the island was across a bridge that crosses an estuary from the mainland.
This all changed with the launching of The Flat Bottom
Fairy, owned and built by John Ward and Paul Nankivell, which now operates as the Mapua to Rabbit Island Walkers and Cyclists ferry.
John and Paul were flatmates in Te Anau 35 years ago. John was the ranger on the Fiordland Parks Board patrol vessel Renown, and Paul crewed on local crayfishing boats. Both men would regularly return to the Nelson area.
"Of all the beautiful places in New Zealand, I always knew I would retire in Mapua," says John. He began his career as an apprentice marine engineer with the Anchor Shipping and Foundry Company Limited. From the third year of his apprenticeship he was at sea in the company's ships. With his apprenticeship completed, John passed the required engineer qualifications and worked as an engineer in several of the coastal scows owned by the Karamea Shipping Company and the Sullivan Shipping Company. "I was in the Kohi when she went into two ports which had not been used for about 14 years. One was Little Wanganui, south of Karamea, and the other was Patea," he says. "The Kohi was the last scow to cart whale oil from the Whekenui Whaling Station in Tory Channel in 1963."
Those were the days when an engineer's time in scows counted as two-thirds deck time, as no engineroom watch was kept. John acquired enough sea time to sit his Restricted Launch Master, River Master and Small Home Trade Master Certificates. In 1968 he joined the National Park Service as a ranger in Abel
Stern view showing the concealed outboards
36 Professional Skipper January/February 2012
Tasman National Park and in 1972 he transferred to Fiordland National Park. "I was involved in the park buying its first coastal
