While ‘chewing the fat’ with the crew on passage through the Solent to Southampton, I was whimsically reminiscing about the last time I visited Ocean Village. It was a long time and several yachts ago in my Parker 31, “Karisma” (she was already named when I bought her) and I was sailing with Phil, the company tekkie that I have mentioned before. I said that I remembered sitting in the cockpit gazing up at Halley’s Comet and it made quite an impression on me. I thought that I could easily determine what year it was as the comet only appears once in a lifetime. Well, it last appeared in 1986, when I would have been 32 and, in sailing terms, somewhere between a 505 dinghy and a Sailfish 18. Our daughter would have just been born, and our son would have been in Baghdad. (my wife absolutely HATES that expression and, if she reads this blog, she will probably insist I delete it) So, it was more likely to be Hale-Bopp (Phil confirms this) which appeared in 1997. Although it is understandable to mistake one comet for another, I did begin to ponder my cerebral decline…
I had also maintained that Ocean Village would be a ‘buzzy’ place with a shopping centre in the marina, but when we arrived, it was ‘sleepy’ and there was no shopping centre to be found. The worries about my deteriorating mental acuity, now shared by my crew, increased until I discovered that there had been a shopping centre, but it was demolished in 2008 to make way for the ubiquitous blocks of apartments.
It seems that Ocean Village was developed in 1987 with hopes of being a retail and entertainment hub but it never really ‘took off’ and little now remains apart from a few bars and restaurants and a struggling two-screen cinema showing mostly ‘arty’ films.
On the periphery, there is the listed former dock office building which has also experienced some ‘history’. In 1997 it was converted into the “Cork and Bottle” pub. It then became a Weatherspoon’s called “The Admiral Sir Lucius Curtis”, in acknowledgement of the dignitary who laid the foundation stone of the first modern dock in 1835. It would appear to have been cursed as, unusually, Weatherspoon’s couldn’t make a go of it, and it became independent as “The King Canute” and more recently “The Queen Mary”. We did our best to keep it in business, but it was very quiet and one must question its chances of survival despite the excellent and enthusiastic staff.
Wandering around to the ablution facilities in the marina, I was intrigued by a ship called the ‘Brave Challenger’ as it has 3 unusual features on the transom. Further investigation uncovered a fascinating and bizarre story.
At 103 feet long, Brave Challenger became a historic high-speed motor yacht, based on a new class of fast Naval ship and built by Vosper in Portsmouth. She was launched in 1960 as ‘Mercury’ for Greek shipping tycoon Stavros Niarchos. She is powered by three Rolls-Royce Proteus gas turbines producing 13,500 SHP and she achieved a legendary top speed of over 60 knots. She is widely considered one of the fastest motor yachts ever built.
In 1979, Wensley Haydon-Baillie, a British aristocrat and Rolls-Royce enthusiast, bought the yacht. He renamed her ‘Brave Challenger’ and undertook a massive restoration project to return her to pristine condition. He had a substantial aircraft and naval collection and spent over 2,2 million specialist man hours on the project over a 10-year period. He also collected an additional 54 spare Rolls-Royce gas turbine engines and many other spares. His Rolls-Royce obsession also extended to cars, and he owned 25 including 13 of the 19 Flying Spur models.
He also owned Wentworth Woodhouse – one of the largest private homes in Europe with an assumed 365 rooms. In the 1980s, he invested millions in a firm that claimed to have a cure for herpes, but the cure never materialised and in 1998 he admitted to debts of £13M.
The family seat was repossessed by a Swiss bank and put on the market. The bank sold the property for just over £1.5 million to architect Clifford Newbold, whose family spent the next decade and a half performing critical structural updates.
The property is now owned by the Wentworth Woodhouse Preservation Trust, a registered charity that purchased the estate from the Newbold family for £7 million.
Backed by significant government funding, private donations, and support from the National Trust, the trust is currently executing a massive, multi-decade restoration project to secure the future of the magnificent property.
Now aged 82, Wensley Haydon-Baillie lives quietly in a small flat in St James’s, London.
So, unusually, there is no sailing content in this blog but, be advised that the final return to Northney Marina will be with the ‘Trauma’ crew – what could possibly go wrong……
Oh my goodness Nick, Haidon-Bailey was a frequent First Class customer on BA and always called on the services of our VIP department with some seriously random requests. He arrived late for a flight once, abandoned his car in the short term car park threw the keys at one of my colleagues and asked him to ‘sort it’! Another time he asked for a package of his girlfriend’s contraceptive pills to be collected from his driver and put on the next aircraft to him. We never knew what preposterous request he’d make next! He was the source of great amusement though, what a character.
Yes, what a character, Simone ! People like that probably don’t exist anymore – and are we the poorer for it – probably not?
Having very recently ‘enjoyed’ a sweaty-squash-tussle with Captain Mines, I can sadly confirm the term ‘Queen Mary’ appears to be far more pertinent to his on-court play than for any of the taverns, hostelries, bordellos and public houses he frequents.
You fail to mention, Carl, that even as the Premier league runner up, I took you to 4 only last week – and that was aged 72 and with two replacement hips!