Island Life October/November 2018

Interview
“There were lots
of interesting old
boats on the river.
To be able to row
past huge North
Sea fishing trawlers
and light ships
moored waiting
for whatever might
be planned.”
opposite Newport’s Quay Arts
Centre), and says they provided
“a first class playground”.
On his way to school in the
morning, Sam would walk past
the Coles Shipyard on Arctic Road,
and peer over the fence to the 500
Ton slipway, seeing various ships
in repair, from beautiful coasters,
to the fast ferries in for repair
during the Cowes Express time.
“It was such an interesting
and wondrous sight, it ignited
one’s imagination - and it
certainly inspired me. I probably
didn’t even realize to what
extent at the time” he says.
Launching out
Never particularly academic,
Sam says he could not wait to
finish school. His passion was
for ‘creating and fixing things’
so as soon as he left school,
he went to work at Bannisters
Garage in Cowes where he did
an apprenticeship as a mechanic,
working and training with what
he describes as “an excellent
team who taught me well and
influenced me to the value
and respect of hard work”.
By the relatively tender age
of 22 he had launched out
with his own garage business,
in a workshop at the Coles’s
old shipyard at Arctic Road,
“I did OK, I was busy, but at that
young age, with inexperience
of such things, I found it
difficult to survive the overhead
costs of the business” he says.
“Ultimately I was just unhappy
in what I was doing and wanted
a change of direction”.
And that change of direction
came about through buying an old
wooden boat. Sam had decided
he wanted a project, something
totally absorbing – and he found
it in the shape of a 65’ Admiralty
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