One of Australia’s oldest wooden boats given new lease on life in SA

ABC NEWS (Australia)

One of Australia's oldest operating wooden boats has been given a new lease of life In south Australia. The Riverland boat has had several lives as a steamer, a ketch, a showboat and a paddleboat and has appeared in two feature films.

Transcript

00:00Since he was a teenager, Nathan Horvath has dreamt of owning the second oldest wooden

00:07boat in Australia, the Amphibious.

00:09I first seen it years and years and years ago, and it was sort of amazing, and I'd

00:17sort of seen it as something, it's beautiful but you're never ever going to get anything

00:21close to that.

00:22But where there's a will, there's a way, and now that dream has become a reality.

00:27The sheer cost was always out of our reach.

00:30Because of its story over the last 149 years, it's pretty unique that it's been an experimental

00:38vane wheel steamer, it's been a catch, it's been a show boat, it's been a paddle steamer

00:44obviously, and been in two movies, and not too many other people have a list that long.

00:50Visibility and action are imperative for the survival of older boats, which often need

00:55to earn their keep to stay afloat.

00:57The comparison I usually draw is between the industry and the agate, the industry does

01:01trips and takes people for rides and makes its own income to support itself, whereas

01:06the agate just sat there for 15, 20 years, didn't have a cent coming in from any activity

01:12that it does, and no one spent a cent on it, and then eventually it sinks.

01:17Staying afloat in the hands of true believers.

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