About Kamalii

Kamalii, a 1958 Philip Rhodes ketch, built by Wilmington Boat Works in California to the order and specification of Edward "Larry" Doheny III, grandson of Edward Doheny, one-time richest man in America. Designed by one of the true greats of American boat design, built by one of the great boat-yards, and  to the order of a man who could spare no expense, Kamalii is a truly magnifiicent piece of American yachting history.

Her basic specifications are:

• LOA: 75' 3"
• LWL: 54'
• Beam: 18' 2"
• Draft: 9' (board up), 13' (board down)
• Ballast: 38,700 lbs lead
• Displacement: 143,000 lbs(!)
• Sail Area: 2,348 sq. ft. (with 85% jib)

Constructed in double-planked mahogany over laminated oak frames with deck-to-keel bronze strapping. With solid 1 7/8" teak decks, the entire super-structure from the decks up is teak. Fitted with two Evadur solid bronze water-tight bulkheads, solid bronze mast steps, bronze centre-board, engine bed, floors...over 10,000 lbs of bronze!

Kamalii (Kah - Mah - Lee - Eee) is Hawaiian, and is supposed to mean "Pacific Princess"; at least that's what Larry Doheny said. It doesn't. "Kamali'i" (with the apostrophe marking a glottal stop) actually means "child", older than a baby but not an adult. "Kamāliʻi" (with the macron over the second 'a') means "royal child", so "Kamāliʻi Wahine" can be interpreted as "Princess". But since they managed to drop the apostrophe and macron from the name it isn't even spelled correctly! Oh well, that's it's given name and that's how we intend to keep it.

She is a well laid out vessel, with three good sized aft cabins providing the main accommodation, with a V-berth in the fore-peak for the crew. Originally the fore-peak just had pipe-berths, and the V-berth was added in the 1990's. The master cabin aft was also altered to provide a double plus a single berth, while the port-side aft cabin was converted to a full double.

These pictures are taken from "Philip L. Rhodes and His Yacht Designs", by Richard Henderson. A fantastic book on Rhodes and his work. Note the rough hand-drawn amendments to Kamalii's accommodation.

Below is a video that takes you on a tour of Kamalii as she was before we purchased her. This was taken by Keiran Russell of Quadrant Yachts as our agent, since we could not get up to the USA at the time, so he goes sticking the camera *everywhere*. You will see missing panels and such all over the place, but fortunately nothing was thrown away, and we get to enjoy the jigsaw puzzle of putting everything back together.