Set in 1950s Tauranga. The four Bromley children and their friends have many adventures during their summer holidays. Mark, Peter, Betty and nine-year-old Harry live in a house right next to the Tauranga harbour between Fourth and Fifth Avenue. Their friends Jack and Joan live nearby, as does their arch rival Wally Sinclair. "In Tauranga two things, wind and tide, mattered more than anything else to sailors like Mark and Peter, Jack Potter and Joan Harris. Every day they watched the wind, deciding how it was going to affect their sailing or racing" (p. 16). During summer the Tauranga Yacht Club holds races on Saturday afternoons. Mark, Peter, Jack and Joan are competing in the Challenge Cup races for P-class seven-footers. The P-Class was designed by New Zealand civil engineer, Harry Highet. It's a simple one person vessel in which boys and girls aged from 11 to 15 can learn to sail. Soon after Highet and family moved to Tauranga in 1923 a fleet of a dozen or so boats could be seen racing each weekend on Tauranga Harbour. The P-Class was initially known as the 'Tauranga Class'. Boats carried the letter 'P' on their sails to indicate they were primary trainers.

Chapter Headings: The Dinghy Game; Sand in the Boats; The First Race; Flounder for Breakfast; Peter in Trouble; Second Race; Easterly Gale; The Fight on the Beach; Bad Luck for Mark; Fresh Kahawai for Bait; A Fish-hook and a Knife; Peter sails Home; The Last Race; The End of the Story.

This book is just a lovely story in the typical fashion of the 1950s (published 1963). The detailed descriptions about how things are done by these resourceful and independent children is just great. I wish every New Zealand child had the opportunity to have a childhood like this one. As I live in Tauranga it was heart-warming to read about places and streets that I know. A really enjoyable read with lovely pen illustrations by artist Ron Stenberg who is now in his 90's. ( )