FD-350 clipping: 'Docklines' by Darien Murray re yacht 'Malabar VII' (The Argonaut, Marina del Rey)

Docklines BY DARIEN MURRAY

'Malabar VII' may be getaway boat

At a waterfront bar in Papeete, Tahiti, I heard one of the most bizarre sea stories of our time. Would you believe that D. B. Cooper, who bailed out of a Western Airlines plane five years ago with a fortune in cash, may be cruising the world's oceans aboard John Alden's "Malabar VII" from Dolphin Marina? "It's our favorite fantasy," yacht broker Dan Streech of Dana Point said, explaining how "Malabar VII," which left Marina del Rey in 1970, may be involved in the still-unsolved mystery of Cooper's successful heist.

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(Indicate page, name of newspaper, city and state.)

P. 18 THE ARGONAUT MARINA DEL REY,

Date: 9-11-75 Edition: Thursday Author: Darien Murray Editor: David Asper John[guess: son] Title: NORJAK

Character: or Classification: LA-[guess: 857]-4137* Submitting Office: Los Angeles

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SEARCHED ______ INDEXED ______ SERIALIZED ______ FILED ______ JUN 1 2 1976 FBI — SEATTLE

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b6 b7C

(Cooper parachuted from an airplane over Oregon/Cali- fornia after successfully pulling off one of the most imaginative robberies in history, and neither he nor the money has ever been found. A current rumor among airline pilots has it that a few months ago an old parachute was discovered hanging on a tree in the area where "Cooper," as he called himself, may have landed.) Dan and Wendell Streech bought the Alden yawl "Mala- bar VII" and departed Marina

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DB Cooper-23134

del Rey in October, 1970, settling into a berth at Fort Lauderdale, Florida, after cruising down the Mexican coastline, through the Panama Canal and exploring the coastline of Venezuela and Colombia and the islands of the British West Indies and the Bahamas aboard the 54-foot wooden yawl which had won the 1926 Bermuda Race with designer Alden at her helm and a schooner rig.

"Malabar VII," one of a dozen and a half boats personally owned by Alden at launching, was offered for sale by the Streeches who left her in Fort Lauderdale and returned to the West Coast, Dan to Dana Point where he began selling boats, and his dad to the family home in Arizona.

"This man who called himself Mike Selzer decided to buy our boat," Dan said, "and he'd looked at a lot of boats. He may have bought ours because we were willing to take his camper as a trade-in. This was about two months after Cooper had made his getaway from the airplane.

"Selzer drove his camper to my folks' home in Arizona, and they spent a lot of time visiting before he took off for Florida. My dad says Selzer mentioned he had worked as a smoke jumper."

Six weeks after Selzer delivered the camper "nearly new, with only 2,000 miles on it," Dan said the F.B.I. turned up at the Streech home "and the agents said the man we knew as Selzer fitted the description of Cooper perfectly. The F.B.I. men also said some of the money Cooper bailed out with had turned up in Las Vegas."

"Malabar VII" with new owner Mike Selzer has never turned up anywhere, Dan added.

BACK PACKING IN FRENCH POLYNESIA

Dan was on his way to the Tahiti airport after three weeks of hiking around the islands of Tahiti, Moorea, Huahine, Raiatea and Bora Bora with a back pack. He'd gone from one island to another as a passenger on the copra boat "Tapora III," hiking days and sleeping nights on the beaches. He said the land-crabs didn't chew on him (the local rumor that keeps visitors from camping on the beaches) and very few mosquitos took a bite: "I was taking Vitamins B 12 and B 6 and I understand if you do that, the mosquitos aren't interested. Anyway, I only got one or two bites a day."

He spent about $300 in three weeks (plus $750 round-trip air fare from Los Angeles) and most of the places where he camped were near native huts "and the Tahitians brought me food." He recalled buying "mostly bread, with lots of peanut butter and jelly."

In his back pack: a sleeping bag, a bedsheet, swim fins and mask, Sterno and freeze-dried food, one pair of long pants, one pair of cut-offs, a swim suit "and three or four shirts."

On Bora Bora, Dan spent two days reading a ship's log kept by Hans Fleish "at the Oa Oa, or perhaps you spell it Oahoa Hotel. Hans caters to visiting yachts and has free hot showers for boating people. Then he asks them to write about their voyages in his log. Some people even draw pictures. I couldn't stop reading about their experiences."

A night at the hotel, with each room [guess: in] "about [guess: 25]" Dan, recalled, [guess: that's] unusually reasonable in the outer islands, where a room or bungalow may run as high as $95 a night and the average is about $50 with two meals.

The best hotel-bargain has got to be a place in Tahiti near downtown Papeete where you pay 150 francs ($2.14) for a room. Unless you want a door, then it's 200 francs. Across from the cruising boats on Papeete's waterfront is the Stewart Hotel (about $10), a favorite among cruising people who want to get off their boats. At the opposite end of the spectrum are the big glassy high-rise hotels where you pay $50 and more to meet other tourists. I stumbled into a happy compromise: the aging Te Puna Be Air, a hotel four miles outside Papeete frequented by Americans and Europeans who visit Tahiti often. Quiet, charming and inexpensive by Tahiti standards (about $20-$22), it's sandwiched between two American-style luxury hotels and you can hike over to their white-sand beaches. One of the charms of the Te Puna Bel Air is its inconsistencies: I met four women from Sacramento who were staying there and they had no hot water (I did), I had a wasp nest on my balcony (they didn't), they had ice in a refrigerator (I didn't) but I had a bottle of Scotch (they didn't). We pooled our resources and soon felt we had a luxury suite. Also, we met island people who treat the hotel bar and restaurant as a local hangout. Two of us explored a nearby reef with American scuba divers who live in Tahiti, and while we snorkeled on the surface, they went down 190 feet and brought up black coral. They called it coral whips, and it looked like wire coathangers someone had straightened out. They said it sells for about $300 a pound locally. ISLAND-HOPPING BY BOAT Inter-island freighters offer expeditions for visitors: one is a 40-day trip with stops at 116 islands and atolls, and it costs about $300. For the visitor on a brief vacation, John Stegenga of the schooner "Candide," four years out of Marina del Rey, suggested this one which he took: "The 'Timi Hani,' a 150 foot diesel freighter, leaves Papeete every Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. You sleep on deck with other travelers, including many Tahitians who sing and dance at night, and there are always people playing guitars. "The freighter puts in a Huahini, Raiatea, Tahaa and Bora Bora and you go ashore and buy food at the Chinese grocery stores that are always close to the docks. You cook on deck. "The 'Timi Hani' brings you back to Papeete on Sunday or Monday and you have spent about 700 francs ($10) plus groceries for a week-long tour of some of the most beautiful islands in the South Pacific."

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