He may be the oldest active Scout in the world. John Landrigan meets an Aucklander whose lifestyle would put many a landlubber to shame.
He's as sharp as a tack, with a sense of adventure that has him cruising the world, and has a handshake that would crush a young avocado to the stone and an energy befitting fellow Scouts.
But Roy Lucca is no ordinary scout. He is, at 94, thought to be the oldest active Scout in the world. "There's a chap, I think, in Cornwall, but he's not active,'' Roy says. "I don't know of anyone else.''
The man standing beside me in full Scout regalia was born in Australia in 1915. He slips a 40-year-old sea cap from its protective cover before posing with it for our photograph.
Unlike the hat, the uniform's a bit tatty. Someone, probably Roy, has patched a couple of
holes in the navy blue trousers. The jersey, decked in scout badges, is rumpled and would once have been a better fit. The scarf has faded a smidgen - but lucky for us, Roy has not.
He's just celebrated his 94th birthday and is fresh from an annual three-month sojourn in Europe. He now allows himself the comfort of flying business class, but travels alone by rail "all over''.
This Scout leader has always been active. He didn't stop putting up two-storey scaffolding and working at his painting and decorating business until 2005.
"I was there at 7am and worked until I got tired,'' he says.
Judging by his iron grip, Roy would have been chugging away until the 5pm knock-off
whistle.
We meet him at the Hawke Sea Scouts hall in Cox's Bay.
Like Roy's uniform, The Ship - as it is commonly known - is a little timeworn. But it has a
proud history worth preserving.
The building has overlooked Cox's Bay in Westmere for 50 of the club's 80 years. Fundraising permitting, the landmark building will get a $750,000 makeover. "I think they're getting a bit carried away in these financial times,'' says Roy of the plan. "It's a bit of a lunatic's dream.''
However, Roy does see the need for the den and is happy to be its poster boy. He has shared his rope and sailing skills with hundreds of kids here, still attends Monday meetings, and goes out in the canoes when he feels up to it.
Because of a stiff neck, Roy takes a passenger seat on the club's sailing cutter and has chucked in his "condemned'' position on the mainsail.
We're sitting on the club's sunny deck. Old boats are scattered below awaiting the tide to right them in the bay. It's a fitting place to meet someone who loves life and all he can cram into it. Roy's a big kid with the remnant of an Aussie drawl. He made his first trip to New Zealand in 1939 and moved here permanently in 1947.
"New Zealand had a Labour government,'' he says. "It was socialist. People were on the
same level. No rich and no poor.''
He grew up inland in New South Wales but was surrounded by irrigation canals that fed his zest for water. At the age of 7 he built 3m canoes out of corrugated iron bent around a piece of wood in the front and with a coat of tar to seal them.
He thinks kids these days couldn't muster the skills or gumption to complete the task and says: "Computers are rotting their brains.''
Roy may be the oldest, but he's not the longest-serving Scout, having joined Hawke
Sea Scouts with one of his sons only 37 years ago.
Old Scouts
New Zealand's scout national operations manager, Richard Uerata-Jennings, says it's likely Roy Lucca is the oldest active member in NZ and arguably the oldest scout leader in the world. In 2008, South Canterbury man Doug Andrews, 94, laid a wreath for the 100-year anniversary of scouting in New Zealand. Mr Andrews was made an honorary member, but isn't an active member.
Britain once claimed to have the oldest scout in 113-year-old Henry William Allingham. He has since died, but was a scout for only six weeks as a boy before being invested for the first time aged 112. Ninety-six-year-old Slovenian Milos Miovic attended the 21st World Scout Jamboree in the UK in 2007. It's not known if he still is a member.
Scout's honour
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