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Places around the world

Here we go again. Day 3

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Another night another motoring night. Winds fell off again, they must have had a party to attend else where, say 30 miles behind us our 2 boats we left Noumea with made up some ground on us over night. We can’t have that. Hopefully daybreak will be different.

Into the darkness with our spreadsheets we go

Switching into night mode, the newly drafted quaterback wasn’t sure what he was in for. I changed the screen brightness which for unknown reasons rebooted the screen, the autopilot got upset that his playbook was changed from white to red and stated He simply didn’t know what to do so sat down. A few wise words like, it will be okay, or red light is the new white, and even a you got this, and he jumped right back into actions .

Well makes you wonder where the fault is, something is still not quite right with the auto pilot. We keep our track shoes on so either one of us is ready to jump in at moments notice and take over, should the beeping of sound terror starts. No spring actions were needed this evening he played well all game.

Daybreak and, sails up and it was off to the races. Well really just happy to turn the engine off, and splash splash along. Making comfortable speed, under a gray day, no rain, but just really overcast. Then somewhere around 2pm, I finally realized the sails were not well trimmed. So a tweak here, a tweak there and 8kts was our standard. Great sailing, just needed some blue skies to go with it.

The wind steadily increasing decided to take some canvas down before going into the night, had checked the radar and Norfolk island and there was some rain going to be crossing our path. So prudent to take a reef.

All well on board
Crossed the 1/2 mark, 430 miles left
jambon wrap for lunch, and pulled pork quesadilla for dinner

ps. Feels like this should be day 4, it maybe or just looking track.

Here we go again. Day 2

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Somewhere in the dark hours the perfect winds changed their tunes and shifted into the direction we wanted to go. Not terribly strong but enough to make us head due south when we need to go east too. Gave up when we started getting blown Southwest and decided to put the sails away and turn on the motors and went back to study the forecast. No where was this what was supposed to be. We ended up 20+ miles off course, so burn some diesel till the weather reads its forecasted playbook.

At the same frustrating point, the auto pilot started being finicky and decided he did want to drive for longer than a few minutes at time. He would start his shift and then poof, take his hand off the wheel and yell, I can’t take this any more.. His yelling sounds vaguely like a truck backup alarm. That made it kind of hard to sleep.
Little bit of investigational therapy, nothing seemed to calm his anxieties. And one last chance, but that didn’t work, so he got benched and the backup quarterback was brought on into service. I had signed the backup in NZ, but never finished. Luck would be on our side, I had finished the wiring and commissioning in New Caledonia, signed the contract and dotted the I’s. So with a flick of a switch, Mr Finicky can pout all he wants while sitting on the bench, so long as the backup QB is ready for the long game of 700 nautical miles.

Morning brought the elusive wind shift, and we hoisted sails and were back in a groove again. The backup QB keeping the team together and reeling in the miles. The forecast again said 4-5kts, we had 14-15 and clear blue skies, a perfect sailing day with reasonable calm seas for ocean sailing. Maxed out at 10.7knts of boat speed according to the GPS log.

Upwind sailing at sunset

All well on board,
About 650 miles left till New Zealand 🇳🇿
Big breakfast of bacon and sausages, gotta eat it or customs gets it. Lots of naps during the day, and some good old Cajun Gumbo for dinner.

The Sad Life of the Melanesia

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The wreck of the Melanesia is an awful eyesore located in the tranquil Baie de Toro.

In an attempt to avoid this wreck we anchored in Baie Ma’a,  a neighboring bay, around the corner.

Baie Ma’a is a beautiful and peaceful bay situated just 11nm from the Noumea, heartbeat of New Caledonia.

A surprising discovery to see brown, dry brush on the hillside. Evidently, this bay is in the rain shadow of Grand Terre so it remains dry on the hillsides.

On the weekends, this becomes is a popular spot for the locals.  They like to go out fishing and return here to the peaceful anchorage.

 Here is a photo from the neighboring hillside.

Hop Over to a Shipwreck

There is a little dirt path from Baie Ma’a over to Baie de Toro where the wreck of Melanesia has landed.

The walk was super easy and relatively flat. 

After about 30 minutes we reached the Baie de Toro, hung a right, and walked along the coast line.  We saw the immense shipwreck as we rounded the peninsula.

Unfortunately, you can see this eye sore from every angle of Baie de Toro.

The Wreck of the Melanesia has been resting on this shore since Cyclone Anne hit New Caledonia in 1988.

The rotted exterior now blurs the inside from the outside.

This small coaster which launched in 1955 had a variety of names and home ports. 

Her name prior to Melanesia was Glenelg which you can still see on the side of the bow.

A Sad Ending for Melanesia

She has had a checkered past with several captains fleeing various countries trying to escape persecution.

In 1980 the ship’s captain escaped Australia in the cover of darkness bound for Vanuatu.  However,  the Vanuatu locals suspected the ship of arms smuggling and her seized again.

In 1981 her Captain escaped again only to run aground just north of New Caledonia.

It took a small team one year to refloat the ship. In December 1982 she was transported to Noumea.

Noumea acquired this ship in 1983 where it changed names to Melanesia.  This poor ship was beyond repair and just sat until 1987. 

At this point the port authority was so embarrassed by the stranded vessel that they moved it.  And then Cyclone Anne repositioned it to its current location on the beach.

Poor Melanesia had a very tumultuous life.

I found these photos taken in 1994 when Melanesia was a little more in tact.  Photos courtesy of ShipSpotting.com/photos

Find Baie Ma’a on No Foreign Land and find Epave du Melanesia on No Foreign Land.

Our blog posts run 4-5 weeks behind actual live events.

We visited the Wreck of Melanesia in the middle of August 2026.