Category Archives: Passage

Yup, there is weather on them oceans

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The forecast was for crossing some “troughs” at some point along the way, well we found our first one.

The wind slowed down, way down, the sails just flapped?!? What happened? Forecast said we should have 20 kts of wind. Oh well, roll up the jib, no sense having it flap about. Hmmm what to do with the main sail, it’s already double reefed, it’s. It flapping too much.

See a darker gray on the moonlight night, a head of us. Check the radar, it’s still 12 miles away… on what the heck, store the main sail too. Turn on engines and top up the batteries..

Enjoy the mysteriously calm sea state and watch the batteries charge, no rain, not much breeze..

Check radar, ahh there it is 5 miles out, the radar shows a long blob, and it’s thick too, like 6 miles to go through. Too long to go around, guess we we will have to just get it over and go through.

Yes, the radar alarms were screaming on this one

Hmmm not much more than a sprinkle in the depths of the radar blob. But coming out the other side was a different story.

No wind, jumped to 40 knots, sea went from placid to “where did that come from”. I had lowered the cockpit rain shades, cause no reason to get wet in the placid drizzle, but now a torrential down pour and honking winds, making the shades shudder. Spent the next 20 minutes keeping the new rain shades from beating them selves to bits in the winds.

Eventually the other side cleared and unfurled the jib and sailed with just the head sail till day break. Not nearly the 200 miles day of the previous, but a respectable 170 miles, and no issues to report

The rest of the day was nice sailing, started out double reefs main and eventually shook it out to only 1 reef when the gusts to 25 subsided. Still a big swell was with us all day, it’s sort of going our direction, which helps with the motion.

We should really reach 1/2 by day break tomorrow, 530 miles left to go. All good on board, getting rest and nice hot bowl of gumbo for dinner.

Full day down

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What a morning sunrise. Not for the view, but for the squalls, lots of em. Driving rain, woke up (rather rudely I might add), to ease the sails and get drenched with cold water as the squall snuck up on us.

The radar was on, was supposed to warn of impending troubles,but I had noticed in the night when a cargo ship crossed our guard zones that no alarm went off. Figured I’d investigate in the day light. Well here we are, barely daylight and I should have investigated. So the fresh shower was my procrastination reward.

The radar has so many settings, over the years I probably have tweaked them all, either to show more I show less. I figured it was time to return to factory settings. Voila, all better was showing the tops of every wave in the ocean (not helpful), so a few tweaks for offshore sailing and we are back in business.

After a few hours of “dodge-squall” the skies cleared up and a nice day of sailing was in store. At our nightly SSB radio check in we were happy to report we knocked off 200 miles toward our destination since the last check-in. Yahooo, rocking along.

One bit of breakage, our jib/genoa car said he was tired of holding the sail and let go. The sound is like a guitar string, boing. This is happened on our first trip down to NZ, and once long ago. With some creative macrame(lots of rope and knots), a temporary fix was in place just waiting for a break in the 25knot winds. Added a new bolt, added lock-tite, but it doesn’t seem to be holding. I painted the top with some of Christine’s electric blue toe polish and can see the nut slowly backing off.

Fix part two, is a back up block ready to handle the job if Mr Lazy jib car gives up again.

I think the painters tape will hold, Right?

More weather, wind and waves scheduled for the night watch. Should be fun. Go sailing, it’s all cocktails and sandy beaches…😀

All good, running along, knocking out the miles. 775 left till Point Resolution Vanuatu.

Happy As

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Happy and Blasted:

Happy: Launched the boat successfully, back in the water and went smooth, everything worked and no water where it shouldn’t be, like “inside” the boat.

Blasted: on the way down river we got Blasted with big winds and driving rain, that might as well have been icicles every time we looked out for the channel markers. Good thing for heaters, they thawed everything out when we finally found some pseudo shelter in 30 kts of wind in the dark. Not good conditions to try and navigate in the confines of a marina.

Happy and Soggy:

Happy to have made the marina, a day late but on a beautiful morning after the deluge all night.

Soggy: The beautiful day turned to rain just as we were approached the dock to tie the boat up, Soggy again which continued off and on all day.

Happy and Sad:

Happy: Happy to be heading out sailing on to new destinations in search of the perpetual summer of the tropics.

Sad: Sad to leave a slew of wonderful, friendly, helpful, generous people of New Zealand behind. We didn’t say goodbye, as we might just do another trip down in a year or two when our visa status resets.

Happy and Broke:

Happy: Happy to leave the dock, course the wind picked up just as we cleared customs and headed to the dock for some duty free fuel for the next adventures

Broke: Having not visited a fuel station since leaving Fiji, some 6 months ago, our girl was plenty thirsty. All good.

Happy and Holy washing machine:

Happy: Happy finally heading down the river and setting sail for Vanuatu some 1015 miles away.

Holy Washing Machine: The timing leaving the river was terrible, wind versus current, sent everything bouncing about the boat. You think you remember how this works, then the washing machine tells you otherwise.

Wait… do we remember how to do this?

We make it out of the washing machine. Start to get set to raise the mainsail, and with all the washing going on the main halyard (rope that raises the sail) got stuck around the front of the mast. Some full on cowboy rodeo skills and the rope was free. First time that happened. Our friends on a boat that was just ahead of us also had a mainsail issue. Both of us got it sorted without drama except on WhatsApp.

A super nice sail up the coast of NZed with the island providing the protection, small seas decent wind, sunny skies… perfect champagne sailing. Minus the champagne as we have a LONG way to go. Damn!

Sure enough, we clear Cape Bret at sun down and veer away from the protection, the waves and wind pick up. It’s not bad tho, the first 6 hours were a perfect way to get into the groove, and we are just grooving.

Boat is cruising along nicely with 1 reef in the mainsail, and full Jib. We found a reasonable course direction to play nice with the waves and wind. Had a quick sleep and just now under 900 miles left.