Cook Strait Crossing

Cook Strait Crossing

We’ve been preparing for days, weeks even. All safety systems in place and inspected. Flares ✓ grab bag ✓ EPIRB (Emergency Position Indicator Radio Beacon) ✓  VHF radio  ✓. Enough food for a month is stowed in every crevice of the boat and the water tanks are filled to their 180 litre capacity. The weather has been studied, analysed, checked and rechecked.

No we are not headed offshore to tropical pacific climes again but preparing for the mere five hour jump across Cook Strait. A paltry 33 nautical miles. So what’s the big deal?

When we first gave birth to the idea of sailing to the Pacific we gave Navire, our Pacific 38 sloop, a practice run to the Bay of Islands to test the mettle of our vessel and its crew. There we met veterans of the Pacific and we told them of our dream. “Where are you from?” they asked. “Wellington” we replied. “Oh Cook Strait,” they said knowingly although they’d never been there, “you’ll be fine offshore”.  And we were. Such is the reputation of this piece of water.

 

Cook Strait has this fearsome reputation for good reason. It has a tidal rip at Karori Rock, so powerful that it has been known to bring the interisland ferry to a standstill. The Marlborough Sounds Cruising Guide, an excellent technical document, recommends that in a fierce southerly with…. “Prayer may be of assistance” when transiting the rip.  It goes on “in strong conditions the rip off Karori Rock will strike fear in the heart of the most hardened mariner.”  Wikipedia states “it is considered one of the most dangerous and unpredictable waters in the world”. To add to the mix, behind Karori Rock and all along the south coast of the North Island are hills and valleys that funnel such fierce gusts out to sea, threatening to lay yachts flat on their sides, that local sailors have named it the Wind Factory.

Actually the whole of Cook Strait is a wind funnel, where wind speeds are up to twice of those of land. Last time we crossed the wind was forecasted at 20 knots and we were walloped by gusts of 42! Or worse the first time I crossed Palliser Bay, which is included in the Cook forecast, the winds were forecast for 35 knots and we got 71!

Now I’m no expert on this trip, this is one women’s view, that of a lowly and rather inept crew member. To prepare for this challenging passage we calculate our passage to arrive at Karori Rock one hour before Wellington high tide. This gets us there at slack tide when the malignant waves lie dormant for a moment. Sometimes this has us leaving in the pitch black, as we have to time our subsequent arrival in the Sounds in daylight so we can see where to drop our pick. This usually only give us one tide in a 24 hour period that we can sail on. A later tide could get us there in the dark.

This malicious tidal effect is caused by “when high water from one side of Cook Strait meets low water from the other” says Wikipedia. The effect of this meeting is reminiscent of being in a washing machine. If we have our tide calculations right, get away at the right time and reach it at slack tide, we barely notice it. However on a recent return trip we got held up by a fuel line problem in Tory Channel and arrived at the rip an hour and a half late. The whole area was awash with steep standing waves. We were only making 1.5 knots (normal speed 5-6 knots) and that wasn’t forwards, but sideways, toward the jagged teeth of the rocks at Karori Light. On another washing machine-like passage, my very first trip back with my partner David, I heard a zipping sound and looked up to see our mainsail tearing right along the boom, a coincidence but scary for a Cook Strait novice crew. David was very cool-headed and dealt with it ably and immediately, as he does. However the rip can also run in our favour. When we were returning from the Pacific we came via the west coast of the North Island, got the tide going our way and raced through at 10 knots – just about planeing!

Preparing for a crossing we watch the weather for days in advance, weeks even. This particular trip was held up for a week by relentless equinox gales which always prevail in December. We would see a weather window appear in the long-range forecast but just as quickly it would disappear, another few days of our holiday being snatched from our grasp. Our weather rules for crossing are that we generally don’t go in more than 20 knots of wind, especially if its velocity is predicted to rise. This wind speed is critical to a comfortable trip but so are the sea conditions. If it has been howling for days on end the sea can remain very rough even when the wind has eased. Or if the wind and tide are going in opposite directions rough seas prevail.

Sometimes, to cover all our bases, just after cast off from Wellington, we make an offering to the sea-gods. Sailors in earlier centuries had no GPS, no daily weather forecasts, and certainly not electronic charts, so they ritually threw tot of rum into the sea accompanied by a suitable incantation. We follow this tradition and go for the trifecta – imploring Neptune, Poseidon and Tangaroa for a fair passage.

One advantage of this arduous crossing is that only the hardiest of Wellington yachts venture forth and the Sounds are saved from being constant rush hour like the bays of the north. In 2008 we were anchored in Smokehouse Bay at Great Barrier Island with 40 yachts on Christmas Day, and 1000 more were due to arrive the next day. We left and headed north. 10 yachts would be a very busy anchorage down here.

So here we are December 2012. The leaving day arrived. Whether to go or not was a not a clear-cut decision. The day was much windier than forecast, and the breeze was coming from the opposite decision to the one predicted. A coffee and a rethink were in order. To get an idea of exactly how windy it was out in Cook Strait we monitored channel 23 on the VHF, which gives us live wind readings from critical points on our journey. Conditions were easing. So we started out, late. Not the ideal but doable. We whipped around the boat securing cupboards, hatches, and musical instruments, and gave a final tug on the dinghy lashings. Autopilot on, instruments on, let go lines and we were off. We raised our brand new mainsail and Navire sighed as she heeled over, nearly dipping her starboard rail in and out of the waves as they raced by.

The idea of crossing Cook Strait often makes me anxious. For me anxiety precipitates seasickness, and the idea of being sick makes me feel more anxious. Not ideal for a sailor you may think but not uncommon as I found out from fellow ocean cruisers in the Pacific.  I get anxious about the wind, the sea conditions, the rip, the skipper even. But most of the time I enjoy the trip.

On this trip were joined by Piet at the ninth hour. He sailed with us from New Zealand to Tonga and was relentlessly cheerful and endlessly capable for over 1000 miles through impenetrable headwinds, storms and malevolent seas, and the permanent tiredness you get with 3 hour watches every night. He and David are a formidable team and I’m grateful that Piet is a man or I might get traded in.

We sped across the harbor, wind 25knots. Everything as working, no winches jamming, nothing crashing around inside, no leaks, looks like we’d done our pre-trip preparation thoroughly.  Out of Wellington Harbour, the sun is shining and clouds are scudding across the sky. Across Lyall Bay, where the breeze accelerates down the wind funnel caused by the isthmus between the Miramar hills and the city. Would we get to the rip in time for slack water?

Sinclair Head in sight, then yes a distinct line of breakers stretch out to sea from Karori Rock. We head well south. The rip is fan shaped with the pointy end at the rock. This end is very rough, short and sharp if you are game. The wide outer fan end is relatively calmer but longer. For comfort’s sake went for this. It wasn’t too bad, not in full flood yet.

We settled in for the main body of the trip. We tend to motor sail across Cook Strait as the objective is getting there, and just occasionally we have a pleasant sail as well. Suddenly an alarm started screaming. I leapt down into the cabin and killed the engine. We sailed on as it cooled and David checked the oil and water, no shortages there. Recently David began researching installing a new engine in Navire for our next Pacific trip. In this process he found that diesel engines like being run at higher revs than we’d been running ours. So this day we wound up the revs but seemingly the system didn’t like it. Once the engine had cooled and we restarted and ran it at our usual laconic revs she ran beautifully. Having any sort of issue with a boat engine makes us feel very uneasy. We are so reliant on it. With any sort of flow coming out of Tory Channel we’d need it.

Tory Channel loomed and we radioed our intention to enter. Fortunately not a ferry in sight. They take up an awful lot of room in that narrow entrance and definitely have right of way.  We sailed on through avoiding the rocks and eddies,

I love the immediate contrast between the stormy seas of Cook Strait and the idyllic calm of Tory Channel, almost permanently sheltered by its surrounding hills. Instantly the nausea abates and my appetite returns voraciously. I’m straight into the galley producing tea and Christmas cake for the grateful crew.

We navigate the shoals of Erie Bay, position ourselves in our usual spot and drop anchor. We breathe out. We are here.

Well that’s it. End of the Navire Pacific Journey and blog. In many ways I’d have preferred to keep cruising. It’s an extraordinary lifestyle. But on this occasion I’m pleased also to come home. It’s what we’d planned and so it’s complete and all without sinking the boat. A very successful adventure if we do say so ourselves.

And now what?
Well, we move back into the house in the next month or two. I get to have Lily living with me again and Jackson staying during university holidays. Wonderful!! We’ll be there for about three years, until Lily leaves school at least and then........... if you can dream it you can do it so we’re dreaming. On the list are the following:

1] Sail to the North American west coast via Tahiti and Honolulu. Not top of the options as it appears a hard uphill slog over many miles but I’d love to cruise the British Columbian coast and the US to Mexico and Panama. Maybe go through the canal into the Caribbean. Maybe back to NZ through the Pacific.
2] Do another Pacific season similar to this one. Maybe spend cyclone season north of the equator in the Marshall Islands and another season in the western Pacific islands
3] I could happily spend a year cruising between Coromandel and North Cape.
4] Buy a canal boat and explore Europe very slowly. This appeals to Janet for the food, always the food. The Pacific is great but the food is pretty uninteresting by comparison with Europe. And there are no coral reefs or violent storms at sea.
We’ll let you know when we find out what it’ll be.

Ah... one last very important thing

Thankyous
We were helped all along the way by many people who generously gave their time and support. To all of you – a big thank you.
· Brian and Meg who have been there – for mentoring
. Kim and Tony who sold us Navire. You have given such a fine ship from which we learn every day.
· Our fabulous crew:
Simon - Wellington/Napier passage and arguably the toughest. Thanks for encouraging me to use seasick pills. Life at sea really is so much better with them.
Piet – Napier/Tonga passage. Thanks for the irrepressible humour, sartorial dressing and electronic wizardry.
Andrew - Tonga/Opua passage. The stove works a treat, and you make a mean pancake
Nick – Opua/Wellington. Thanks for coming aboard at such short notice and being so cheerful
· Anne for looking after our Wellington affairs, and for endless use of her sewing machine and dining table
· Brian who volunteered in Napier to fix our laptop. It’s gone well ever since.
· Phill for helping us with our computer and trying to get to Weatherfax going
· Bob of Saggitarius who spent many hours sorting out our regulator.
· Richard for the margaritas and fine company, and for hosting a 60th dinner for David when we were knee deep in boat preparation
· Myrto for medical help at the end of a phone
· Gaylene for looking after Janet’s job for six months
· Sia and Niko, our hosts at Niuatoputapu, for a very special welcome
· Alene and Bruce, of Migration, for huge fun, stupendous birthday party and much else
· Neil of KW International for stunning us with making a dinghy in just 2 days.
· Jim, Rag of the Air, for weather and great humour
· Mandy for use of her car in Whangarei
· Liz for teaching us how to blog and believing in us.
· All of those who gave us books. We had some excellent reading
· Alfred and Rhoda, for showing us Samoa, inside and out.
· Alan Jackson who stole some time to repair our outboard. It hasn’t missed a beat.
· Mike – at Alexander motors for teaching us to strip an alternator and much else
· All the many cruisers we met on the way but especially Compass Rose, Casteel, Obsession, Hoki Mai, Scott Free, Migaloo II, Kia Kaha, Distracted
All you readers of this blog who wrote encouragements to us. You know who you are.

The biggest thank you is to the Navire skipper. David was superb on this trip. He remained calm and in control when we encountered storms at sea, navigated us across thousands of miles of ocean, through coral infested areas, and anchored us so consistently well that we never once dragged. He created wonderful social situations with his music, creating jam sessions and entertaining people wherever we went. He is a dogged fisherman, dragging our lures across vast oceans till finally something caught, then gleefully doing the slaughtering bit. One of his best skills for this kind of trip is his problem solving ability. There are endless things that can go wrong on a yacht at sea, and some did, but he has a go at working them out, and fixed many a thing en route. And I do love him so.

One of the best treasures from this adventure is that I’m more in love with Janet than when we left. That’s not to say we didn't have our moments. At one point she had plans to sign on with another yacht, any other yacht and that wasn’t the only moment. But over all love has grown. Cool eh! She’s a cook extraordinaire who can create a tasty meal in heaving seas while dashing occasionally to the rail herself. There are sailors now all over the Pacific whose culinary dreams came true at her table. She can check the oil level on the engine, download and decipher a weather map, she’s a dab hand on the radio and has stood in for Rag of the Air co-ordinator on several occasions. She can climb the mast and stand her watch while paralysed with sea sickness and fear. She relayed critical weather information to many yachts on passage. She provisioned Navire impeccably and even late in the trip could be relied on to pull something magic from a hidden corner. And together we had fun. Shit, did we have fun!!



Cheers for now. Janet, David and Navire.

Shit Does Happen!!

If you thought, as I did, that losing our dinghy was a big deal consider these other stories of loss all of which occurred around the same time and in the same waters in which we were travelling.

We found this sad yacht with broken rudder, mast, keel and severe hull damage on the north shore of Savaii, Samoa. She struck the reef as she tried to enter the lagoon at night just two weeks before.
Another sloop was wrecked on the reef at Kelefesia in the Ha’apai Group of Tonga entering the lagoon in which we had anchored a few weeks earlier. Some sailors anchored near-by to remove the rig and other gear so as to reduce hazard to other yachts. They commented on how spooky and forlorn she looked on the coral under the aqua sea.
This is the remains of a large and very expensive catamaran that capsized between Niue and Tonga. The story as I have it is that she was caught off-guard by a squall that, in its approach looked no different to many others that had passed over harmlessly. This photo is of the Niue supply ship that had earlier picked up the crew and this time took the vessel on board. A write-off!
Yet another vessel had a close call, landing their keel on a coral shelf during a sudden wind shift at night, only days after we had been anchored in much the same place. With help from other yachts she managed to get herself off the coral with little damage other than to the self esteem and still racing hearts of the crew.

Andrew up the mast conning us through coral reefs

The best way we found to safely negotiate coral.

Then there’s the yacht missing near Fiji in Oct where only debris has been found. I’ve not heard if the debris is from the missing yacht nor if the yacht or crew has since been located.
It is sobering to know of and even see yachts that have come to grief, in all cases with no loss of life apart from the one possible missing yacht –right where we have been sailing. Without doubt it focuses the mind.
On a smaller scale but dramatic nevertheless, a catamaran called Isabella, was struck by lightning in Panama. Hers was the shortest mast around but still the one zapped. Deep fried all the electrics which they are still replacing.
Another catamaran lost her propeller in Vava’u.

Eagle Wings, with two or three children aboard, made the passage to Tonga from New Zealand at much the same time as Navire. She had endless trouble on that trip beginning with a failed gear box, followed by their diesel and all the fresh water getting contaminated by sea water, and then by the headsail furler jamming. On the lucky side, a passing freighter stopped for them to dinghy over in the flat calm and trade a bottle of rum for 100 litres of precious drinking water. We did not see or hear of a ship on either passage. They were stuck for at least six weeks in sweltering Nukualofa downwind from a boat drying sea slugs on deck – the smell at times was rank. Then, as they prepared to cast off and at last begin their South Pacific cruise they discovered that their engine had seized. We left them amongst a dismantled motor, waiting on their ‘rarely seen’ mechanic and contemplating what to do about the suddenly empty cruising kitty. We met Eagle Wings while despondently arranging to replace our dinghy. Their story lifted out spirits no end.
We have rarely told our lost dinghy story without the listener confessing to a similar mishap. These stories too did wonders for our mood. Losing a dinghy, it appears, is a very common occurrence. Many, of course, are recovered, some after the passage of several months. Perhaps there is hope for ours yet. We learned too that there are worse circumstances in which to lose a dinghy such as losing someone else’s of which we heard several. The custom is to insist that visitors to your yacht tie their own dinghy. It will be no surprise that we follow this approach.
David


The Passage Home
David
Setting out on passage puts me in mind of that saying “the longest journey begins with the first step.” It seems such a monumental thing to set out on an 1100 mile ocean crossing, just us and this little boat but actually, it isn’t. You just lift the anchor and go, like we’ve done a thousand times before. You just go. It seems so ordinary. Just another day’s sail, except that on this occasion we keep going. Evening comes, we have dinner, someone goes on watch and the others go to bed and all the while Navire sails on, ticking off the miles. Before you know it you have 3 or 400 hundred miles under the keel.
We prepare of course, but apart from the volume of food and spare parts there’s not much more to do than for crossing Cook Strait. That is, from this end. For the outward journey we had a ‘To Do’ list of 300 items at least. Unlike a day sail we do pay attention to the weather at least a couple of week before casting off. There is endless examination of weather maps and conversations amongst ourselves and with others doing the same passage. And then there is that anxious decision about when to leave. But with the decision taken, we lift anchor and go. There should be a fanfare, horns hooting, streamers thrown, crowds to wave us off. On this occasion, where we left from Big Mamma’s on Pangaimotu, even though it was mid afternoon not a lot was stirring on the other yachts. We just slipped our moorings and headed for the pass in the reef. Not a single horn blast or wave, or streamer. Very ordinary and yet such a big first step.

Janet
Middle of the night, middle of the ocean, October sometime.
(I seem to always write in the dead of night)
Well we are underway, three days south of Tonga and six days north of NZ. This midnight watch I’m on can be glorious, gliding across the ocean under a majestic starry sky, or hard work like now, racing along at 7 knots, reefed down, the wind gusting to 30 knots and the waves slamming the hull. It’s all shades of grey, no stars or moon to guide us tonight, I’ve been through a lot worse now but these conditions still makes me feel vulnerable, out here in 38’ of plastic in this volatile sea.

Leaving land is always a slightly anxious time, mostly worrying about weather - have we picked the right conditions for a good passage? So far so good, not enough wind yet in fact. And I’m not seasick, a little queasy but that’s okay. Said goodbye to Tonga and to the glorious life of cruising (for now maybe). And glorious it was. While I’m out here on night watch I have a slide show going through my head of trip highlights. Whales were a significant feature, watching them breach, slapping the water with their tails, swimming close to them and watching them lying deep under the surface then slowly swimming up to blow. Listening to the whale-song through the hull in Niue in the middle of the night was truly awesome.

Although we went to many beautiful places what really enriched the experience was the people we met, cruisers and locals alike. We made a lot of special friends who we intend to stay in touch with. Locals include Alfred and Rhoda in Samoa who adopted us and showed us their country, and Niko and Sia on Niuatoputapu in northern Tonga who were most excellent hosts.
We saw amazing scenery, stunning white sandy beaches, beautiful coral, brightly coloured sea-life, caverns and chasms, palm trees and coral blue sea. We had great intercultural moments watching NZ international rugby in all the countries we visited. Playing music was an absolute highlight. Playing and singing was a regular part of socialising on land and on other boats.
Writing the blog has been a joy, it has helped cement the experience, but best of all was the responses we’ve had from you readers. Because of lack of internet access I haven’t been able to read it right through yet so I have that pleasure to come back in NZ.
Other pictures in my slide show in my mind are watching the Wizard of Oz on a big screen, under the star on the deck of Migration, a large trimaran, night lobster diving, catching big fish, and visiting a local school. I had great fun with food. Having lots of time to cook was great and always a willing audience to try my food. It was interesting working with local ingredients.
And most gloriously it was warm all the time. I love life at 25 degrees average, wearing little or no clothes and having a warm sea to dive into whenever I pleased. Ahhhhhhh......
Back to the present. There are other boats within a few hundred miles of us but I doubt we’ll see them (actually a catamaran overtook us on the second to last day). We hear them on the radio, they have good wind, no wind, headwinds or too much wind, broken motors or are hove-to, so we are doing rather well.
The queasiness is abating, it hasn’t been so bad this time out, and I’m finally getting my sea legs. Poor Andrew has mal de mer and struggles around the boat with his blue bucket in tow. I do know how he feels. However when he’s on deck he’s good, he keeps the boat racing along. I love to see him and David tweaking the sails, I just don’t seem to have the knack.

Actually I'd rather die, thanks all the same.

I’d love to enjoy the ocean passages but I don’t much. I want to enjoy the wide open spaces and the foreverness of it but in reality, I feel queasy some of the time, I’m often tired from being up for three hours in the dead of night, and from the G-forces of the boat being heeled over. There’s always the spectre of bad weather just over the horizon somewhere. So I just want to get there. However I do like the lack of reference points, not knowing what day it is, and only knowing where we are from the latitude and longitude readings on the GPS.
The best thing about this night watch is getting to bed afterwards, I just literally fall in. Yuck it’s raining now, it’s killed the wind and the sails are slatting....now the wind is back with a vengance.. roll on 3am.

David’s journal entry
Friday. Day 3
Janet feeling queasy but doesn’t miss a beat. Attends to weather and food magnificently. Still a horror on the actual sailing. Andrew, I suspect would abandon ship at Minerva if he could. So far it’s a misery for him – head in a bucket or asleep. Nevertheless he does his watch and fights the seasickness with little success, alas.
I was feeling fine with only the occasional twinges of woosiness. Then, at the end of my 9-12pm watch last night, after looking at weather faxes on the pc I could feel that awful presage of seasickness and decided reading was not a good idea. I went back on deck and before I knew it I was hanging over the rail doing my best to deposit my entire gastrointestinal track in the sea. Ohhhh it is so wretched a feeling. Dozed all the rest of my watch. Off watch I slept well and came on deck feeling fine. Took another Pahia Bomb anyway. Got to keep that awful feeling at bay. With Andrew down and Janet just controlling it we can’t afford a third person in that “who gives a fuck, do as little as possible, oh God get me off of here” state. Fortunately my stomach stayed steady as a rock all the way home. Yipee!!.

Passages, long or short, have been something to be endured, to get to another place. Disappointing. I’ve wanted to ‘live at sea’, do things, read, make music, attend to the ship, gaze in wonder at the vast ocean, write, eat and enjoy the company but that has happened only in patches. Mostly it’s an endurance, watching the miles tick by – and these past 2 days they have gone by so very slowly - focused on getting there. (Directly after this watch the winds filled in and we began making fabulous time and, as Janet writes, we made NZ in record time and in relative comfort. I finally had a long passage that I enjoyed. I was able to read and write, and attend to the ship and to gaze at the vast ocean. Best of all I understood the weather we were in. I knew there was no front about to beat us up. If the winds picked up I was confident they would not keep increasing to the point of serious discomfort. The wind would stay in the east and vary by 10 or 15 knots. And they did, all the way to Opua. Fabulous.)

Midnight next night (Janet)
Only one more day till we get to 30 degrees South, leaving the tropical zone and heading towards the Southern Ocean. We are four days out of Tonga and I’m back into my wet weather gear at night, but the trip is nowhere as cold as the one we had going north.

Andrew looking much better

Hard day yesterday, not a storm, but the wind was 25-30 knots (35 is gale force) but it made the waves big enough to slam into us making getting around the boat difficult. Andrew actually asked for food today. A good sign. I’m not feeling queasy any more either.

We are making good time, doing 170 miles one day, a record for us. Soon we have to decide whether to go in to Opua in the Bay of Islands, or to head west and sail down the west coast of the North Island. I feel too tired to do that. If we get a couple of days of smoother seas I’ll feel better. Opua appeals – hot showers and a bed that doesn’t get slammed by every sixth wave. It’s been too rough to shower and I’m beginning to dislike the smell of myself. I dream my first NZ meal – lamb cutlets, asparagus,... finished off by lemon meringue pie and cream. No more awful Tongan chicken.

Oct 27
Tonight should be our last night at sea on this leg. We are going to Opua – yes! The weather isn’t good enough to go straight on to Wellington. This trip to Opua is 1060 miles and the leg to Wellington is 600 with much more volatile weather conditions. I have two bottles of bubbly ready to celebrate land fall.

Bay of Islands
We have arrived in Opua safely after having a very good trip down from Tonga. We did it in seven days which is an excellent time for us. We arrived on a sunny, warm day, welcomed by a pod of dolphins and a tuna on the line. We stopped in the shelter of a bay to enjoy a lunch of fresh tuna sushi before heading into Opua

and all the officialdom of customs, MAF and of manouvering in tight marinas.

This journey is not over yet though. We still have what is the most challenging leg to go, down the West Coast to Wellington. While we are here we reprovision, water up and refuel, plus catch up with cruising friends who are arriving each day having completed their own passages to New Zealand. To our great joy Meg and Brian, neighbours from our marina in Wellington, were touring up round here and came to visit. David’s mum came up from Whangarei to visit too and it was lovely to catch up with her. She is a yachting cruiser from way back with two passages to the islands under belt so had some understanding of what we were feeling.

Nov 1, Off Cape Rienga
Back on the road again after having a great time in Opua. We partied with other cruisers with much bragging about boat speeds and sharing passage conditions.

North Cape

Its 15 degrees and bloody freezing. The weather is giving a taste of NZ classic conditions. Its blowing 30 knots and the seas are 3-4 metres. I’m in the cockpit in the dark with big waves rolling down behind us, occasionally one breaks and I can hear the crashing sound. Fortunately very little of it comes aboard. Doing this side of the country means we will have completed a circumnavigation of the North Island. Quite an achievement.

We have been joined by a lovely young man, Nick from Kansas USA. We borrowed him from Compass Rose.

Andrew got a call from Wellington to say his dad was in hospital so he flew back home immediately.

If you look closely, yes, it's Mt Taranaki

It's a hard life this passage making

Nov 4, Cook Strait, only hours from home
We are racing through Cook Strait in the dead of night. We want to get to Wellington before a 50 knot Southerly arrives. We have wind and tide with us and clocked 10.5 knots at one stage, it’s a wonder we didn’t get speed wobbles. There was quite a bit of shipping about. Fortunately we timed the tide right and the rip at Karori rock was negligible. It can be a horrendous bit of water if you get the timing wrong.
We arrived at dawn and dear Piet was waiting to take our lines. I swallowed a couple of whiskies, had a hot shower and passed out. I woke to friends visiting then Wellington had the decency to put on a fireworks display to welcome us back. A fitting end to the trip.

Blog Oct 11
Less than a week to go before we head south to the 40’s, depending on the weather of course. We are following a friend’s progress sailing to NZ, on the radio and it is not pretty out there right now. Strong southerly head-winds. But it is gorgeous right here back in Uoleva, a tiny island with white sandy beaches – classic tropical island photo stuff. After days of wind and rain, and being stuck anchored off a town with a noisy town generator and ships coming past at night, the sun is out. Yesterday evening we were treated to a full-on thunderstorm and torrential rain, on our way home in the dinghy. From the shore we couldn’t even see the boat. One night it was so wet we had a roster for emptying the rainwater out of the dinghy so the outboard wouldn’t get swamped overnight .

Andrew has arrived safely and is proving a useful addition to the crew. Not only is he a sailor and a mechanic, we’d be the envy of the fleet up here if anyone found out, but he can sing. He’s a bass, and does harmonies, so we are warbling away here in three part harmony.

Andrew climbing for coconuts

We are spending our time preparing the boat and studying the weather – endlessly. I am tied to the galley bench cooking meals to freeze for the trip. Six different ways with chicken. That is the only meat we can get here. And only legs and thighs. When you buy your tender, easy to prepare, chicken breasts in the supermarket in NZ have you ever spared a thought for where all the other bits go? Well they all come here!

Aren't they amazing!

When my thoughts turn to NZ, apart from dreading the Wellington “spring” weather, I think of the luxuries in store for us. Long hot showers, supermarkets with a range of more than 40 products, crunchy apples, long showers again, fast internet, and best of all, seeing friends and family. Alas Harry is working in Wanaka over summer and I won’t get to see him, fortunately Tom is in town. But I do look forward to catching up with all of you. For all the glories of beautiful beaches and new experiences I think the main thing that really feeds me is friendships. When we get to places with email we revel in getting your emails. We copy them into a Word file and relish each word at our leisure. Fortunately we have an immediate community right here on the ocean. We have had a great time developing relationships with a number of other cruisers. Even when we are 100’s of miles apart we celebrate when we hear them on the radio. Friendships develop very quickly out here as we already have a huge amount in common when we meet, they are all fellow adventurers and have chosen sailing as their way of exploring the world.

I’ve been acting net controller on a cruisers’ net. It is huge fun. It has seriously improved my radio skills and I get to talk to all the yachts around here. We know about half of them so I get to catch up with all our friends. Jim, the guy who runs the net is having radio problems and hardly anyone can hear him so I’ve been checking in with yachts on passage and have Ted, a guy on a yacht in Opua doing the weather.

Oct 15
We are back in Nukualofa, our jump off point to NZ. All feeling tired. We’ve been visiting islands in the Ha’apais and were going to stay at a beautiful one, Kelefesia, even the name is lovely, before sailing down here. On arrival we navigated through the coral and found the anchorage very rolly, ocean swell was coming in, so we turned around and headed down here which meant an overnight sail. We were motoring as there was no wind so we thought we were in for an easy, calm, albeit noisy night on the ocean. But just before my watch we were hit by a 30 knot squall, so no star gazing for me, and for poor David who had to reef the sail. I was sick too, not too onerously though. Poor Andrew had his head firmly in a bucket for his watch. We’ll get our sea-legs soon. You may think that spending all this time on a boat would help me but the ocean movement is quite different to being in sheltered waters.

After leaving Uoleva we sailed a few hours to the island of Ha’afeva where the whole village happened to be having a feast to open the priest’s new house. Half a mill it cost, we were told, a lot of money for a very small village, maybe 250 people, to raise.

This woman seemed to want to have her way with me. I had to ask her to be gentle.

She was very funny.

Most of the people live pretty much on a subsistence level, albeit a well fed one, but the church constantly draws money from all. Aside from my cultural reservations about this we had a great time, dancing and feasting. The tables were laden with suckling pigs and lobster. Everyone was wearing their Sunday best making for a very colourful occasion.

The choir

On our way we came across these humpback whales messing about and having fun. Well, tnat's what it looks like to us. A very impressive display.

Mostly lying on their backs

waving their long flukes in the air but we saw one or two breathtaking breaches where they hurl themselves three quarters out of the water and land on their sides with a massive splash.

Now we are in this southern place we wait for the weather. There is no wind for the next few days so we will reprovision, refuel, prepare the boat and rest up. A number of boats have left in the last few days but they are either motoring or going nowhere, they tell us on the net. We will wait for the trade winds to come in again. It’s a fine line as we don’t want to run into bad weather a week later at the NZ end, and it sounds like you have been having it – 10 degrees in Bay of Islands – hope I’ve got enough clothes for those latitudes.
Xx
Janet

Oct 17
We thought we’d be waiting for a good weather spell to leave but the weather in fact is so good that we can’t sail anywhere, there is no wind all week! It is dead calm most of the time then we get hit by big squalls in the middle of the night. Thunder and lightning, and torrential downpours. We are anchored but we all get up and run the engine, and watch the GPS to see if we shift. Last night at 4am a squall hit and the boat in front of us dragged their anchor but fortunately they got away before they got to us. On the plus side we filled our water tanks and can do much needed laundry today.
Watch this space.

October 3 Janet
We are hanging out in a bay off the island of Uoleva in the Hapaai Island group in Tonga. I can feel our trip drawing to a close. We are starting to get the boat ready for the final passage of the trip.
This island is classically gorgeous. It is one long white sandy beach. There are no villages, just two backpacker resorts and a more upmarket one called Serenity, all tucked into the trees by the beach And only one other yacht here. When we arrived we knew of the backpacker places so set off down the beach to explore them. These places are rather basic with no power or food services, one was a bit rough but the other was lovely. However while we were there we learned of this place called Serenity that had a bar and a FRIDGE! (they have a generator for power). And they were having a birthday party for the owner. So we piled back into our dinghy and headed down there.
Serenity is everything that my perfect island retreat would be. The bar/restaurant is an open round building on the beachfront, fale style. Even the kitchen is open. You help yourself to beer and wine from the fridge and write it on a piece of paper. There is only one thing on the menu so you know its fresh and you don’t even have to make any decisions! The lighting is candles, hurricane and solar lamps. You can sit there and gaze out through the palm trees at the moonlight on the sea. To go to the loo you follow a path through the coconut palms lit by lanterns creating a magical effect. The accommodation is fales and thatched huts amongst the coconut palms.
We arrived and joined the backpacker people at a table. Then a group of five men from the other boat, an Australian ketch, arrived with guitars and drums. This looked promising. After dinner a very large cava bowl was brought out and many of us sat around it on the floor on mats. Speeches were made then we were told the protocol – drink, sing, drink, sing.... perfect! Oh and one clap for half a bowl of cava and two claps for a whole bowl. Gradually all the guitars came out and a drum. First the staff sang some Tongan songs with lovely harmonies then one of the Aussie men started with reggae. David and I sang a range of songs. It was a great night.
I like the feeling cava gives me. It is not a strong drug high but a lovely mellowness. Very gentle.
The Aussies had been having trouble with their single sideband radio (SSB), the radio we use for contact with the world when we are away from land, so the next morning I went over and helped them sort it out - well I sorted out channels and frequencies but the hardware left something to be desired. Great progress for a bird who hardly knew how to use this piece of equipment before she left NZ. The Aussies were impressed (they certainly were!! D).
Yesterday we had the best snorkelling on the whole trip. We followed a reef out from the beach. The coral was stunning.
Andrew, our crew for the return voyage, an old friend of mine from primary school days, arrives next week to cruise with us for a week before we head south. Yesterday I was listening to a boat on the net (an SSB station where we get weather and check in with) that was only a few hundred miles south of here, on their way back to NZ, and they said it was cold already! Frightening.
Tomorrow we head back to Pangai (the local town) to get more fresh food and water, our watermaker has packed up, and will meet up with Migration (American friends), and Hoki Mai an NZ boat we met in Samoa.
Well the sun is going to set soon so I’m off to the Aussie boat with David to have a drink with the rather lovely Aussie men. I tell you at 53 to have the attention of five ocean sailing men (ranging mid-forties to 60) does my self-esteem a world of good. (curiously David has been slightly more attentive!).
Later
Never got this posted last week so I’ll add a bit more. We are back in beautiful Uoleva. Several more boats turned up, most of whom we know now and we had a beach party. It was a beautiful calm night, pot luck dinner, full-on milky way and we played music around the bonfire. Perfection.
Then the next night was Bruce’s birthday on Migration. David made him a delicious chocolate layer cake and, using a calking nozzle, piped a whale in icing on it. Then he wrote a song for Bruce, typed it up and put it in a bottle (Bruce and Alene have a tradition of putting messages in bottles and setting them adrift). We took the guitar over and sang it before dinner. He loved it. Migration is a large trimaran with a huge foredeck. Bruce and Alene invited everyone in the bay over after dinner, set up a screen on deck and fired up their data projector. We watched The Wizard of Oz under the stars. Outrageous!!
Every morning we check into a radio net to say where we are and get weather updates. Twice this week Jim, who runs it, hasn’t been able to do it and asked me to do it. So I call up a whole lot of yachts who are on passage and get their positions and directions and check if they are okay. I love it. Alas my skills are nowhere near up to doing the weather. (But they ARE amazing – lots of cruisers have commented very favourably - D)
We will be in phone contact till we leave Tonga and will get to check the email one more time on about the 14th. We are really enjoying the emails you send.
Xx Janet

Haapai, Tonga

Ha’apai blog Sept 18
Today is my birthday and I couldn’t be in a more perfect place. We are back in Tonga, in the Ha’apai group, a relatively unvisited area of Tonga. We have only seen three other yachts here, two of whom we already knew, and we now know the other one after the ubiquitous “hello, how are you, where are you from, and come and have a drink” protocol of cruising.

After the last week in Niue being cloudy and cool, with very rolly seas in the anchorage, and the rough seas of the passage, we were greeted by a breaching whale not far off the back of the boat and the biggest fish we’ve ever caught – a one metre mahi mahi, iridescent blue which turned green in the cockpit. We dropped anchor in light winds, flat seas, warm temperatures, the most gorgeous aqua coloured clear warm sea, and palm fringed white sandy beaches. There was only one other yacht in our first anchorage where we rested the night before checking in to Tonga. It was Compass Rose whom we had met and partied with at Niuatoputapu. We were promptly invited over for dinner and accepted, donating a chunk of the fish David had caught!

We have cell-phone range again here and have treasured the texts we’ve had from you. It is extraordinary that in this remote place we have cell-phone contact!

Last night we had my second birthday celebration for this 53rd occasion. In Niue our friends Bruce and Alene on Migration threw us a little advance party in case we didn’t see them again. They had their boat decorated with streamers, party hats and whistles and balloons. We had a reading of Dr Seuss’s Birthday Book and they gave me a copy of one of Bruce’s children’s books, him being the author.

For last night’s party we reconnected with Kia Kaha, a NZ boat we’d met in Vavau last time we were in Tonga, so Mike and Kirsten and their baby Ocean came over along with Compass Rose for a fabulous potluck dinner, complete with our freshly caught fish. David sang me a song that had seduced me seven years ago – A Case of You by Joni Mitchell. Well I certainly do have a chronic case of him and long may it last. David topped it off by making me a classic NZ Edmonds banana birthday cake (with Niuean bananas), decorated by using a piping bag he’d made out of a plastic bag and a nozzle from a caulking gun. It even had birthday candles!

We’ve been into “town”, one dusty street with a few old buildings and a remarkable 5 or 6 “supermarkets”, all stocking much the same thing, and that is a very limited range, and most of them run by Chinese people. But the market yielded plenty of fresh fruit and veg and as we had stocked up really well in Samoa we are still dining like kings.

It is so nice to stop. We are going to hang out here for a few days as Migration are turning up on Monday. And just slow down. The whole trip has been such an intense melee of new experiences. It is nice to have time to just absorb it. Especially now as we are turning our thoughts to preparing ourselves and the boat for the return journey next month. Given that the passage to NZ is one of the potentially most brutal in the world we have to give it due consideration.
Janet

Saturday Sept 11
The devastation in Christchurch and the persistent stream of aftershocks has been on our minds. The tension and worry must be terrible. While our journey so far has been happily reminiscent of the tropical idyll we all imagine, the scars of natural destruction are everywhere. Here in Niue the effects of cyclone Heta which flattened the island in Jan 2004 are everywhere present:
- in remnants of physical damage – there are abandoned houses all around the coast,
- in the sudden population drop where it had been declining alarmingly anyway – after the cyclone many families relocated to NZ,
- but mostly in the casual comments and stories of those we meet. I met Ernie, who must be in his 80’s, while buying one of his coconut shell necklaces for Janet’s birthday. He described how he and his wife grabbed just a photo album and laptop before leaving their cliff-top home, 100 ft or so above sea level, for the greater safety of a friend’s home. But the enormous waves swept through this house, pinning Ernie under a sofa. He managed to hold his breath until the sea receded but he was trapped until his wife helped. He was hurt but alive. Not so his own home. By morning foundations were all that remained. There are at least 20 other similar stories. Time is marked, before and after the cyclone, as in Samoa and Niuatoputapu by the tsunami. So will it be for the 2010 Christchurch earthquake.

As for us, we went to bed last night to the music of singing whales, directly below us. Unforgettable!! As was the evening at the Golf Club where we took part in a quiz contest (I was in the winning team and even contributed one or two correct answers). We all stood and sang heartily the NZ national anthem in both languages and then watched in awe as the All Blacks came from WAY behind to win. Wahoo!! Mark Blumsky was there too.

We’ve explored half a dozen of the many cave systems and chasms on the island. They are all so different and each quite fabulous architecture. Many have pools, one with fresh water – yum, and a great, deep swim through – spelunking lingo for swimming underwater and under rock from one cave to the next.

The way down to the oasis.

Togo Chasm Oasis

Our favourite which I did twice was Vaikona because it was so difficult requiring a rope and harness, wetsuit,mask,snorkel and torch.

The start of Vaikona

Sandy, Les, David, Bruce, Alene

We knocked the bastard off

We did it twice because on the first go we couldn’t find the way out and had to retrace our steps through 4 swims-through. Soon after the start you have to cross a chasm for which we used the rope and harness. Very slippery and a fall would be disastrous. Hard to know how you’d ever get an injured person out. Then through 4 pools in the dark. We made it out by climbing a near vertical rock face and found later that we still hadn’t found the orthodox exit. Next time perhaps.

Janet very skilfully made a coaster at a village weaving morning. The women weavers invite any interested people to sit in with them as they weave mats and hats, baskets and fans so Alene and Janet went along.

At a village fair Bruce and I were nudged by our loving partners into filling out the ranks of the men’s fashion parade – there was only one contestant. We strutted out stuff in the most trendy of yachtie fashion gear and even danced for the crowd. For days after we were each recognised warmly in the street.

Tuapu village show day - Women's and Men's fashion show

A couple of days later Bruce, who plays Morris Dance tunes on a concertina, and I swapped songs at the Monday night Yacht Club BBQ.

We’ve also fitted in 2 scuba dives, one at Gothic City with 500 yr old coral, precious as it was not destroyed by the cyclone, and Snake Gully, so named because it’s riddled with gorgeous sea snakes that can kill in minutes but can’t open their mouths enough to bite. One let me hold it as it swam lazily by. The water is mile-deep clear. Wonderful!!

We’re getting ready to leave for Tonga in the next day or so. We will take with us memories of a very special three weeks on the this remarkable island.

David

Ps Janet is becoming quite the dab hand on the SSB radio. She assists on a radio net of a dozen or so yachts on passage, giving a weather report for her local (Niue for now) and relaying messages for yachts who can’t be heard by the net co-ordinator and weather guru. SSB communications have a language all their own - roger that, negative, stand by, Navire = november, alpha, victor, india, romeo, echo, copy that? and weather language is very specific – wind direction and speed, barometric pressure, percentage of cloud cover, sea conditions. The good ones do all this with the clarity needed to be understood over the crackle, fade in and out, Korean fishermen and other background noise as well as add humour. Janet is now doing all this with distinction.