One advantage of being at sea today is no children holding you to ransom for some sweets!  We do have a pumkin aboard but its being kept as good eating in a few days.  The islanders on Oua, our last stop in Tonga, as always want to give you food so we have pineapples, papaya, […]

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Wind has come around to East of South and we are off towards Opua, New Zealand [-35.317,174.117] (174E not west so a positive now for google maps).  Lots of other boats left today as the weather window looks good.  One of the faster boats that left on the last good window on October 20th was […]

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Mr Legoman, who has been with us from the start of our journey, now feels safe to come out and enjoy the trip. He has a walrus face and when we asked for a name back came John Lennon since he sang “I am a walrus”! Staying in the rope locker he felt trying to […]

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Humpback whales bread in Tongan waters but feed in the waters of the antartic.  They start to leave in October to go south and we are doing the same.  We did manage to see a small group with a baby, they were entertaining people from a sight seeing boat who were swimming with them by […]

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The Apia marina dinghy meets you in the bay and escorts the yachts into their marina berth, they have been known to direct sailors to share a berth with a bommie , yes a bommie one of the large coral heads that can put holes in a glassfibre hull. The game starts when the dinghy […]

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Tonga is the oldest and last remaining Polynesian monarchy. It is divided into four parts, volcanic Niuas in the north, Vava’u group, Ha’api group low coral and high volcanoes, and Tongatapu in the south with the capital Nuku’alofa. We start with the Niuas, arriving at Niuatoputapu just after the tsunami, there are three villages on […]

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We would all like to thank you for all the emails you sent during the last couple of weeks, they meant a great deal to us. Replies will be coming out but as you probably guess life was a bit hectic, we were exhausted physically and mentally. We could however sail away, I hope we […]

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Photos of the damage and the initial recovery of this northern Tongan island now in the gallery. Link to gallery

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How often does a custom’s official thank you for your help at your previous destination?  He was really concerned for his fellow Tongans at Niuatoputapu. We have a mobile SIM for Tonga.  You can skype this number as well as it accepting normal phone calls (send us an email for the number). Position: 18°39′ 173°59′ […]

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Weather charts have a nice force 3 northerly wind but we have had none for 14 hours now just a whisper from the SW.  Spent from 07:00 to 14:00 no sails up with an oily sea all around.  I think this has been our longest spell of no wind at sea to date. Position: 17°44′ […]

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