In Whangarei at the moment. Looking forward to meeting up with Barbara and Deryck again on Monday. Kirsty has a job in a lodge on Mount Cook starting in a couple of weeks. We will bring the boat back here after Barbara and Deryck leave and then go land based sight seeing with Karen and […]

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Arrived 22:00 11th November. This is a small place but very friendly and many good yachtie services. Lots of boats arriving all the time from Tonga, Fiji and New Caledonia. Will be here in NZ until the end of cyclone season in the Pacific which is April time. We will focus on maintenance and then […]

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Lots of Sooty Shearwaters and some Albatrosses which make a lovely sight. It makes up for it being so cold.  We now have full thermals as per UK early season sailing! Wind now around to the west so making Opua on this tack and keeping up a good speed.  Position of tack on Monday morning […]

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Weather now very changeable in wind speed and direction.  Constant sail changes and several tacks.  Wind from 5 to 30 knots and direction from SE to west.  David’s slept in oilskins to allow fast changes in sail plan overnight.  Had a great period with the staysail and 25 knots of wind for a few hours […]

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Now in the SW airflow and the adverse current.  Made as much west as possible overnight hence poor progress towards Opua.  Tacked at 10:00 local time and making good progress but need a wind shift into west to get into Opua without tacking. Mary and Kirsty have excelled themselves with baking.  They don’t get thrown […]

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Wind filled in about midnight and then from dawn we have been tripled reefed with a reduced headsail.  Sea is very lumpy.  Still making good progress though.  Still heading SW ready for the SW winds Position: 29°46’S 175°15’E [-29.763,175.257] at local 16:00, GMT 03:00 November 8th 24hr run:  130.5 miles by GPS, 131.6 miles through […]

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Wind died this morning.  We put up the big reacher for a while.  Wind filling in again but from the direction we want to go!  I suspect we will be hard on the wind now until the last short stretch into Opua. Tactics are to stay on the port tack well out to the west […]

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Another big milestone – now in the eastern hemisphere.  Longitude will reduce now rather than increase! Great nights sailing wind holding up until dawn and then we put up pinkie – our huge pink masthead spinnaker!  Had it up for about 6 hours until the wind filled in again.  Making very good progress given the […]

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We have left North Minerva reef on the last leg to New Zealand.  The norm for this passage is to have one spell off stronger winds.  Our forecast is very good with wind most of the way but no gales – I guess it can only get worse from here!  We’ll be ready with our […]

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We have 19 boats around us here in Minerva reef.  Still room for 100 more – big reef with all the inside at about 15 meters depth. Some are here just because it a different place to visit.  Most are waiting for the wind to fill in.  The weather forecasts give hope that tomorrow morning […]

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