Whangarei

Finally I have some spare time and can update the blog. I note it's over a month since I last was on here but so much has happened it seems a lifetime ago.

Starting at the end first, we have been tied up in the Whangarei Basin right in the heart of Whangarei and next door to Ivan and Erin on Masada for the last couple of weeks. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not, far too many nights drinking rum and playing the guitar with Ivan on his electric organ.

We finally left Napier on 7th October and headed north stopping overnight at Mahia the first night then up to Tolaga Bay the next day. It was quite an experience going across Poverty Bay past Gisborne. The weather forecast was for 25 - 30 knots which was about as much as we would have liked but it steadily built up to over 50 knots with quite rough sea and a 12 hour trip before any shelter...not one of our better days. We anchored overnight in Tolaga Bay then the next morning headed north again and round East Cape to Hicks Bay where we anchored again. Next morning we upped anchor at around 4am and sailed across the Bay of Plenty, past White Island which was covered in cloud and sulphur fumes arriving at Tauranga about 10pm. The next day we sailed up to Whitianga but again the wind got up and the sea was too rough to get into Whitianga so we found a little sheltered bay and waited a few hours until it calmed down a bit then went in.

Irrepressible at Whitianga

It blew a gale for the next four days to we stayed there on a mooring before setting off for the Mercury Islands which are a couple of hours off Whitianga. Great Mercury Island where we stayed is owned by Michael Fay but visitors are allowed ashore and we spent several very pleasant hours walking around the island which is quite hilly. The exercise was good though after being on the boat for so long.

The boat to the right of us is our friend's boat, Nutcase.

On the beach at Great Mercury Island.

We stayed here a couple of nights then sailed (motored really) up to Great Barrier Island where we stayed for a week, ducking and diving and trying to find a sheltered bay to anchor in each night. The weather wasn't the best with 30 knot winds most days but we went ashore several times and did a couple of bush walks and had a good look around the place.

Smokehouse Bay, Great Barrier.

We finally got away from Great Barrier on Friday 26th October and for the first time since leaving Napier had a really good sail across to Whangarei. The wind was almost perfect for a change and the boat sailed really well. We arrived here around 8pm and Ivan had arranged for us to tie up next to them on a berth which was vacant. We'll probably stay here until the end of the month then move up to our own berth at Tutukaka.

Irrepressible and Masada at Whangarei

Whangarei Basin

Ivan outside shower block

And that pretty much brings us up to the present time. Doreen is away in Auckland at a school reunion for a few days so I have the boat to myself and a bit of time on my hands.

Hopefully the next update will be a bit quicker than this one!

Ready to go (almost)

I was talking to Bev on the phone this morning and she kindly reminded me that I haven't updated the blog for a little while, actually quite a long while. So, feeling a little guilty I have roused myself to action.

Life continues at a hectic pace with every day bringing it's own unique challenges and one's database of experiences rising exponentially as a result. Mainly we have been busy getting the 101 things we want to do before leaving Napier done. Doreen's largest project has been recovering the squabs (mattress type things to you landlubbers) in the aft cabin and sewing up all the new fitted bedding she wants in there. Yeah, right, sewing on a boat I hear you say. Well look no further:

And as for me, I've been doing what I do best, spending money on new toys and installing them. The big ticket items lately have been a new computer (one that's big enough for me to actually be able to see) and a new solar panel to try and give us enough battery power to run everything without having to run the motor to charge the batteries too often.

The computer is great (I think it's the same as the one Rick bought when we were in Brisbane earlier this year) but Windows Vista gives me gas. It's all very nice with lots of flashing lights and clever gimics but seems slower than XP, uses more memory than you can shake a stick at and seems to have lots of little glitches in it. eg when you close a window in Internet Explorer it tells you IE has stopped working and Windows is checking to find out why. I know why for God's sake, I closed the bloody thing! Apart from that it plays a mean game of Solitaire with very fancy graphics.

We've only got one more important job to do now. We were filling the water tanks the other night, they hold about 600 litres and take an hour or so to fill. We were watching TV and having a few drinks and after a couple of hours Doreen asked if it always took so long to fill them. My response was yes or something similar and we carried on watching TV. After about another hour I thought my feet were getting a bit cold and looked down to see water round them. The long and the short of it was that the top of one of the tanks had split and the water was gradually filling up the boat. It certainly got our attention and put paid to the TV and drinks. I don't think it will be a particularly big job to fix it though and hopefully we'll get it done tomorrow and then on Friday or Saturday, weather permitting we will finally be off on the trip north.

Watch this space for further updates.

P.S Happy 50th birthday to David.

Spring at last

The last couple of weeks have actually been quite busy, with our friend's boat out of the water and many days of scrubbing, sanding, filling and painting of the hull. It's quite physically demanding work standing underneath a boat and holding a heavy sander above your head while trying not to get blinded or asphyxiated (try spelling that without a dictionary). The good news is that it's all finished now and they are going back in the water tomorrow.

We've also been doing some work on our boat with the new radar unit being installed last week (a bit more of the inheritance down the drain) and today we started getting the sails down and trying to clean them up a bit. They don't look as if they've had much attention for years and were very dirty. We did the staysail today, laying it out on the concrete and scrubbing it with a broom and a mixture of bleach and detergent and it's come up looking like new (well almost). So with renewed enthusiasm, the mizzen is set for the treatment tomorrow, weather permitting. And talking of the weather, it's actually been quite nice the last week or so, temperatures getting up around 20C and lovely sunny days. Even the wind has died down to almost nothing today although it has been gale force for the last few days.

Doreen's current project is making curtains for the boat, no small task as there are at least 14 windows which need doing and being a boat they are not all in the easiest of places to get to to screw up track etc. It will be a big job but worth the effort I'm sure.

I think we'll be in Napier for another three or four weeks and at this stage it looks like we'll all be ready to move north around the end of the month. It's been great living here for the last couple of months but we're both starting to get the urge to move on now.

That's it for now. More in a week or two unless there is any special news.

More of the Same

I note that it is almost three weeks since I last posted anything on here and I'm struggling to think of much new and interesting to talk about.

As I type, the rain is beating down, gale force winds are expected later this morning and the temperature is hovering somewhere around the 10C mark. Just another day in Paradise.

Actually there have been a few things happening since I last wrote. As I recall, I mentioned that a number of boats had come into Napier seeking shelter. Well one of them was an Australian boat called "Ray of Sunshine" with an Aussie couple from Tweed Heads on board. They are about our age and have been cruising round Australia for the last 14 years. They had just had an eventful trip across the Tasman where they got knocked down a couple of times in a storm, suffered lots of damage and ended up getting blown back to Tasmania where they repaired the damage and then set out again. Full marks for persistence! They ended up in Napier tied up next to us and we got on really with them and have become good friends. We took them to Taupo one day and did all the touristy things like the Huka Falls (they were awestruck!), Craters of the Moon (amazed) etc then drove back over the Desert Road and the Taihape - Napier Road (which I think is known as the Gentle Annie and which we had never been on before). We did a small detour into Waiouru and tried to find our old house which we did eventually but not without some difficulty. The whole area where we lived has had all the houses removed and is now acres of parkland all except for ONE house which has been left standing in the middle of nowhere for some reason and believe it or not it is the very house that we lived in when we got married. Amazing or what!

Anyway, back to the story. The weather finally improved enough for them to get away and continue their trip up North and a couple of days later we heard from them on the radio that they were holed up in Gisborne waiting for the next wave of weather to pass. Having never been to Gisborne we decided to drive up there and have a look around which we did, meeting up with our new friends for lunch while we were there. Gisborne is a two and a half hour drive from Napier over some pretty spectacular, hilly country. Mainly farmland, both sheep and cattle (and lots of goats) but quite a lot of forest and native bush. Similar in some ways to the Rye Valley area near Dave and Bev.

Other than these little excursions we've been pottering around on the boat, finding places to store everything (not easy), fixing things that need fixing and changing things that need changing.

I guess most of you know that Angus Tait died last week. He had been ill with cancer for the last year and in hospital for the last couple of months. I flew down to Christchurch on Monday for the funeral where about 800 people attended (250 of us in the funeral chapel and the rest in the Aurora Centre where it was televised into). He was 88 and his death had been anticipated so it wasn't a particularly sad funeral and it was good to catch up with so many old friends and acquaintances even if it was only for a few hours. I stayed with our friends the Atkinsons near Mona Vale and flew back to Napier the next day.

Our friends Graeme and Sandra are due to leave Picton on their boat (Nutcase) in the next day or so and when they get to Napier will be working on their boat for a couple of weeks before we all head off north. Hopefully the weather will have improved somewhat by then.

More weather

Well the rain and wind went away for a few days and we actually have had several days of nice sunny weather. I even managed to get into shorts for a few hours yesterday! However, another round of gale force winds and heavy rain is due to descend on us this afternoon and last for several days. There was an influx of boats arriving in the marina yesterday all coming in for shelter against the coming weather so it looks like it's going to be a miserable few days.

I've just read Julie's blog and see the temperature in Dubai was 48C. Does anyone in the Warren family live somewhere where the weather is good?

We went for a sail a couple of days ago, just out into the middle of Hawkes Bay and back again which was good and then yesterday we drove up to Mahia which is about 150kms away right up the top end of the bay. Neither of us has ever been in this part of the country and it was interesting seeing parts of NZ we had never seen before.

Congratulations to Kerrie and Leigh for both finishing and passing your courses. You most both be feeling very pleased with yourselves and should be proud of what you have achieved. It can't have been easy managing a family and studying at the same time. Congratulations also to Liam on achieving the ripe old age of one. Happy Birthday Liam.

Congratulations also to myself. It's two months today since I quit smoking.

Watch this space.

Rain, rain, go away.

Rain, rain, more rain and strong winds have been the story of our life for the last couple of weeks. The weather here in Napier (and most of the North Island) has been diabolical almost from the day we arrived here. Apart from a couple of reasonable days its been constant rain and high winds.

We've spent the time working on the boat (finding leaks and trying to fix them), going into town for a break and generally sitting around waiting for the weather to improve. Unfortunately, the forecast is for much of the same for the next week. Our friends are in an even worse position, they've been stuck here for four weeks delivering a launch from Tauranga to Picton.

Some of you have already found out that our photosite is no longer working. Photosite advised us a week ago that they were closing the site down and moving all their customers to Snapfish.com. They have done that but it's not so easy to get into and navigate around the site so when new photos are added you'll get an email inviting you to view them.

Well that's about it for now, I'm off to look for new leaks.

More onboard

Looks like the photo upload is working now.

It's now a couple of days since our stuff arrived and Doreen has worked wonders finding a place for almost everything. There is still a bit to do but at least we can live reasonably comfortably now.

I've spent the last week trying to make sense of all the knobs, dials and switches and fixing toilets and shower pumps etc but I'm slowly coming to grips with it all and should be ready to go sailing in a day or two.

The weather has been really cold the last few days with gales and snow storms sweeping the country. Cyclones and tornados have destroyed many buildings in Taranaki (the other side of the country from where we are in Napier) although it has been reasonably nice where we are.

Well that's it for now, more in a few days.