New Zealand

I need to get one thing off my chest ... to fellow cruisers planning their South Pacific voyage: New Zealand is NO longer an inexpensive place to have boat work done. There are long faces everywhere from this years cruising group. Not sure if it is inflation, exchange rates or just too much demand. Some of the costs come in weird ways and are unavoidable - like having your electrical system certified (100,if you pass otherwise double) propane tanks certified (40, yes even brand new ones if they are not NZ). Lots of mark ups on all parts etc - a guy needing to replace his engine got a quote with a 2,500 mark up over the U.S. or U.K. - now shipping might be a tiny portion of this but taxes are not as you buy everything tax free as a foreign boater in NZ.

Fortunately, we had lots of cosmetic things but nothing major, we are definitely re prioritizing our work list though.

The adjustment to NZ has been difficult, the relief of safely making it through all the passages, the uncertainty of what you will do with yourself now that the schedule is blank for 6 months, and the cold..... we are freezing. We are also looking forward to the holidays with family back in WA State so a bit distracted and excited.

We have decided to buy a car and go camping as our way of touring NZ, that way we are sure we can get down to the South Island, which otherwise would be a 2,400 mile round trip sail. Used cars are very inexpensive though you are picking up a beater for sure. Ours is a Ford Taurus, wagon, 1996, with 80,000 miles, though clean on the inside for 2,700.

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To New Zealand

We left this past Monday for our last South Pacific leg of this cruising season. A trip of about 1,100 miles from Tonga, so expected 7-10 days. This is passage is notorious for bad weather and the problems always occur near to New Zealand so therefore difficult to depart Tonga with a reliable weather forecast.

We are now on Sunday, 67 miles to go and have had a good passage overall. The first three days were typical trade wind sailing with us running a SSW course across the winds to it was boisterous. We then ran into the high pressure system and horse latitudes where winds are usually light. They were for us and we pushed ahead under motor, our goal to get south of 30s before a strong low moved through.

Usually the lows move south of 35-40s so if one is to pass your course you slow down, because it will invariably have gale force winds a very rough seas. This one though was running well north so we hustled and did make 32s, avoiding the low and the worst of the weather. We did have to go through the associated cold front and got 20 knots of wind on the nose thus pushing us backwards for about 12 hours, but managed that well.

So the last few hours of our trip, weather is very clear, we are motoring in calm winds, and hope that it stays that way. Oh ya and it is cold...... we are all in winter wear.

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Canadian Thanksgiving - Written by the s/v Artemo

Thanksgiving day started off like any other cruising Thanksgiving in the beautiful shelter of a Tongan anchorage. We had made plans that we would have dinner on the beach with everyone in the anchorage since one boat could not hold 40 people. The kids all went to the beach and we played for a while.

At the beach we started to get bitten. The mosquitos here have Dengue Fever, so there is a chance of disease. We were marooned on the island with two kayaks since the dinghy had been taken back by the adults on Tyee. They had brought the kayaks there and left on the dinghy. They told us if we hollered loud enough they would come and get us. At this point we were getting frantic about the mosquitos, so I jumped in the kayak to go and grab a dinghy to collect everyone. Jake a 7 year old from Nikita jumped on the back. Just as we pushed off the kids on the beach got a hold of my mom (Julie) and she came to the beach to carry everyone back to their boats.

The idea of having dinner on the beach was crossed off. Simpatica had just came back from the main town and anchored and they dropped their dinghy in the water and came over to Artemo. They had heard that the beach had mosquitos and Captain Louis was looking for a new plan. He had heard that our friends on another kid boat called Stray Kitty were coming in so as quick as a flash Louis was downstairs on Artemo radioing Stray Kitty to tell them that they were rafting up to Simpatica and Artemo would raft up to them. Captain Chris on Stray Kitty thought this was a fine plan. We aren't sure he realized though at this point that he was agreeing to hosting the party!

Artemo and Simpatica had both their anchors out to relatively the same distance so they were parallel to each other. The theory was that Stray Kitty would tie up to Simpatica and then two powerful dinghy's would push Artemo up to Stray Kitty to tie on. After all was said and done it turned out pretty well. The end result was two multi-hull boats tied up to Artemo a mono hull.

As the night progressed Artemo presented itself as the boy boat because we had the Wii. Simpatica the other outside boat was the girls boat and the middle boat Stray Kitty was the party boat. Lucie on Tyee had cooked a delicious turkey and Christine on Stray Kitty had made pumpkin pie. Everything you would expect at a Thanksgiving dinner was on the table which in this lifestyle is surprising since comfort food from home is hard to find. During the nights conversations you could hear, "...that was my last jar of something or other".

As the night went on the girls made a show which included a number of Taylor Swift songs and a song Amelia made up awhile ago. Simi on Tyee even got up and sang "Skater Boy", much to Captain Louis's chagrin because he said he would get up and dance if Simi sang. The next song he got up and danced with Kerry who is around 6 and it was hilarious.

As the night went on more beers were downed and the party started getting pretty funny. Later that night I learned how single malt whiskey is made and what chasers are and how to serve beer, which by the way is drinking the first couple sips! (thanks for the lesson Captain Dave)

Everyone started to leave before the rain started and when it started to rain it filled the dinghy's to the brim which is a lot of water. The morning after Captain Louis organized a boat cleaning party and we scrubbed Stray Kitty till it was spick and span and generally wasted a ton of water.

We disbanded from our rafted up formation and later that day I thought to myself that this Thanksgiving might just tie with my Auntie Theresa's Thanksgiving.

BY:(well i hoped you guessed it) Alex Perry

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Ha' Apai

We have spent the last week in the Ha' Apai group in Tonga. This group of islands lies between Vavau and Tongatapu, is lightly populated and rarely visited. There are numerous reefs and shoal areas with average charting of such. The anchorages are all exposed to one or more directions and the islands principally low lying atolls.

The snorkeling, beach combing, fishing and whale watching have all been superb. Last night we had whales in the harbor with us, swimming within 300 feet of the boat. Most of the anchorages we have shared with only one other boat and most of the anchorages have been off of uninhabited islands. The coral has been the most lively in memory with very little algae growth or other damage. The fish life has been good, with lots of pelagics and several reef fish, though the reef fish are heavily fished by the locals so tend to be on the smaller side.

Our next stop will take us to Tongatapu where we will stage for our trip to New Zealand.

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Whales Redux

Hmmm, well that blog post was a little early. No more than an hour later, we were off for a snorkel in the dinghy when we came across a female (mom) and baby humpback. They were playing a little, coming up out of the water, but as we approached began to swim. I jumped in the water but could not keep up with them and then they dived. We waited and they surfaced again, we moved closer and Jake and I got in and began to swim with the whales, this time they let us approach and the baby came over to our side to have a look. Rae Ann got in a bit later, though they were swimming away and got a good glimpse as well. We then proceeded to our snorkel spot......

After our snorkel we get back in the dinghy and all of sudden the mom is completely out of the water splashing down with a huge slap. The baby follows, they put on a 20 minute show of breaches and fluke waving before diving again.

We were still back in time for lunch.

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Whales

We have a great couple of weeks in the Vavau group. It is currently humpback whale mating and calfing season. We have been able to see several sets of whales, some from afar and others up quite close. Amazing animals.

We have also met a boat that carries their own dive compressor, and they have kids..., so we have been having a blast diving and playing. I saw my first set of clown fish, pretty cool after watching Finding Nemo 400 times.

Slowly all the boats are now starting to head south with the official start of the NZ crossing season being October 15, we will plan for an early November trip. Hard to imagine that our cruising season will actually be coming to an end as we reach NZ.

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The Big Race

We arrived in Vavau just as the annual regatta started. While we were unprepared to participate in the around buoy race, we did get our act together for destination race. The race course was about 12 miles in length and contained downwind, beam and upwind legs. We got Nikita in here most sleek condition, but that still including the dinghy on deck etc... not much of a classical race look. But this was our first official race in Nikita so we were excited.

The race started with about 40 boats ranging from 30 feet to 60 feet, monohulls and multihulls. Nikita got a good start, about 30 seconds off the line, others were better. We quickly closed on the first bottle neck of the course a narrow point leading out of Neiafu harbor, we had about 5 boats within beer passing distance as we rounded the mark. With some quick work including using the deck to stop the free fall of the pole, we got our genoa polled out and ran wing and wing downwind, quickly separating from all but the boats flying spinnakers. Rounding the next island 4 miles later, we came up on a beam reach quickly unpolling the genoa, we then gained on the spinnaker boats whom slowed down getting their spinnaker down. We raced along in 5th place at that point separating from the pack on a strong beam reach. Through the next bottle neck we came up hard on the wind, side by side with the 4th place boat, a 50 footer, we crossed behind them nearly putting our anchor in their davit hung dinghy. We fell slightly back and worked hard, rail in the water down to the pass and the final turn.

At the final turn we tacked in behind the 3rd place boat hoping we could hold a very tight angle. The 4th place boat held for a later turn. We shot ahead crossed through the reef lined pass and headed for the finish line 3 miles away.... in 4th place and we held that all the way beating the 5th place boat by 100 feet. Great fun, close racing. The first and second place boats were all 50+ monos, the third place boat a 42 foot Jboat, and then 40 foot Nikita. The multis finished behind, as well as several, probably 10 50+ monos... a great showing for Nikita.

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