I went to Whangarei to meet up with my friend Pascal, the plan was to set sail for fiji on his Ovni 28. this is the week that was.

2/5/10 Sunday
Met Pascal at dockyard 5 in Whangarei, E'eva was in the slings ready to go back in the water, we made sailing plans and the did a bit of shopping for the island kids, frizbies, stickers, hats and hair-ties
Then we went out for dinner.

3/5/10 Monday.
Took E'eva to Ray Roberts marine to have the vibration on the shaft looked out. the new bearing at the prop end of the shaft was exaggerating the wobble in the flange from gearbox to shaft. hey took both halves off and re-spun them,

4/5/10 Tuesday.
The boys from Ray Roberts reassembled the shaft and we went to the supermarket, a big trolley of goodies and then at 3:30 we set sail for Paihia.

At night fall we were off bream head, Pascal took first watch and i got a little sleep. about 10pm i got up just as Pascal said what is that, pointing to a very bright white light and an equally bright red light. he said that the boat had been coming towards up for about 20 minutes and hadn't changed coarse.
It still didn't seem like was going to so we started the engine and turned out towards it, it went steaming past out port-side with lots of yelling from who ever was on board, it seems they have finally seen us. just as well someone was watching or it might have been the shortest trip on record.
The rest of my watch was lovely and peaceful.


5/5/10 Wednesday
I did a 2 - 5am watch and only saw one ship, it saw us from miles away and gave us a lovely wide berth. it may have been one of Fullers overnite Cats.
The night was perfect with a steady breeze, stars and half a moon keeping me company, a big coat, leggings, woolie hat and gloves kept me toastie warm as i watched the sea slide by.

Pascal woke about 5 just as the wind dropped and i went to bed. we were about 3 miles from Cape Brett then.

as the morning progressed the wind died away even further and we ended up motoring the last couple of miles into Paihia

we tied up in Paihia at about 1130am, we pulled up along side and the was quite a bit of pressure against the ropes. Pascal made contact with the Marina office to let them know we were there, the guy says "oh yes i can see you tied to the dock with your sail still up, just proves we didn't get enough sleep.
we spent a little time on shore doing the washing and having a shower, then anchored off Paihia and used the free internet to check the whether, still no southerlies. :-( Had lunch then a snooze and then dinner, i think we should do more than sleep between meals.

6/5/10 Thurday.
Up at 7:30am, a slow start checked the emails and then Banana rice for breakfast. After a bit of a tidy up we set sail for Black rocks but the wind picked up from the east and we weren't going to make it in one run so we had a re-think and set sail for Roberton island, and a lovely bay to anchor in over nite.
We caught a Kahawai one the way across the bay so that was lunch in a sandwich.
We spent the afternoon fishing and just cruising, 3 snapper and an unidentifiable fish that got away, 2 of the snapper were put back and one went in the pan for dinner.
We had 3 people fro a neighboring boat over for drinks then after a quick fight with a stingray that had picked up our snapper bait it was bed time.

7/5/10 Friday.
Out of bed before Pascal so i could have a turn of the new soft-bait rod, lots of action and damage to the baits but no fish, so it was left over couscous with banana for breakfast then a we had another fight with another stingray, they like Kahawai heads, it took the line under the boat and across the new antifloul which didn't impress Pascal at all. he put up a gallant fight before shreading the line and stealing our hook.
After breakkie we sailed for Kerikeri, just a perfect day, a nice easterly took us right up the river to within about 500 meters of the stone store.
We walked up to town and used the internet at the library to check the whether, it showed northerlies and nothing else for the whole of the next week, i decided to head home and do some work while it sorts itself out
hopefully the next entry will be from Fiji....
We got steak and mussels from the supermarket for a final feast, smoked mussels for entree and steak eggs and tomatoes for a main, then bed time.

8/5/10 Saturday,
A quick walk to town, then a bus to Whangarei to collect the van then back to the sunny South Waikato.