Bound for Australia

Vessel Name: Sirius
30 November 2013
30 November 2013 | Coffs Harbour
30 November 2013 | On route New Cal to Oz
30 November 2013 | Noumea
23 November 2013
19 November 2013 | Vanuatu
28 October 2013 | Erromango, Vanuatu
28 October 2013 | Port Resolution, Tanna, Vanuatu
17 October 2013 | Mt Yasur, Tanna, Vanuatu
16 October 2013 | Port Resolution, Tanna, Vanuatu
16 October 2013 | Vanuatu Group
16 October 2013 | Fiji
01 October 2013
23 September 2013 | Tonga
23 September 2013 | Tonga
23 September 2013 | Tonga
18 September 2013 | Tonga
09 September 2013 | Nuie a very small country
09 September 2013 | Suwarrow
09 September 2013 | Suwarrow Atoll Cook Is
Recent Blog Posts
30 November 2013

The Last Leg to Bundabah

Anchored off our land in Bundabah November 21 - to be concluded

30 November 2013 | Coffs Harbour

Arrived Australia Sunday 10th November 2013

It's good to be home at last

30 November 2013 | On route New Cal to Oz

The Last Passage

With winds coming from the south southeast it made heading south quite difficult and not particularly pleasant but we continued staying as close to our desired course as possible. Once again it took a couple of days for most of us to find our sea legs, though Andrew never seems to loose his. Having Scott [...]

30 November 2013 | Noumea

New Caledonia

After spending the Friday night at anchor in the main Noumea bay we were lucky enough to secure a pontoon in the marina and were nicely tied up just in time for Scott, Mark and Jayden's arrival. Scott is my brother, Jayden is his son and Mark is my sister Patricia's youngest son. They joined us to do [...]

23 November 2013

On the way to New Caledonia

On to New Caledonia – the last stop before Australian waters: We waited about 5 days for a weather opportunity to move on to New Caledonia, along with a dozen or so boats heading South, almost all to New Zealand, but a few going our way. By late November, the Summer cyclone/typhoon season comes to the tropics including Vanuatu and New Caledonia, so by late October, all the cruising boats get ready to move on, most South to New Zealand, or some Australia, but a few also head North back across the Equator to Indonesia or the Philippines. We left on Tuesday 22nd October, which would get us into Noumea, Capital of New Caledonia, and the only port of entry by Friday with any luck, in time to meet 3 more family guests there on Saturday 26th. We had been more or less heading West since Panama with the prevailing winds, but now had to make 340 miles to the South West. For a while it looked like we would not be able to sail this way at all, and would have to make the long journey around the top of New Caledonia adding 200 miles to the trip and lots of motoring, but finally the wind had just enough East in it to let us sail to Noumea direct, although this was our first passage sailing into the wind since Belize back in March. We made good enough time to come through the outer islands of New Caledonia on Friday morning and get into Noumea Harbour by sunset. The Harbour was to our surprise packed with hundreds of sailing boats, most at anchor as the two small marinas were overflowing. Who they all were and where they were all going we never really found out. We worried that arriving after hours on a Friday would cause all the usual problems with officials, but not here – this is part of France and the EU, so everything is helpful, easy going and free. The photo is our Halloween party onboard - explanation in the next blog from Noumea.

19 November 2013 | Vanuatu

Port Vila

Just 20 minutes out of Port Vila we had drawn a complete blank on the fishing. This was a big disappointment to Margaret, who was very keen to catch just something ahead of brother Mark and uncle Scott coming onboard in Noumea. Then fish on and the reel buzzed. Margaret hauled it in, Warren gaffed [...]

Tanna Part 1

16 October 2013 | Port Resolution, Tanna, Vanuatu
AJ
Tanna Part 1: Our early start on Monday morning - already light at 5.00am as the Southern Summer approaches – got us into Port Resolution on Tanna by 14:00 that afternoon. As New South Wales has just clicked into Summertime, it is now the same time as Vanuatu and New Caledonia. That means after changing the clock 18 times since we set off, we are now finally on Australia time, and won’t have to change the ship’s clock again. Thankfully we were just ahead of Warren and Margaret’s arrival in the bay by van (Ute). They had flown to the Vanuatu capital Port Vila from Australia and then taken a small islander plane to Tanna. The airstrip is with the main town on the other side of Tanna, and needed a 3 hour drive in the Chief’s son’s Ute on dusty dirt roads to reach Port Resolution, but they had a bit of a tour and lots of photo stops along the way. They were very relieved to see Sirius already in the bay after all that travel. Margaret’s very heavy bag was hauled onboard, and was packed with goodies: wow - chocolates, champagne, gin, kids movies and a case of beer – thanks Margaret and Warren, and lots of new clothes for the kids – thanks alot to Auntie Patricia. Bags stowed, we all went ashore to meet Stanley who runs the ‘Yacht Club’ - a local building just on the cliff above the bay. Stanley organises everything, and we booked our tour of Mt Yasur, the Tanna volcano for the next day. We had seen this erupting every 10-20 minutes as we sailed up the East side of Tanna, and were looking forward to the trip up to the crater with excitement and just a little apprehension. After that we explored the village. Like Anatom, almost all palm leaves buildings, but everyone happy and in good form. The grass area in the middle of the village had been turned into a football (soccer) pitch and the Port Resolution team was training hard for a big match tomorrow – Tuesday. We were greeted by Marianne, who turned out to be Stanley’s sister, and who gave us 2 cucumbers and showed us around. Dogs, cats and piglets running round with the local children, a fine ocean beach, and a lobster bought by Warren for VTU 500 (about AUD 5). We ate the lobster for dinner and opened the new booze at sunset in the cockpit. Next day we had an excellent local food lunch at a ‘restaurant’ run by Sarah – one of the palm house converted to a kitchen and dining table to sit around. Everything was very quiet today, as most of the villagers had taken the 1 1/2 hour walk to the next village to watch the footie. Here we finally got the hang of trading – with help from Uncle Warren who is a master of this and could sell snow to an Eskimo. We swapped now-too-small Sophia and Cameron clothes, flip flops (thongs) and old toys for fruit and veg. The best trade got us 5 more excellent lobsters. Ashore at 3:30, we wait for the van to take us up the volcano.
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