12/12/2007
10am Wednesday 12/12/07 and we have just slipped the dock lines for the final big leg of our travels. Australia, here we come!!!!
Thank goodness, the rain finally stopped yesterday; it's miserable out here in the rain. Today we have cloudy skies but no rain. The wind is from the NE at about 30 knots out at sea and it will hopefully ease this afternoon (update, we're out here now and they told a fib, the wind is only about 20 knots) Not much wind in here at all, as we are still in the protection of the Bay. We have to head over the top of New Zealand and clear Cape Reinga before we make our turn for Australia. We should take a minimum of 7 days and a maximum of 10 days, so the aim is to make into Sydney for Christmas.
We have had a great time in this beautiful part of the world. My brother-in-law, Milton has flown over for the trip back with us and it's a shame he didn't see it in sunshine; it certainly makes a difference. Yesterday, as it was still sprinkling in the morning, with a gale warning out, we hired a car (from some lovely English ex cruising people who have settled here and started a car and van hire business) and took off to show Milton the countryside from Opua to Whangerai - very, very pretty. Our first stop was at the home of the hire car people to pick up the car, which was a treat in itself, as they have bought a lovely house and land in the middle of what's known as Brit's Road, yes, you guessed it, there are so many English people that have bought along that country road, I'm sure as it reminds them of the English countryside. After that we continued onto Kawakawa to visit the Hunderwasser Kawakawa Toilets. Very colourful and fascinating place! The shinny multi-coloured ceramic columns, at the entrance to the toilets are a feature and the tiles were made by the local school children, bricks came from local buildings and the windows in the block were constructed using old bottles.
I suspect the artists and architects amongst us will know of Frederick Hunderwasser, the Austrian internationally known architect and ecologist, who first came to New Zealand in the 1970's and subsequently made NZ his home. In 1990 he was declared a national treasure, he died and is buried on his farm in Kawakawa in February 2000 at the age of 71. A few fascinating shops opposite the toilets have the same columns and hold a collection of books and paintings of his works. Will post a photo when we finally get to land. This area is well worth a visit, so much to see and do.
Now it's back to sea again and I suppose I better get up on deck to see my last glimpses of land, before sighting the coast of Australia.
UPDATE: 16:00 the wind is dying on us now, e have less than 10 knots, can't see land, mainly because we're sailing past a huge bay, we're getting along nicely though, at approx 5.5 - 6 knots on a comfortable beam reach. #
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12/12/2007
Yes, we past all the islands and rocks to the north of New Zealand and turned the corner for home at 0550 today, so now it really is Australia here we come.
If you want to follow our track and haven't tried yet, just go the right hand side of the blog page and click on current position. This chart tracks our trip when we input our latitude and longitude. We just type away on a sailmail email putting all the correct codes in, and push the button and a computer sets everything out on the blog page for us. Except for times when human error intervenes and the codes aren't put in the correct place and oooppsii the posting doesn't get done, like yesterday. You can also follow the instructions if you have Google Earth on you computer and you can actually see our live position, neat isn't it! If we had satellite communication on board we could also post the pictures at the same time. Unfortunately, we don't so we have to wait till we get to land and get wi-fi coverage to do that.
The trip is going well, we're averaging about 6.5 - 7 knots, wind is from the NE at about 15 - 20 knots at times, with a 2 metre swell, "Volare" is still moving along nicely on a beam reach. We move between having one to two reefs in the main and the genoa furled in depending on the breeze. Captain Greg doesn't like to over extend the boat, especially in confused, cross seas. We could sail a lot faster if we put more sail out but no use over extending the boat and making it a lot less comfortable for the crew. So we're pretty snug, except now and again when we go over a big undersea trench and we notice the sea gets a lot more confused and choppy.
Current ETA into Newcastle (where we will clear customs) is next Thursday, 20th Dec, but this will be updated as we get closer. We'll have a quick stopover, change of crew, my Dad 80 year old Harry Parsons (nearly 81) is going to do the last leg into Sydney with us. After all, he is one of the reasons why sailing is in our blood. Dad has done about 5 Hobart's in his days and sailed many thousands of miles himself. For the intrepid sailors or motor boat people amongst you, Dad may have even rescued, towed or taken your position when he was on watch at the Sydney South Head Coast Guard Station, as he was very involved in Coast Guard Sydney for approx 6 years and Commodore of the Sydney Flotilla for the last few of those years, until last year when he switched from the Coast Guard to his new passion, Bowls. #
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With Debbie flying back to Sydney for a reunion with Japanese friends and Jade's first birthday, it was time to get stuck into some maintenance work on Volaré.
She was hauled out at Ashby's Boatyard Yard, Opua on November 19th for antifouling and other work. I painted her bottom with International Ultra, a hard antifouling, hopefully with similar properties to the product we used in Mexico nearly eighteen months ago. I decided to drop the rudder and give it a close inspection. There are tremendous forces operating on a spade rudder that is not supported by a bottom pintle and you need to be careful there is no sign of corrosion where the stainless shaft goes into the actual rudder. The rudder was perfect, however there were other signs of wear after 8,000 miles of sailing.
When I was removing the steering quadrant in order to drop the rudder I found one of the steering cables hanging on by a few threads of wire - it would have snapped in the not too distant future. I had a new cable made up and was ready to put the rudder back in after replacing the packing around the gland.
I had the hull acid washed to remove any of the left over Pacific Ocean and then the hull was polished.
We have been annoyed a few times with water coming down the mast when it rains heavily because it drops straight onto Debbie's head and pillow. I think I may have fixed this problem with a product called Spar Tite - a two pot mix that you pour into the mast partners that replaces the rubber wedges needed on a keel stepped mast and (hopefully) provides a permanent water tight seal.
While out of the water, I took the opportunity of replacing all the toilet plumbing in both heads (the pipes had a cholesterol problem with severe calcium build-up).
I had an articulated bow roller made up by a local engineering shop that will make it easier to launch and retrieve our Delta anchor. It's now self launching once the brake is released.
The mainsail went off to the local sailmaker for an overhaul - primarily repairing chafe, replacing a broken leech line and importantly putting in a third set of reef points. I also had them do a little nip and tuck to take out a wee bit of stretch on the leech that had come about because we have sailed so far with two reefs in the main.
Finally, we had been getting a few bubbles in the gelcoat on the cockpit seats because we have had cockpit cushions down for the entire time we have lived aboard. This causes the seats to sweat and water finds its way under the gelcoat causing an air bubble. It was an easy matter to grind these out with my new Dremmel tool but it meant repainting the cockpit seats after the bubbles were filled. I decided that I would put non-skip paint down on the seats and the cockpit coaming as well as the cockpit floor. Even though there is a deck pattern moulded in these areas it can get a little slippery from time to time, so now we'll stick to them like glue.
Today I have been doing some varnishing around the companionway that gets a lot of sun. I'm just about done now in time for Debbie's return on Thursday and a departure, hopefully, over the weekend.
Oh, just remembered - about halfway through the work schedule after the boat was back in the water I went out in company with Magnum, firstly to Russel where we tried out the new Thai restaurant then to a little bay on Urapukapuka Island (try saying that after a few rum punches). At low tide we took the dinghy across to a little reef that had dried out and found the mother lode of blue lip mussels. We filled a 5-gallon bucket, stopped off at Magnum to get a few beers, then went ashore to clean them.
As the sun set slowly in the west Uva and I sat on a rock telling stories, cleaning mussles, drinking a beer each and shucking and swallowing oysters to accompany the beer.
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.
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