Vava'u. 4am. Thursday 10/5
It's still yesterday for you; 11am 10/4 to be exact.
….
Yesterday, I went to a local presentation about Whangarei and Opua by some NZ people who travel her to brief cruisers! The outdoor cafe was jammed pack with couples and some kids all going to NZ. I'm not much for that kind of events usually so it was not much fun for me but I got some good info. It seems that people have formed pretty tight knit groups.

….when things don't work and the fix seems improbable, [it seems like ] Sailing is actually easier to do alone, than working on the boat is.

Neiafu is quite quaint and Vava'u has beautiful anchorages I think, but I just want to get to NZ.

Yesterday was psychologically pretty hard because nothing worked, including trying to put that SIM card to talk to you and talk to FUruno.

I think I'll just give that up, use an internet cafe, and see if I can contact Furuno like that. when you start having to fight with things in order to fight with other things, it's time to call it quits, I say.

Before I can leave I have to make the wind vane work better (adjustments and maintenance I think). Make sure I have the new Zealand charts on Maxsea to replace the chartplotter that does work.
And put the charts both on the onboard computer and my Dell because I don't completely trust either of them.
On the other hand I trusted the new furuno chart plotter and it conked out..... I have to leave on the 14th so I have another 9 days to get ready which should be plenty. I could actually leave in a couple days and I probably will if the weather window looks favorable.