Rapturous!

Rapture undergoing surgery
With her clean bottom, Rapture was ready to leave the dirty boatyard and stinky marina. Okay, the boat didn't care but we were more than ready to leave the marina and head down the coast to Auckland. It had been all work since Rapture splashed down. The boat had not had a thorough cleaning for months. There was still sawdust between the louvres of the cabinets and now in the winter, the humidity translated to condensation and turned sawdust into mud and mould. The boat stank (sorry Rapture); it was cold and dank. When we turned on the heat, the warm interior next to the cold exterior seeped drips from hatches and portholes. So for days after she splashed down, I was washing down every surface with Simple Green and vinegar, using a scrub brush to get into the corners of the louvres. And then, our rental car was stolen.

It was a Mazda Demio with 150,000 km on the odometer. These cars have no theft protection, no alarm, no key cue, so all that's needed is a screwdriver to hotwire it. Apparently, an international tictock challenge was issued of how many Demios could be stolen. In our neighborhood two disappeared that night. Here's some gratuitous advice: Never rent a Mazda car.

The police and the rental car company were very helpful and accomodating. The rental company drove another car out to us at the marina and charged us nothing extra from the insurance. The police found the car three days later absolutely trashed with licence plates and all identifying decals scraped and ripped away. For us, the greatest loss was Greg's brand new prescription sunglasses that were left in the car. They were never found.

So we were happy to leave Marsden. We had a weather window with winds from the South West predicted at 20 knots. We would be sailing for once, on a close reach, double reefed, putting the new rigging to the test. The sun was shining, waves negligible since the wind was coming from the land. The boat sprang like a filly, heeled over, straining jib and main and our speed over ground kept rising 6.5, 7.0 7.5 knots. She seldom reaches those speeds but she felt so light and the new fairlead travellers made for easy trimming. When we lose the 600 lb of battery weight in the stern we will really fly.

Of course, it couldn't last. By noon, the wind was gusting to 30 knots and it was time to reef the jib. Our speed barely dropped and we were no longer burying the rail. I could even make lunch down below. By 2:00pm we turned into the wind as we rounded the headland into Hauraki gulf. We furled the jib and fired up the engine. Kawau island was our destination but now we were bashing into the waves with wind on our nose making barely 3 knots at 2800 rpm. Biting cold squalls passed over us with gusts and horizontal rain. Our safe harbor seemed never to approach. When the inlet finally opened up, the wind seemed to be funneling straight in. We wondered if there would be shelter. Entering the inlet we turned beam to the wind, as it hit 31 knots. Five minutes later it was 17, then 10, and 5 knots at our anchor point. We were safe.

Kawau to Auckland is 5 hours sailing. Now we had to be close hauled trying to make way into the waves. Our trimming skills need work! Tankers and huge cargo ships line up outside the port making tricky obstacles to sail through. In the channel, speedy freighters don't suffer yachties gladly if they stray into their way. Reluctantly, we furled the sails and motored the rest of the way.

Docking is always stressful. In New Zealand many of the marina docks do not have cleats. Instead, they have rings through which you have to thread the docklines before the boat takes the slack. This time we had wind from the stern which should have pushed us onto the finger pier but which only pushed the bow down making it impossible for me to get off. Fortunately, our slip was longer than needed so I just got the spring line snagged in time. There, done.

We will be in Westhaven marina for two months but we plan to go out sailing (and practice that trimming) whenever the weather is favorable. It's great to be able to walk everywhere with chandleries, stores and restaurants close by.

Here are three videos of the improvements to the boat so far.