Astra Blog: Tonga to Bay of Islands, New Zealand (Pa rt 2) 29.10.08 - 02.11.08

Astra Blog: Wednesday 29/10/08 With a good wind all
night, up to 20 knots TWS, sailing under chocolate-box starry skies, one felt a
bit of a fraud really – in what is meant to be one of the more demanding ocean
passages, it shouldn’t be this easy. Conditions in the
morning can only be described as All good things must
come to an end, and thus it was that the decision was made to take the sails
down just as Ash put his lovingly prepared beef salad on the table. Deprived of
the stability of the sails, most of the lunch ended up either in the laps of the
crew or face down on the deck. Miraculously after
lunch another sailing wind appeared and stayed with us till evening. This was a
rather challenging SSE, which we were able to deal with by pulling everything in
tight, and Astra responded by sailing 36º to port at a cracking 7-8 knots for
most of the afternoon. This wind let us know its polar origins, and despite the
clear skies, jumpers and jackets came out.
Happy hour was an indoor affair and was followed by a dinner of mahi-mahi
with some rather warming chilli sauce, followed by chocolate ice-cream with
added rum rations to cool us down again. Thursday 30/10/08 The day started
unpromisingly with only a weak westerly causing us to motor most of the night
and morning. An experiment with sailing in the afternoon proved to be
short-lived. However, catering standards took a step up with Stef’s French toast
for breakfast followed by Fantastic Soup for lunch, resulting in a prolonged
siesta by most of the ship’s company. When asked what were the ingredients of
the Fantastic Soup, Stef simply answered “everything.” We crossed the
30th parallel at about 1800 leaving us only 350 miles from
Opua. We now started to get a
bit concerned as the latest grib (weather forecast) files seemed to show that
most of the wind between here and Opua was going to be southerly and that we
might not have enough fuel to make it (we had already motored for most of day
1). Quick crash course for the crew on VMG (velocity made good) navigation
techniques and a little lecture by the skipper on the theme that going “for a
little sail” in the wrong direction would not be a good
idea. Friday 31/10/08 Actually we had quite a
lively night with a south-easterly persisting more strongly and in a better
direction than expected. Sally made the first call, waking up Paul to hoist the
sails in 20 knots of SE wind. This then increased to around 25 knots, making us
reef the genoa. This completely unexpected wind stayed with us all night giving
us sailing speeds of 7-9 knots, and it wasn’t until mid-morning that the engine
had to go on again. Now with only 250 miles
to go we could probably motor the whole thing if we had to, and that knowledge
made everything better. At least we would not be drifting round the Pacific till
the end of time. Ash continued his very
complicated sextant reading which has been going on since Wednesday. He has
almost worked out where we are, though by the time he does we may be in the bar
in Opua! Dinner cooked by Jeremy was sausages – in fact a sort of sausagey tour
of the South Pacific as we race to empty the freezer before landfall. Paul took advantage of
the motoring conditions to get out the fishing gear, and was rewarded for his
pains by a rather small though lively skipjack tuna, more ready to be caught
than its big brother, which jumped off the hook at the last minute. Saturday 1/11/08 In millpond conditions,
the night watches were a combination of celestial wonderment and bus driving.
The temperature was still dropping as we headed south – compared to a sea
temperature of 26ºC in But what was left of
that wind was replaced early on by the beginning of the low pressure area we
were racing against. The sails went up at 0600 and soon Astra was rollicking
along at 8-10 knots to a stiff westerly that increased to 30 knots with roughish
seas. Mystere passed us around lunchtime in a hurry to get to At last land was
sighted about 1700 and we hit the waypoint at the entrance to the Sunday 2/11/08 After being assured by
knowing yachties that Opua customs was just a one man band, sure not to be seen
on a Sunday morning before ten, we were rudely awakened at 0830 by the first of
three inspection teams. Unfortunately we had left telling quantities of spirits
on the table from our celebrations the night before, but they seemed to take
this in their stride. The first inspector was the man from Immigration, who
insisted on visiting all crew in their berths to match their passport pictures.
He was followed by the Biosecurity man from the Ministry of Ag and Fish, who
confiscated the peppercorns but was quite relaxed about the bacon which we
hadn’t got round to having for breakfast. Last came the sniffer dogs, two
beautiful black So finally cleared for
entry, we were able to transfer to the marina, just in time to welcome John and
Angie who brought further supplies of champagne to mark our arrival, deeply
appreciated by all. John then whisked us to the local seaside |