Day 4 - Minerva Reef

Clarabella
Gerard Coulson
Wed 7 Nov 2007 02:47
Date: 7 Nov 2007, 1100 local time (GMT +13)
Position: 23:37.284S 178:55.499W
Day's run: 93 nm
Course: 210
Distance to run: 851nm

Another first! Minerva Reef is one of those places that I first read of as a fairly small boy; it always sounded awful, basically an anchorage in the middle of the ocean that was a refuge against the foul weather en route to NZ. As it happens we're in a perfect circle of coral 2.5 miles in diameter, anchored in 10m of azure water in flat calm water. It is peculiar because we are, too all intents, anchored in the middle of the South Pacific but it is beautiful here in an eerie way. There are 5 other boats here all waiting for a Low to move out of the way over NZ. We don't expect to have to stay long.

In the last 24 hours we've had some of the lovliest sailing, close reaching at 6.5 knots in flat seas - lovely. Overnight it went very light and we had a gorgeous night ghosting along under the stars.