Opua, New Zealand
Jarek
Fri 28 Nov 2003 20:08
Passage to New Zealand took us seventeen days vs. The average is eight -
ten days. Granted, we took a detour to visit Ceva-i-Ra reef which forced
us into close hauling up the prevailing winds. Moreover, the weather was
mostly not too kind and the broken furling disabled our genoa and yankee.
The clearing in was fast easy and courtuos. Everybody seems to be awfuly
nice here, the countryside hilly and vegetation aboundand. We do some
hiking and sightseeing. We like it here, in New Zealnad. Two deep lows
are passing over the North Island right now, so we decided to stay in
Opua few more days, until the weather improves and then continue to
Tauranga, about 200 miles south. There are many nice anchorages on the
way there, so it will be mostly daily sailing.
Since we left Ceva-i-Ra reef, for a week we had to beat against the
strong southeasterly and then south-southeast winds which were
mercilessly pushing us west all the way to Tasman Sea. Then the center
of a high becalmed us for a day so we motored towards Cape North. The
next day, favourable winds allowed us to run straight to New Zealand.
The night in the center of hight was very beautiful. Moving along on a
smooth ocean, the boat was gently rolled by a long swell. There was no
moon but the night was surprisingly bright, lightened with the stars
crowding the dark blue sky. I do not remember ever seeing so many stars:
Milky Way and its nebulas were bright and almost shadowing the sky with
their pearly opalescence. The air was very clear and there was no “light
pollution”, many stars could be seen unusually low over the horizon. The
brighter stars were throwing long beams of light on the water. On the port
bow, I spotted a distant light, flickering back and forth from green to
red and sometimes to white. A swaying mast light of a distant sailboat, I
thought. It soon faded away. A very bright star, Jupiter, I think, was
slowly moving down to the horizon in the west. Suddenly, it turned red,
then green, then white and red again! There was no sailboat around, the
stars were changing colors when close to the horizon! Then, the star
simply set behind the horizon, rather then waning away well above it.
NOTE: Hey, Kenny! Great to hear from you! Of course I remember s/v Keita
in Nanortalik, Greenland. Thanks for SMS. Do you want to send me your
e-mail address? I am looking forward to meet you, guys, in South Pacific!