Here we go again. Maybe!
Southern Princess
John & Irene Hunt
Tue 13 Apr 2010 08:25
|
35:18.847S 174:07.332E
I am sitting in Opua, Bay of Islands, New
Zealand waiting for things to happen.
Departed Gulf Harbour just north of Auckland on
Saturday 10th and with a good breeze and a motor doing 2500 rpm we averaged 9
knots! Tucked in around Cape Brett and had 10 hours sleep after a half bottle of
Otago Pinot. Leisurely breakfast, ran out the main sail as it seemed to jamb the
day before however it was working OK and then motored into Opua.
Opua Marina was its usual self with a tide running
through it and with a beam wind at 15 knots which blew me onto a timber pile!
This action managed to set off the Jon Buoy and I ended up with this rescue
device inflating itself as I was trying to dock. Talk about a f***up! I had only
had it serviced three days before hand at big cost and here we go again!
Fortunately I still had the dealers card, so called him on his mobile Sunday, he
advised that he was the only bloke in NZ who could do the job!! Hired a car,
drove to Auckland, stayed with Gabby, Rich & the boys, up early; out to
Kumeu and delivered the now dis-inflated pile of plastic, had it repacked,
needed a new cover and a bottle of gas. Bloody hell retail for the gas bottle
was NZ$500 but they let me have it for $300, jeeze it is expensive to keep the
crew safe!
Big list of things to do to get ready for the
Tasman. Working through it slowly.
Weather looks like it will be OK and our fantastic
weatherman, Bruce Buckley from Perth, WA who has looked after us for years is
going to do it again. Recons by Thursday/Friday all this crap will be gone and
it will be a doddle across the pond! OK I will believe it when I see
it!
We've had the yacht on the market for the last 12
months and not much action. Get ready to leave and all hell breaks loose.
Inspections, offers, counter offers and in the end we are going to leave; cause
if we don't go we loose the weather window.
Crew joins me in the next couple of days. Ryan
Hunt, brother Bob's son is joining us tomorrow night and Ian Massam (Ian has
featured in past blogs having sailed with us on other occasions with wife
Avelyn, who is cooking us some meals to take with us) joins us Thursday. I pick
him up at Keri Keri Airport at 11:15, present ourselves at Customs etc, sign the
documents, load up on duty free fuel and off we go.
Gabby has cooked some frozen meals for us as well
so this trip will be pretty easy food wise. I miss Irene especially when it
comes to catering, oh and the other day when I was only my own and really needed
a nap after lunch!
Should take us 6-8 days depending on the weather,
but looking at the charts seems we will have soft easterlies, will have to fill
up the bladder with duty free fuel as there will be a lot of motoring me
thinks!
No pictures this trip, left the camera at home and
I can't figure how to load the iPhone into this computer. Word pictures only I
am afraid.
With luck I will post this each day.
Cheers
JH _/)
|