Day 1 Tonga to New Zealand S21:41:687 W176:43:791

Superted V
Jean & Matt Findlay
Sat 3 Nov 2012 18:18

Light winds during the day and night.  The beast was out of the bag during the day to help us along a bit but got put away before dark.  Lovely flat seas with just a long rolling 1meter swell (is this the famous pacific swell!!)  Cloudy day and night.  Been on port tack all night – wind up and down between 4 and 8 knots but picked up to around 12 knots and went ahead about 5am.  Sailing a close reach on port tack.  About to have some porridge and download a weather grib file.  2 more boats in vicinity – Barbara and Michael on Astate, Monique and JanBart on Victory – good to have a bit of company!  The big issue is a developing tropical depression around Wednesday. Lots of radio chat about when and where. One boat already turned back. Our back up position is to hunker down at Minerva reef, which we should be passing tomorrow. Email from our friends Jo and Trevor on Malarkey – they got to Australia safely - great stuff.

 

24 hour distance:  142 miles