We booked ourselves a place on Vigilant, a 43 foot sloop, cutter rigged and weighing about 16 tons. 

There was Nick (the owner), first mate Carolyn, and a Spanish family of four from Madrid (Dad currently working in Wellington as a diplomat), a couple from Guernsey, Keith (a chef from Russell) and ourselves.

We caught the ferry over to Russell and by 1000 we had departed.

Not much wind but enough to sail gently out towards Robertson Island towing a dinghy with two canoes, much to Helen’s excitement. It was a cloudy start to the day

but within a couple of hours we arrived at Robertson Bay and the dinghy and canoes and ‘guests’ were all transported ashore either by dinghy or swimming

Nick’s well rehearsed plan was to leave us all on the beach where we could walk to the top of the hill, swim in the lagoon or kayak. Helen was keen to kayak and impress on Mark the need to have a kayak on Marita so that we do not to have always blow up the dinghy.

She was first to have a go. In she climbed

out she fell

and finally off she paddled

it was a lovely island with great views. The sun came out.

An hour and a half later Nick came to pick us all up and took us back to the boat for lunch—chicken sandwich and fruit

and then we set sail in the freshening afternoon sea breeze

sailing home via Black Rock—it could have been Falmouth on a sunny day!

The afternoon breeze died away for a short time which meant that we did not get back to Russell until 5 pm, which gave us an extra hour on the water. A lovely day and really good value ($95 per head).