Yes, we made it across the ditch and are now at the Opua Marina freezing our arses off. This cold weather is as bad as Tasmania and a rude shock from the warm (admittedly wet, rainy) Coffs Harbour.
We departed Coffs around midday on Sunday 3rd of May and were waved off by my family. We enjoyed a comfortable and fast ride as far as Lord Howe Island. The breeze from the SSE at about 18knots and we sailed on a close hauled course under slightly furled jib and double reefed mainsail. We experienced some ups and downs in pressure. In the log book Peter notes, "Wind doing weird things, 20knots then 2 90 degree shifts. Wish it would just settle."
For the first day and a half I was fine, no sea sickness however as the swell and wind increased so did my discomfort. In the end I learned to love the maxalon and gave up on the kwells. Yesterday we went to the pharmacy in Pahia and asked for "the seasickness pills that you can't buy in Australia". Multiple people have recommended these pills which you only have to take once when you first wake up. The lady in the shop showed us "sea legs" which she said were the equivalent of our kwells. We looked at them and said no, do you have anything else? We got out the phone and checked a msg but there was no name given for the pills. After much discussion with her she eventually said, "we do have these ones we make up ourselves, we can't advertise them though". So NZ$60 later I now have enough for 20 days. You take a white pill and half an hour later follow it with a blue pill. Apparently no one gets sea sick so I'll see how it goes. It would be nice to be able to help Peter out a bit more.
So the crossing wasn't the easiest passage for either of us but particularly for Peter. He noted in the log " After a great start the breeze last night was all over the place in direction and strength. A lot to do so not much sleep." Massive rain squalls hit us hard and we went from 20 knots to 55 knots! And we think our gauge reads under! Often Peter could see the squalls approaching and the radar often backed up his ???? and he would go on deck and try to reduce the sail before the wind and rain hit. We were unprepared for one rain squall and Peter was pondering going on deck to reduce sail when we broached under reefed main and poled out headsail. The broach was too much for the pole and it folded in half! There was some small damage to the luff and leach of the headsail and a lost batten. These squalls continued for most of the trip and we were glad to see the New Zealand coast albeit for a very short time as the visibility decreased. During the entire trip we saw 4 vessels, 2 off the Australian coast shortly after departure and then nothing until we were coming down the New Zealand Coast. We kept in regular radio contact (morning and evening skeds) with RCC Australia and also emailed daily updates to our families.
We were prepared for the trip to take 10 days and hoped for less. In the end we sailed in Opua on Monday morning and tied up on the customs wharf at 9am. We slowed ourselves up at times so we would arrive on a weekday to avoid paying double time to the officials however we later found out that unlike Australia, customs and immigration and free in New Zealand. In Australia it can cost you around $450 if you come in on a Sunday, so that was a nice surprise.
Customs and immigration was extremely simple. We declared everything and they took very little of our food. The only things they were interested in were fresh fruit and veg, chicken and eggs, and anything that may grow such as seeds ????. We had pre-prepared cooked meals for the voyage and thought we would lose what was left however the man was very nice. He said normally we could keep any Australian beef or lamb in its original packaging and our pre cooked meals would have to go however he let us keep them.
The Bay Of Islands is on the east coast of New Zealands North Island. Opua is a small quaint fishing village that used to be a bustling port. There is a marina, yacht club, charter vessels and a general store along with a huge marine industry including a slip way and hard stand, chandlery, sail makers, boat repairers, pretty much anything boating you could need. It is a popular arrival and departure point for cruisers like us and there are many boats sitting waiting for the right weather to head to Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji and Tonga. We have already met two vessels heading to Tonga and hope to travel with them.
Yesterday we caught a private shuttle service to the nearby town of Pahia. It is a holiday village really, cafes, restaurants, souvenir shops, banks and many tourism operations. There is a woolworths although it is really more like a iga store with just a small selection of products. We took our provisioning list with us and started the huge shop. We plan to take as much food as we can fit as we know there are limited supplies in the areas of Tonga and Fiji we plan to visit. We anticipate that we will be able to purchase plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables and maybe some bread and other basics but we know that the meat in Tonga is very poor quality and we won't be purchasing meat. Yesterday we spent NZ$300 in woolworths and probably are not even half way through the list. With little to no public transport in the area we have decided to hire a car for two days, looks like it will cost about AUS$100 and we can then go to the town of Kerikeri where there is a butcher and a larger grocery store and also do a bit of sight seeing in the area.
Today we are having some repairs done to the boat and will probably have dinner at the Cruising Club tonight so we can meet some new people. A lot of the boats here have already been to Tonga and Fiji so there is a lot of information we can gather.
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