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Last Night

Well, last night at sea! The breeze eased off early this morning, so we shook out a reef and sailed well all day until sunset, when we started one engine to give us a bit of a push. By 11pm the headsail was away, at 1am the second engine went on, and by 3am the main was down. We have 70 nm to go at 4am and are hoping to be tied up on the Q berth before everyone goes home. A big plus is that it’s not quite as cold, although that doesn’t mean I’m not still wrapped up in fleecy clothes. And, even better, there is no splashing to make me wet and soggy. Last day. After the last few days of strong winds, big seas, squalls and water coming over the boat, it’s great to be motoring towards land in calm conditions. We made fantastic time on this passage, and if it hadn’t been for the poor weather at the end, which cost us a few days, it would have gone down in the record books. It’s ...

Cold and Bumpy

It’s still blowing 30+ knots, with squalls rolling through bringing gusts into the high 30s, and we’ve seen 45 knots a few times. The problem with squalls is that it’s difficult to tell exactly what they are going to do, so we have to be on hand to reduce sail if one gets closer and looks ugly. It’s better to be cautious than to find out the hard way that we should have reefed earlier. At night, I’m dropping the main and creeping forwards with some headsail and the leeward engine running at 1,600 rpm. It’s not particularly fast, but it keeps us moving without having too much sail up when the squalls come through. We have about 250 nm to Opua, but we can’t aim directly where we want to go because there is a bit of east in the breeze. There is also enough south in it to make it very cold. The spray is making everything damp and salty, and intermittent rain is adding to the atmosphere. Its pretty bouncy and I’ve had to cable-tie a cushion onto the screen in the saloon to stop it bang...

Working Our Way

Not much blog today. The plan has fallen into place and the wind shifted around 1am, so we tacked. We currently have gusts up to 36 knots and some large seas. We are heading around 55 degrees off the apparent wind, with the headsail deeply furled and one engine running at 1,600 rpm. Despite all that, we are only about 30 degrees off course and heading north of BOI. The forecast is supposed to begin to ease off in around 18 hours, and Im hoping that will allow us to make a better course for Opua. For now we are making what progress we can and waiting for the conditions to improve. After all the weather-watching over the last few days, we’re dealing with exactly what we were planning around.

The Final Stretch

We have about 450 nm to go in a straight line, but probably closer to 550 nm depending on the wind over the next few days. Given that weather forecasting isn't an exact science, even 24 hours out, getting the detailed timing right is tricky. The front looks as though it will/has mostly pass south of us, leaving us right on its northern edge. We should then get around 18 hours of westerly wind before it swings around to the south and stays there for the rest of the passage. A first glimpse of NZ this morning - The Kermadecs Our current course is designed to give us a better angle into the Bay of Islands once the southerlies arrive. As things are looking at the moment, we should be able to make it into Opua without having to sail too hard on the wind, which would be a welcome after all the weather-watching and route planning of the last few da...

Picking Our Way South

We turned south at 8am this morning, and the weather forecasts are still a little higgeldy-piggeldy. The ECMWF is definitely looking a bit more dramatic, with much stronger gusts and an earlier change to southerlies. The GFS, while not exactly appealing, is definitely my preferred model, with the low appearing further south and the gusts looking considerably less concerning. The next obstacle is a strong southerly change coming through either on Friday, according to the ECMWF, or Saturday, according to the GFS. Obviously, I'm hoping for Saturday. The plan is to get as far south as possible before the change arrives. After that, the best I can hope for is to be able to point the boat towards Opua and make some progress in the right direction. What I'd really like is to be able to aim for Opua with the apparent wind at least 60 degrees off the bow. The further away from the bow the better, as far as I'm concerned. Unfortunately, I think we may have to settle for not even bei...

A Two-for-One Special

This is a two-for-one special because I didn’t manage to write a post yesterday. I started one, but spent so much time looking at the weather, waiting for updates, reassessing things, considering options and trying to work out how to get to Opua as quickly as possible while avoiding any strong winds that the blog just became a long list of possible scenarios. Not particularly entertaining reading, and not much fun to write either. It does make you think about how things have changed. Back in the day, we would have left Tahiti and essentially been sailing blind unless we could pick up a weather station on the HF radio. We would probably have sailed straight into any poor weather and dealt with whatever happened. Now we can zoom in on a pixel on the chart and get 16 different agencies’ opinions on which direction the wind will blow from, how strong it will be, how long it will last and exactly when it will start and stop. The problem is that they don't always agree, and ...