Hot Baths and Clean Bottoms.

The wind is charging the batteries and the rain has nicely rinsed the decks. We are anchored at Kiwiriki Bay, Great Barrier Island. A nice day was had yesterday as we enjoyed the facilities at "Smokehouse Bay". A great facility for visiting boaties provided by the Webster family. The "bay" has an area of land that contains a smokehouse for your fish, BBQ sites, a shed with a bath and shower, an outside bath, a wetback wood stove to provide hot water and some piles to allow you to dry the boat out with the tide. We put Elenya alongside the piles to clean the bottom of the boat, clean up and paint the propellor, and to service one of our seacocks. This was all done in the pouring rain (with a rain cover over the prop). As we cleaned we would run up to the wood stove every now and again to keep the fire roaring. At midday we completed our tasks, had lunch and then spent the afternoon relaxing in the outside bath with lots of hot water. Every now and again we would top up with hot water. No prizes for guessing who got the job of stocking the fire and chopping wood every now an again. I can imagine the news headline had I slipped whilst swinging the axe!!

After a few hours, several refreshments, and tons of cold rain pouring down we reluctantly eased out of our steaming bath and got ready to leave on the evenings tide. A wee bit of wind had arrived by our departure time but a short motor saw us safely anchored for the night. Our plans are to spend some time here then head to Auckland, stopping to terrorize and taunt a good friend on our way. Then on to Bayswater Marina, and joy of joys back to work on 1st July. But that's still along way off...................

Arrival at the Mercurys

We are sitting in Huruhi Harbour in Great Mercury Island enjoying sunshine and calm waters, a nice change from our trip here. We left Gisborne on the promise of a SW flow developing. We stopped off at Tolaga Bay due to the strengthening NW but were happy to leave during the night when the wind abated as it was just a bit rolly! Dawn saw us rounding East Cape and despite the continued NW we decided to keep going as the forecast for Plenty was SW. The knowledge that there was a south to SW flow over the country was of great comfort as we bashed our way into what still looked like NW to us. We eventually made Huruhi Harbour just after dark and picked up a mooring buoy for the night. The next day continued NW. The Mercury Islands marks the furthest south I had previously been on Elenya, if you search back through the archives of the blog you can find some pictures of the last time we were here.

Waiting for Weather

On the way up from Wellington we motor-sailed as far as Napier and spent a night there hiding out from some forecast strong head winds, not sure if they ever eventuated but we had a nice night and a very good sail the rest of the way to Gisborne. We are at present waiting to head north if the current northwesterlies ever die away! We had expected to be away by now but yet again we are waiting for the prevailing wind to develop! On the plus side the weather here has been quite nice, we haven't had any of the thunderstorms and hail etc the rest of the country seems to be having (and the beer at the nearby Tatapouri Sport Fishing Club is quite cheap!)

Wellington

We have had a great time in Wellington catching up with friends and family. It was good to be able to catch up with everyone and thanks to Rod and Bridget for the loan of a car which made things logistically a lot easier. We also met the local winlink radio operator who (along with other operators in Australia) has made these updates possible. In between the socialising we have managed two kayak trips (the first time the kayaks have been used since Auckland!). We had a play in the surf at Titahi Bay and an overnight trip up to Otaki. At Otaki we spent most of the day practising and playing in a small area with some friends and then Jim and I finished off by paddling a small section of the river. A very good time was had, apart from when I managed to go over one of the rapids upside down (not the recommended method), Jim managed to avoid this by either skill, luck, judgment, upper body strength, fear of cold water, a kayak with some buoyancy in the tail or some combination of the above!

We are looking at leaving tomorrow, weather depending, this will mean a pre 5:00 am departure as we need high water to get over the Mana bar, we will then be at sea for 2 to 4 days en route to Gisborne.