Sunrise in Foveaux Straight - only 20 Knots, but rising later
Last night we had one of the best restaurant meals we have had for a while - the food was exquisite and the location warm and welcoming. The proprietors were great, Chris at front of house and Deanne as head chef. Food of distinction - no wonder, when Deanne travels to Italy to Chef there, during the off season here in NZ. Her Paua Ravioli entree was Devine, as was the Main of Hapuku (Groper) just beautiful! We were so disappointed we didn’t have more time to go through the menu, on other evenings as we had mistakenly thought they were closed for the season, until we saw their advert during the movie yesterday. We also met a lovely couple, George and Merima, who were much more adventurous travellers of the oceans than we were! They had been just about everywhere imaginable in their sailing boat, to destinations I would be afraid to visit in a tour group. It was a surprise to learn they currently have a boat moored in a marina very close to ours - small World!
We retired to the boat much later than planned having had a thoroughly enjoyable evening, Having tied the tender to an endless rope on the Jetty (now low tide). It was a bit of a circus to get the dinghy to remain beneath the very long ladder so that I could jump in and steady the boat for Jo to follow. We managed to get ourselves sorted and with flashlight in hand Jo guided me back out to H3. We had the best sleep of 8 days at Stewart with only light winds. I set my alarm for 5:30am to get an early departure at 6:00am for Dunedin. I awoke at 5:00am and could feel the boat rocking so knew that while the wind had dropped off, but the sea hadn’t. While Jo remained in bed, I set the boat up for a rough trip and set all the instrument backlight settings to preserve my night vision. It reminded me of the old days when I used to do night flying. It is amazing how little light is required in complete darkness and it would be so, for at least another hour or more. We weighed anchor at 6:00am with Jo wrapped up warm beside me at the helm. We cruised out at 7 knots due to how pitch black it was and not wanted to over run any floating debris. The track lead me out in between Islands so it was a constant task of just confirming our position and checking both chart and GPS for any obstacles. In our path. We noticed another vessel heading out at the same time on a different track, so strangely comforting to realise that we were not the only crazies venturing out in the dark. We could also see another boat heading towards us from Bluff direction with all lights blazing. We kept an eye on him on screen once the radar picked him up, both boats didn’t have AIS so we were unable to check heading, size of vessel or closing speeds. I do like AIS and as mentioned before think it should be compulsory. Radar was at least useful to determine that he was on a different heading to us but we needed to wait until we could pick him up on radar with the now rolling seas.
It was barely dawn when Jo decided the waves were too big for her comfort so she took herself back to bed where she didn’t see the swell. Once out in Foveaux Straight the wind was a predicted 25 -30 knots on our stern and the sea was rolling from the South East at about 2 - 3metres. It was great to watch the sunrise but we didn’t actually see the sun for another hour or so as there was still dense cloud all around. It was very cold inside the boat so I wrapped up with blankets at the helm but after 3 hours or more decided it wasn’t going to warm up so started the get set and turned the heating on. It was at least another hour before I got rid of the blankets. As the visibility improved I continued to lift our speed until we were doing 17 knots and surfing regularly up to 21 knots.
Joanne arriving in Dunedin in calm water - a lot happier now!
Dunedin harbour at last - made good time but a rugged trip!
I checked on Jo periodically and she wasn’t feeling great so I got her an earplug, once that was in place inher ear she began to feel better. Not enough to come up top again though! Based on my own experiences it is better to be up top facing forward but I guess if you don’t want to see the size of the ocean - below decks is best.
It was a long day at the helm but we were still on schedule as we were running quite fast despite the conditions. Once I was within an hour of Port I made the usual call to the port harbour control on channel 14 to seek permission to enter and to check for any shipping movements during our entry. We were cleared to enter so proceeded to the channel entry point where I contacted Otago Maritime radio on channel 16 to close my trip report. It took us about an hour to reach Careys Bay where we had arranged a berth in the fisherman’s marina. It was great to be tied up and able to walk ashore without getting our feet wet or ourselves. The marina term is used very loosely! How in 2018 it is allowed is beyond my understanding? If I provided employee access of this nature I would expect to be prosecuted. No handrails, rickety structure moving around under foot, planks broken, diesel leaking onto the deck and into the sea from a fuel pump hose; (I phoned the fuel company to advise and turned the main valve off). They said they would send someone out to fix it?? I guess the whole issue is the cost of a replacement Marina and having to tell the fisherman the cost of mooring there would go up 500%.!!
Tieing up to our new location for the next 3 days - this berth has seen a lot of action and so has the boat on our port side!
Our curious welcoming by a 120 Kg Sea Lion - he gave us a hell of a fright as we hadn’t seen him swim up. Apparently the berth holder, Peter, said he would have been looking for a fish as he always gives him a feed on arrival! Our fish supplies were depleted so he wasn’t having any of ours!
Not the condition of the neighbour at the waterline - he was out each day around 5:30 fishing in this boat - much braver than me!
Once tied up and settled, we walked the one kilometre into Port Chalmers to check out the services there. We found everything we needed, two cafes, a large 4 square supermarket plus a variety of shops and a bus stop. I decided a car would be useful to take Jo to the airport for her flight home and at the same time pick Robin up to continue the journey home with me. So a rental was arranged for the following morning. On walking back to the boat we decided to have a beer at the old stone house in Careys Bay, it was a fabulous place with lovely staff behind the bar. We decided to be naughty and have a plate of chips with our beer, they lasted no time at all. Then it was back to the boat for Blue Cod and salad for tea. The following morning we caught the bus to Dunedin Central and a cab from there to collect the rental car. First time on public transport for us for many, many years, it was actually fine, to my surprise! Once Mobile we could now get around easily and we drove back to tidy up the boat, get Jo packed and sort all the laundry as next on the agenda was a massive laundry trip, with two weeks of washing to catch up with. Some was as a result of the forward hatches leaking when the nose of the boat was submarining on the trip from Stewart Island!
We drove to town again to have lunch at a cafe there and then it was time for the airport trip. It all timed nicely with Robin arriving just before Jo’s departure time, enough time for us all to catch up again. We told Robin that we had good news and bad, the good being that it was a beautiful calm sunny day in Dunedin, the bad was that he was going to have to help with the laundry on the way back to the boat!
Once back on the boat, it was almost tea time where I cooked up the last of our Blue Cod. Still loving the cod! We had a big day planned for tomorrow with getting the boat fuelled and full of water. The water had lasted us 10 days, with almost 700 litres left! We also needed to fit a new chain counter and wash the boat down plus our usual engine checks. We managed all that without drama just before dark, we were now ready for our 10 hour trip to Akaroa tomorrow. Incidentally, today was the first time I was able to be outside all day with just a tee shirt and trackies! It had been a beautiful day again; it is the little things that make me smile.
Not wanting to cook again tonight, we went to our new local and enjoyed a fabulous meal and a beer returning around 9:00pm. So ended another day of our adventures around NZ.
Like most buses in New Zealand immediately after peak hours - very empty! Trying to make up for all the fuel we had been burning in the boat.