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As I think back on yesterday I can’t figure out what order things happened in so again I’ll just list the events in semi random order.
We had a couple of visits from outside contractors. The stainless steel guys came by to measure up the bowsprit for the anchor protector. While they were with us we discussed an improvement to the anchor locker which will prevent pile ups of the anchor chain.
We were also visited by the engineering firm to examine our gooseneck/boom and our rudder bearings. They came back with rather a large quote later in the day, mostly for the rudder bearings. In discussion with the yard manager, Peter, he came up with a better and cheaper solution to address the wear on the bearings.
The sanding continued all morning. We occupied this time by washing and conditioning our jib sheets and old furling line. I was interrupted in this task (although I can’t remember what by) and the lines are still sitting in the bucket to be finished today. We also visited the chandlers to pick up replacement nipples/through hull, a large tub of rust remover, some flares (our current ones are out of date), a grab bag for our emergency supplies if we have to abandon ship (better late than never) and a few other sundry items. We also picked up a cheap blow heater as it was freezing cold yesterday morning (though not so bad today). We finally found Arthur’s Emporium, a fantastic store filled with all sorts of things. We didn’t have much time and will have to go back but we did manage to pick up a replacement hammock which we’ve been scouring town for.
When the sanding had finished we were loaned the power wash to wash down the boat. The blue dust was every where and it took 2-3 hours to clean the boat top to bottom. At the end of this we scraped and sanded all the through hulls and I gave them all a second thorough inspection for any pitting – there was none.
At some point in the day I verified we had the latest s/w for our two Garmin GPSs and Helen created a list for the grab bag contents. We have most of it at hand but we want to do a proper job with the contents.
We received a call from the rigger who’s finished the splicing and will drop them by this morning and perform a rigging inspection. We also received a call from the upholster who’s finished the back of our seat which I can collect today.
During the day we had the pleasure of bumping into Ingi from Boree in the yard (and in one of the stores) and also Stuart from Imagine swung by to say hello. We got to know Rod from our neighbouring boat Proximity. He seems to know everyone we know but somehow we missed hooking up along the way. It was of course impossible not to bump into John working hard on Sea Mist from time to time.
We were pooped after all of this so we had a takeaway pizza for dinner and finished the day with a movie.
by steve, on November 11th, 2010 ( At Sea, Attitude, Blue Penguin, Boree, Illusion, Imagine, Kilkea II, Larabeck, Tin Tin) We’ve had an encouraging start to this passage. The winds, as predicted, did shift around enough for us to not only gain the rhumb line but to also let out the sails for a more comfortable ride. Overnight the swell, which always lags the wind, shifted too so we stopped crashing into the waves so much. All good. The wind forecasts are also coming in as good as we could hope for. We have pretty much a beam to close reach for the next few days in around and about 20 knots of wind which we will sail well in. The 7 day forecast even shows the stationary high in our way dissipating providing the hint that we may be able to sail all the way in.
All the boats that left yesterday are sailing for either Whangarei or Opua (mostly the latter) so we’re all close by. We always had sails on the horizon around us and Kilkea in particular took station 2 miles off our port and stayed there overnight. this morning within spitting distance of us are Attitude, Blue Penguin, Boree, Illusion, Imagine, Kilkea, Tin Tin and Larabeck. Quite a crowd.
Unfortunately, Sea Mist had to turn back. Outside of the reef at Tongatapu they noticed the stitching coming apart around the clew of their jib. They decided to turn back and effect repairs. We heard from them this morning. They have found a possible place to get it repaired. Our fingers are crossed that they can make it out in this weather window but it is tight. A low pressure system is chasing us down which will make things bumpier and wetter for them.
We had a little problem with our job too but nothing serious. I noticed some more of the stitching for the sun strip had come undone. Fortunate this was close to the furler so I went forward and stitched it up leaving the sail out. It was a bit awkward as I caught a few waves as well as catching my finger with the needle a few times.
More excitement came in the afternoon when we were briefly accompanied by some pilot whales. I rushed for my camera but they didn’t stay long enough to pose.
Sailing to New Zealand is a bit like playing dodgems with the weather systems. Given that it’s getting colder we’ve elected to use a little diesel on the way to provide some comfort in terms of warmth and to avoid loss of speed due to regeneration. If we need to slow down we’ll regenerate but not unless we need to. Our sailing angle to the wind is screwing up the wind gen as the wind spilling of the main spins it around and we get no useful energy from it. That’s a pity as we’d do pretty well in these wind speeds.
We’re currently managing to average just over 6 knots which puts us on an ETA for arrival next Thursday on the 8th. We’d always hoped to arrive before the weekend so this is a nice comfortable margin.
by KC2RIY, on November 9th, 2010 ( Imagine, Tonga) In the morning Helen and Ben took the water taxi into Nuku’alofa while I went ashore here to Big Mama’s for some internet and weather discussions. There weren’t too many people in Big Mama’s that morning so I was able to sort some paperwork out and get up to date with our tracks. One thing I didn’t manage to do was link some photo albums I’ve recently uploaded to their respective blogs. In the absence of this, the albums can of course be seen on our general photos page http://www.aboarddignity.com/photos.htm.
In the afternoon I had planned to scrape the starboard hull. I decided to do some early parts replacement on the genset first. If we end up motoring the last day or two I want to minimise the possibility of any issues there. I therefore replaced the impeller as well as both fuel filters. Prior to replacing the fuel filters I ran the fuel pumps for about 20-30 minutes on each tank giving the fuel a bit of a polish on the old filters. While that was happening I replaced the impeller. This time two blades had broken off and I found three wedged in the ins and outs to the chamber holding the impeller. Once I’d changed out the fuel filters I again ran the fuel pump to purge out any air.
When I started the genset to check it was ok it made a terrible noise and failed to start properly. It’s normal practice, when putting new fuel filters on, to fill them with fuel before putting them in place. I’ve always managed to get away with this as the priming action has got rid of the air. I checked the primary filter an no fuel had made it in there so with Ben’s help I filled it, screwed it back on, ran the fuel pump for a couple of minutes and retested. All was ok with the engine. Except for one thing. Sea water was squirting at high pressure from around the raw water pump housing the impeller I’d just changed.
Nothing for it but to take the pump apart and inspect it all. Some of the water tight surfaces looked a bit grimy so I figured it needed a bit of a clean up before reassembly. As this was the first time for me to do something like this I called Stuart over from Imagine to offer any advice. I’m glad I did as he was able to advise me how to really clean up the salts that had built up on the shaft. I also found a pump rebuild kit I had as spares so a lot of the parts I replaced for new leaving cleaning up the old ones for a later date.
With everything reassembled I fired up the genset and all was ok. Phew. Good news we did this as now I feel we have a more reliable genset.
With all the extra time spent on the genset we’d run out of time to clean the starboard hull. Helen had bought a six pack of beer in the morning (I’d suggested 12) principally to have some for our arrival in New Zealand. These were soon quaffed to celebrate our improved generator before we cleaned up and headed ashore for our final night out. Quite a few folks showed up which was nice. We had plenty of beers and had one last meal. Ben and Ian ended up going back with our last bottle of nasty Tongan rum in exchange for more cava which was doing the rounds with the youngsters. He’ll be as agile as a sloth today I’m sure which will be fun because he’s supposed to help out with the hull cleaning.
The weather picture looks slightly improved on yesterday. The winds look as though they’ll begin turning to the east a little earlier. No news on the stalled high at the other end. We’ll just have to take our chances with that when we are on the move. Today we’ll focus on getting the boat ready for passage so we can leave as soon as we want in the morning.
Our sail down was slow and drizzly but uneventful. We’d aimed for the eastern passage into Tongatapu hoping to see whales outside in the deep water. No luck there. We arrived around 3pm, anchored behind the island of Pangaimotu on first try and settled down exhausted. We’d all had a troubled night’s sleep and were all ready for a rest.
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Not without first checking the internet. This was fortunate really as although it is free here, it is insanely slow. So we all started downloading stuff then slowing down and resting.
In the evening we went ashore to Big Mama’s where we ate out along with Sea Mists, Imagines and Tahinas. Later, the movie “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” was shown but we didn’t stay. The Visions of Johanna’s came for the movie so we had a chance to say hello and catch up. There are others in this anchorage we know. The Leu Cats are here as well as the Borees and another number of other boats we recognise but know less well. All are waiting here for their preferred weather window. A whole load of boats left last Sunday. I wouldn’t have but I keep my fingers crossed for all of them as we know a few.
This morning I took the 9am water taxi to the main dock a mile away to clear in. I shared a taxi to the Immigration Office with the Borees. There I discovered my visa was all in order and they said I didn’t need to do anything until I leave. Same was true for customs and the port captain, they said. It may be incorrect but I’m still cleared into Tonga so I can’t go too far wrong.
My next problem was that the return water taxi was at 1pm. I picked up some supplies based on a list that Helen gave me and wandered around Nuku’alofa for a while. I covered most of it in fairly short order and still ended up with plenty of time. I ended up at the dock an hour early. I sat in a cafe and read a magazine to kill the time.
This afternoon I’ve been back on the boat sorting out my ebook collection. Helen has spent all day on her year two perspective – still not finished. Ben has been stuck into his actuarial studies. It’s been too windy today to take down our headsail. Frank on Tahina offered us the use of his sail sewing machine which I’d like to do after taping up the tear. The quick and dirty fix of putting marine compound on the sail repair tape can wait until if and when it recurs.
A new headsail and a service of our old one was already on our to do list for New Zealand. I think the tear is a result of our old problem of the sun strip being a tad too narrow. We look after the sail by furling it tight but the initial damage may be quite old.
by KC2RIY, on October 7th, 2010 ( Imagine, Jackster, Kamaya, Tonga) In the morning Ben, Tim (from Kamaya) and I dinghied around Euakafa to go spear fishing. The guide books said the south side was supposed to be pretty good but it turned out to be a little less than spectacular. We anchored the dinghy fairly close to where Tim, Stuart and Paul had capsized in Stuart’s dinghy the previous day. There were a few items that hadn’t been recovered the previous day. Tim had a look for those too but had no luck.
Having exhausted the thrills of Euakafa (the hike was the only good thing) we moved the boat to Avalau around midday.
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Here there are vast expanses of turquoise waters making the area look quite pretty. Ben was soon out spear fishing and caught a couple of fish. I joined him but I think the word was out and no decent fish were presenting themselves.
Both Imagine and Jackster were in the anchorage so we invited them over for dinner – particularly because Stuart is still single handing and probably needed the company. Over the evening the weather picked up and the anchorage became quite swelly. Overnight things have not improved and we woke to a grim, gray morning. The poor conditions make this a less desirable stop so we may move on today.
Some news on the charger front. I was passed (I suspect without reading) an email which revealed that the charger was at UPS but awaiting on someone to pay. There was no indication that anyone was doing anything nor was there any indication that my requests to prevent it being sent to Nieafu (and hopefully onto Tongatapu instead) had been heeded. That email got a quick response. The delivery has been canned and now it’s going to New Zealand. Given the poor show so far that’s probably about the only thing that will work for us. The resiliency of the system is not letting us down so we can get about ok. If we’d been told up front that sending the replacement to Tonga was impractical and could we have waited til NZ I would probably have accepted it. Instead our expectations were set and then the comedy began. In Aitutaki I had to cycle miles to get an internet connection to research delivery options. In Niue I had to make several trips ashore to use the public phone (mostly to full voice mailboxes) for a dialog which would have been simple over email. I’ve had to make several (almost always completely ignored) calls a day from Tonga to chase. We’ve wasted time and money on all these fruitless phone calls. I’m sure the real reasons for the delays and frustrations are being concealed from us but the result, which is all that matters, is a big zilch. What a load of bollocks.
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