15 April 2015 Whangarei, New Zealand
We’re gearing up to leave tomorrow, so we spent the morning finishing off jobs. I got the bilge pump and automatic switch working, but there’s so much crap at the bottom of the sump that the pump filter keeps clogging up. After cleaning the filter ten times, I gave up. The problem is that the sump is only 2 or 3 inches wide and is two feet deep, so I can’t get my arm in there to dig it out. This afternoon, I bought a second hand dessert spoon from a charity shop and my grand plan is to lash it to a stick and dig out the sludge a spoon at a time – I'm not looking forward to it.
Our afternoon was spent in a shopping frenzy. I had a list of spares that I still needed to buy and Glenys was focused on provisions and more things to give and trade when we get up to the islands. We both did a couple of runs to the local supermarket to stock up with enough drinks and food to last us a week while we sail up to Opua.
We've sold our bikes to “The Beguine” and will drop them off just before we leave tomorrow. For £40 each they've been a fantastic asset here in Whangarei, but they’re too big to take with us (and will just rust away), so we’re selling them – I’ll miss my daily bike ride.
In the evening, we treated ourselves to a night out and had an Indian curry – probably our last one for a long time.
16 April 2015 Whangarei to Urquhart Bay, New Zealand
We were up early doing our last minute jobs. The boat still looked like a bomb had hit it with stuff everywhere, but we had a few hours to sort it all out because today’s tide meant that we couldn't leave until two o'clock in the afternoon.
We first fitted the dinghy cover, put all the velcro flaps in place and tensioned the outer string. It looks great, but it’s been a lot of work – I estimate about 60 hours including our abortive first attempt at the templates. Now that we've done one, it would probably still take 40 hours to make another from scratch, so I pray that this one survives for the rest of our cruising life.
Glenys sorted out all of the bags and bucket loads of stuff that we bought (and been given) to take to Vanuatu. She's stowed most of it in the back heads shower, with the rest in a few big bags in the front cabin. We've still got lots of space to take more clothes and food.
By one o'clock, we were pretty well shipshape with the dinghy up on the davits, the decks cleared, the engine tested and everything stowed away down below. We then had an interminable wait for an hour until we had enough depth of water to move.
At two o'clock precisely, we dropped our lines and motored out of Whangarei Town Marina, through the lifting bridge, past Norsand Boat Yard and headed down the estuary. We've had a great 4½ months in Whangarei, which is a lovely town with all the facilities that a cruiser could want within a one mile radius. The people have been really friendly and helpful – we will miss the place, but our credit card will be grateful not to be used for a while.
The trip up the river was uneventful, with a pleasant (but cold) 15 knot wind from the south east allowing us to pull out our genoa and motor-sail down the winding channel. We arrived in Urquhart Bay at five o'clock, just in time to anchor and have a cold beer before the sun went down.
17 April 2015 Whangarei to Urquhart Bay, New Zealand
We had a lovely calm night, with just a bit of gentle rocking, so it was a pleasant re-introduction to sleeping at anchor. There was no rush to leave, so we had leisurely breakfast before heading off to sail the twenty miles to our next anchorage.
After we rounded Whangarei Heads, we had a good 15 knot wind, mostly on the beam, all the way to Tutukaka Harbour. On the way, I took advantage of the calms seas to potter about on deck tensioning the halyards on all three sails and stowing the ropes away. Everything looks to be working fine, which is a relief after four months without use.
We were tucked up in Tutukaka Bay by one o'clock and had a lazy afternoon, reading and napping – it’s a long time since we've had time to sit and stare. This harbour has a lovely, snug anchorage and we’re planning to stay here for a couple of nights to weather out a low that’s forecast to pass over tomorrow.
18 April 2015 Tutukaka Harbour, New Zealand
The low arrived with squalls and occasional strong winds, so we chilled out, hunkered down below. I did some administration and caught up on my blog, while Glenys did a few small sewing jobs and surfed the internet.
I looked at the long range weather forecast and there doesn't seem to be a clear weather window to get up to Vanuatu for the next couple of weeks, it just seems to be one low following another, so we have some time to relax and take it slow getting up to Opua. The weather looks good to head north tomorrow when the wind should turn easterly.
19 April 2015 Tutukaka Harbour to Whangaruru, New Zealand
We left just after eight o'clock and motored out into a two metre swell from the east. It was a little tough getting out of the narrow harbour entrance, with ten minutes of motoring straight into the waves. I wouldn't want to try to get out if there was a big swell.
Once we cleared the headland and had turned north, we had a nice 10-20 knot wind from the east putting us on a broad reach. We decided to go into Whangaruru rather than Whangamumu because we were worried that the east swell might make its way into Whangamumu. What a good choice because we anchored in Puripuri Bay, which is very pretty and, even better, there was no swell at all.
After lunch we went ashore. There’s a camping ground with a walking track that wanders around the peninsula and our plan is to do that tomorrow.
Our new dinghy wheels got their first outing. We've done without wheels for the past four years, but sometimes it’s been a struggle to get our heavy dinghy ashore when there are big tides which expose a lot of beach. The wheels worked well when we pulled the dinghy up onto the hard packed sand, but the seabed shallowed very slowly and the wheels hit the bottom a long way out, so we ended up having to wade further than we would normally. We’ll have to have to refine our approach and maybe sometimes only deploy the wheels when we’re actually beached.
We invited “Pebbles” over for sundowners and for once it was actually warm enough to sit in the cockpit. Dean and Janie are locals from Wellington and are just starting their first long distance cruise to Tonga and Fiji – they’re very excited.
20 April 2015 Whangaruru to Paradise Bay, New Zealand
Glenys woke up with a niggly ache in a tooth. A few months ago, she had an inflammation in the tooth and the dentist in Whangarei thought that he might have to give her a root canal. He gave her some anti-inflammatory treatment and the nerve seemed to calm down after a few weeks, so the dentist left the nerve in there and crowned it.
It’s been bothering her for a few days and she’s now worried that she’s going to have problems with the tooth, which would be a nightmare if we were in the outlying islands. We decided to get to Opua and organise a dentist appointment as soon as possible.
We upped anchor just after nine o’clock and had a pleasant trip over to the Bay of Islands. The wind was very fickle and we only had a few hours of sailing, having to motor sail the around the impressive Cape Brett and all the rest of the way to the Paradise Bay. This is another lovely anchorage with a few yachts already anchored here. I suspect that they’re all cruisers waiting for a weather window to head north, rather than locals who seem to give up sailing after Easter.
Glenys rang the only dentist in Opua, but can’t get an appointment until the 24th – oh well, the tooth isn’t painful and we’re not planning to leave New Zealand for a couple of weeks.
I took advantage of the clear water in the bay to snorkel down and look at the hull. The water was very cold and I was glad that I’d put on my 3mm full length wet suit. The hull doesn’t look too bad. I was worried that we’d have a lot of barnacles after spending 2½ months in Whangarei Town Marina, but the antifoul seems to have done a good job, with just a light covering of green slime over most of the hull.
The propeller however, was covered in barnacles and a few oyster clams. Also, the bottom foot of both the rudder and the keel were covered in barnacles. It looks like we’ve been sinking into soft mud at low tide and this has reduced the effectiveness of the antifoul. I spent an hour diving down to clean the worst off the propeller and the keel, but I gave up after an hour, because I’m still leaving behind small white calcium deposits from the bottom of the barnacles. If I don’t get these off and reveal fresh antifoul, then we’ll quickly get more growth on these deposits. So, unfortunately, I’m going to have to don a scuba tank and go back down tomorrow.