We find a beautiful and secluded spot called Uitoe Bay. It is just off the mainland of Grande Terre and in front of Ilot Mathieu.
Sugar Shack enjoys this sweet spot all to ourselves.
We had calm conditions despite the winds blowing between 20-35kts from the SE.
All around us are stunning turquoise waters.
Ilot Mathieu
We took the dinghy over to the neighboring Ilot to do some exploring. We anchored Sweetie on the north side of the island where there was a beautiful 3 mile stretch to wander.
There was not much of a “beach.” The shoreline was covered in rocks, coral, and shells.
Strangely enough, there were lots of cacti on the shoreline as well. This is the second place we’ve seen cactus by the shore.
It seems so out of place!
But even the cactus can’t take the beauty away from this little Ilot.
Another gorgeous day for sailing. Day break the wind started building, up go the sails and off to the races. A perfect 10-12kts from the west now. Everyone loves beam reach.. The light winds and direction change, means the seas were also very kind. Zoom Zoom on to New Zealand we go.
Drug the lines for a bit, until the boat speed was touching 8kts and above. Nothing small is going to catch the lure at those speeds and certainly didn’t feel like slowing down just to have to clean a fish, even with another Mahi being reported by boats behind us. 🙂
Final sunset.
The final sunset, was beautiful. We still had a long night and a time change to deal with. We lost 2 hrs, so our midnight arrival was really going to be 2am on Kiwi time.
Preparing quarantine flag for arrival, just before sunset.
As we were just approaching the BOI (Bay of Islands) the wind pipped up, which is opposite of normal. Normally it gets softer at near the bay, so that last bit of sleep was put on hold while speed was up. With the auto pilot still being a bit finicky it seemed prudent to be near the helm just in case he decided he needed break after 6 long days of 24/7 service. It was a good call, as he tried to take a break a few times during the final miles ..
Yellow “Q” flag, says we haven’t been cleared into country, immigration/ health / bio security/ customs.
Now that we were close enough, starlink data was full on, no longer billable by Gigabyte. I did a quick google search on the Autopilot issue, and the suspicion was correct, time for a new RAM or at least a maintenance project. It seems the ram is supposed to be sent into get serviced every 1000 hours, and with our 40,000 miles we were well past service at 8000 hrs, who knew. So guess what gets service/updated in NZ, and of course a spare brother picked up. If you have 2 on board, you’ll never need the spare, or so goes the theory.
Arrived dock at 2am, with next to no wind, perfect for negotiating the dock in the dark, spinning around 180 and getting tied up. By 3am we were settled, and finally had a cold beer before the ever too short sleep before customs / immigration / biosecurity arrived. Super efficient and we were cleared to leave the Q dock an hour after the process started. Time for some more work to rinse the boat and get a proper sleep.
Save a favorite Mongolian Pork for the final push to rid the fridge of the ‘forbidden’ items.
Interesting that the only thing Biosecurity needed to remove from us in the end was a salami that we purchased in NZ before leaving that was made in Christ Church NZ. No worries, all the officers said Christine was super organized, and made the process super easy/efficient and we were done within 1 hour.
Back in the land where we read the labels, and what’s not to love about Snaka Changi marketing.
Back to the regular scheduled posts that will no doubt have a different spin on the short daily stories.
5 days, 17 hours
900 miles.
Water-maker fitting and autopilot hiccups, or bad at all for an ocean passage. Hope the next one is just as sweet.
Getting closer and closer with every mile traveled, amazing how that works. It’s like math or something that’s just hard to explain. Another night done, we are still looking good for 2 more sleeps till officialdom.
A great day out on the blue highway, not a bit of traffic in sight, nary a cloud in the sky, nor a breeze to be found.
At daybreak changed over to running the port engine, giving starboard a much needed rest.
Sunrise
Another of those must finish foods breakfast lunch and dinner kind of days. Calories don’t count on passage, or at least that what the ubiquitous “they” have said. Last bit bacon gone, good thing they have more in NZ.
Lack of wind, did a proper flake of the mainsail, getting it all nice and tidy, knowing full well if the wind comes up that effort would be wasted. Started water maker, making some water. Some minutes later the engine room alarm was going off. The water maker burst a high pressure compression fitting. Tried to once to simply re-use the ferule, but it had seen better days, and fails as spectacular as the first time. A glorious water feature that would be a feature in a Las Vegas hotel. So had to locate the spares on board. Of course on passage, things get stowed, so this involved moving the toys around a bunch to get to the spares. And voila, just like that another accomplishment for the day. Made water for most of the day. With engines being run, there was plenty of warm water for nice outside shower and no further water feature.
Christine made more of special little army as we were running low, those little gingerbread men have ensured a safe comfortable passage.
So productive we are on calm sea days.
Friends on the boats behind us, took advantage of the calm weather to go swimming in the bottomless pool. Meanwhile around our boat were 100s if not 1000s of blue bottles floating on the surface. Since the water was glass they were easy to spot. I just hoping they wouldn’t get sucked up in the citizens of the sea torpedo. Blue bottles are what I would call Portuguese Man-o-War jelly fish, just much smaller. They still pop like bubble wrap when to step on them, but their will sting like crazy. So better to stay away and keep on trucking.
Blue bottle, zoom from a moving boat ain’t the the greatest picture
Drug the lines in the water after another report of a Mahi Mahi being landed. Ours must not be tasty, we did manage to get a big eye tuna close to the boat, had taken the lure on the hand line, but spit the hook with one last effort within 2 meters from the boat. 🙁
As the wind changed so did the temperature, we must be getting close. Was t-shirt and shorts all day till the sun about 4pm, Thats when the chill started.
Sunset, starboard must be going south.
150 more miles, arriving in the dark or early morning. Last remaining beers added to fridge for reward at destination.
Bacon 🥓 , sausage and bacon for breakfast, kitchen sink pasta with every fresh vegetable we have onboard and very last jalapeño sausage too.
