Tag Archives: town basin marina

Impactful Upgrades

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New Zealand means great friends, beautiful country, delicious food, amazing activities, and lots of boat work.  This third trip is no different – did a lot of little upgrades and lot of big upgrades that will have a huge impact to our daily lives.

This blog post will focus on the “little but powerful upgrades.”

Chart plotters at each Helm

Over the past 15 years we’ve sailed 70,000 nautical miles across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.  We’ve visited over 35 countries and truly love our boat/home. 

However, we have never had a chart plotter at the helm.  We’ve had a handheld Garmin 73 (with satellite and tracks), but no chart plotter.  We’ve had to either zip into the salon to see the multitude of charts on the navigation station or rely on Navionics on the iPad.  Not ideal, but it worked for us.

Finally, it was time to upgrade the helms.  The first thing we did was fabricate a new pedestal extension at each helm.  Each helm station has a pedestal and an additional small extension where our Garmin holder, Raymarine gauge, stereo remote, (2) anchor controls, a small control panel, and the IridumGo antenna lived.

Matt disconnected all of the gauges and instruments first. Then with loads of patience he removed the 5200 holding the back extension.

We cleaned up the front and back and removed the 5200 excess.  

Our friend, Ian on Tavake (a Catana 431) told us to use fabricator Scott Banks.  Super nice guy! 

Scott came out, took a bunch of measurements, gave us a reasonable quote, collected the pedestal extensions, and told us he’d be back in 2 weeks. 

Unfortunately it took way longer than 2 weeks, but we are very pleased with the final product (see below).

Chart Plotters

We purchased (2) B&G Zeus 9 Chart plotters from Marine Deals.  It took 6 weeks to get delivered and cost approximately $1400 USD each.

The other controls (small control panel allows us to turn on/off 6 items, stereo remote control, and (2) anchor controls will go on the new pedestal extension.

We had to move the existing Raymarine P70 gauge to a new Marine Pod mount which will sit to the side of each helm. 

Marine Pods for Raymarine Gauge

We could have made the pedestal extension large enough to accommodate all of our equipment.  However that would block the view from the helm seat. 

In order to keep the view we went with a smaller pedestal extension and a marine pod mount for the gauge.

We purchased (2) marine pod mounts to move the Raymarine Autopilot (ST60) gauges to the sides of the pedestals. 

The pods are called Seaview SP1BOX Marine Pod Kit . We bought them on ebay for $95 USD each

LC Hydraulics (Phillip) fabricated two mounting holders for the new PODs.  It took about 2 days and cost $855NZD.

The white square is the pod and the two holders are for each helm.

The new upgraded helm stations are amazing! 

With the new helm extension holding our chart plotters and our new pod’s holding our gauge!  

Purchasing and Contact Info:

  • Scott Banks, Fabricator, Whangarei, NZ +64.22.380.3972.  Fabricated the helm pedestal extensions and the window rain flashing
  • Chart plotters purchased from Marine Deals, www.marine-deals.co.nz
  • Raymarine gauge mount : Seaview SP1BOX Marine Pod Kit New Open Box Accessory Mount for GPS VHF Display purchased from eBay
  • Marine Deals +64 09 281 3150, www.marine-deals.co.nz, Auckland, NZ
  • LC Hydraulics, www.lchydraulics.co.nz/, +64.21.0285.5072

Design specs of the chart plotter that we used as a base for the helm pedestal extension.

Our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual events.  

We started working on these little upgrades as soon as we arrived in New Zealand (Oct.2025-Jan.2026).

These are just a few of the massive projects we completed. 

See our full list on our “Hauling out at Norsand Boatyard” blog post.

Hanging out with the Farm Animals

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It is so great to return to Whangarei, New Zealand!  We are back in our old stomping grounds, surrounded by wonderful friends in familiar grounds.

During our first few weeks we take the time to visit a variety of farm animals at our friend’s house.

Not sure my friend’s would call these “farm” animals but rather pets.  I will let you decide.

Sharron’s Sheep Sheering

Sharron has grown up around sheep her entire life.  She had a rather large flock a few months ago but ended up giving away her ram and 3 ewes.  Now she has one mother ewe, a young 1 year old ewe and two lambs.

The adorable lambs were about 6 weeks old when I visited.

Today, the two “older” ewes were getting a hair cut.  The two shearers had a fun time trying to capture the rambunctious ewes.  But once they were placed on their back they settled and became super docile!  Strange to watch their transformation.

The shearers start on the older ewe who has been to the salon many times before.  The younger ewe just sits and patiently waits.

Before and after her haircut.  Unfortunately, the wool is no longer worth anything here in NZ.  Too many sheep and too much wool.  Back in the day the wool was worth a lot of money and then over the years it slowly declined.

But at least the sheep are more comfortable in the warmer climates.

It was so much fun for me to see the sheep sheering.  I know it is super run of the mill for Sharron and the shearers, but for me it was a great life experience.

The Greystone Farm

Our friend Rob who owns RH Precision and has done a lot of work for Sugar Shack, invited us to his farm and home.  It is a short 30 minute drive from Whangarei but it feels like it is so much further away.  

There are sweeping, green hillsides, lots of farms, and beautiful ocean views.  Rob and his wife Hannah have a gorgeous octagon type house that has 2 levels and multiple bedrooms.  Simply gorgeous.

Hannah is a lover of everything animal!  She has a wide variety of farm animals (pets) all over the ranch.  Starting at the house she takes care of 2 fish tanks with incredibly unusual fish.

They have a beautiful rottweiler, a German shepherd, 5 guinea pigs and an EMU!  Yep, you read that right.  They have an emu named Wallace whom I got to hand feed. 

Wallace used to have a mate but she passed away.  Not he is happily enjoying his large enclosure to himself.  

Evidently, when one mate dies, the other typically dies shortly after.  But not Wallace.

Rob and Hannah also have 3 feisty donkeys and a retired race horse. All of them incredibly friendly and eager to meet the city girl.

True Farm Animals

Then came the “beef cows.”  Yes, all cows are beef.  But in NZ you name the cow beef cows when they are raised for slaughter (beef) or milk cows or breeding cows.

They had 5 young cows (a few months old) that were fighting for the food dish.  It was super funny watching them push each other around to get to the food.  Politely rude I called it.  I love these farm animals.

My favorite photos are the bottom two right where the one left out cow pokes his head around the others. 

Being a true “city girl” it was great fun to hang out with so many fabulous animals.  I feel so blessed to have met generous friends who share their variety of pets with me.

We were in Whangarei at Sharron and Rob’s house toward the beginning of November 2025.

Our blog posts run 4-6 weeks behind actual live events.

Did you read about our lovely stay at Whangarei, Town Basin Marina – check out the blog post.

Whangarei Town Basin Marina

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We are so thrilled to return to Whangarei and the Town Basin Marina!  We love it here!  

Evidently, we are not the only ones who love Whangarei as their moto is “Love it Here!”

Town Basin is a beautiful marina located in the heart of Whangarei.  Walking distance to restaurants, a few bars, grocery stores, marine stores, hardware stores, gift shops, and more!

Guests can utilize the Black Ball Yacht Club facilities for social hour, or hang out in the marina office with wifi, showers, toilets, laundry, and a book exchange.

The Town Basin Marina staff are absolutely amazing.  They are extremely knowledgeable, helpful, friendly, and resourceful.  You won’t get a better welcome than at this marina.

This is the lovely staff including Brian, Sharron, and Kara!

Several hundred boats berth here on either floating docks or pilings. We tend to go to the “catamaran” dock (see featured image).

The marina ends at the Canopy Bridge which lights up beautifully at night.  I love the reflection of the colored lights on our enclosure.

There can be a pretty high tide.  We saw 3 meter difference between low and high tide.

Don’t miss reading about how we celebrated Fiji Day in our last blog post.

Find Town Basin Marina on No Foreign Land.

Our blog posts run 4-6 weeks behind actual live events.

We were in Town Basin Marina from late October to early November 2025.  We sure do hate to leave, but it was time to haul out at Norsand Boatyard.