Time flies

Well a month has gone by without a posting but it seems like a couple of days to us. Yes we have been busy with sailing the last leg from Opua to Gulf Harbour which is 12 miles north of Auckland where we are moored on the same dock as last year but in a different berth which is just great. It is the first time in six years of doing this that we have ended up at the same place where we left. We did a big circle of four thousand or so miles up to the islands as they call the south pacific group of Fiji, Vanuatu, and New Caledonia. We had a great time and it is nice to be back in New Zealand where we have a car and know where the supermarket is as well as a number of people and services where we can get things done. Really we don't have much to do on the boat this year as we did most major things last year so only need minor adjustments now. This will allow us to do some travelling around on land for a change and hope to visit the south island in January and February.

We spent just a few days in Gulf Harbour before flying over to Sydney to visit Marians sister who lives in Cronulla. She has three young children and are doing a major renovation on their house. This was not a problem because we have friends, who are sailors, that have moved back on land and live close by and kindly invited to stay with them. It is quite amazing the close bonds we make living on the ocean. The kindred spirits seem of us yachties are wonderful and seeing Ray and Brenda after four years was like we saw them just yesterday. They live in an enchanting area with parakeets landing on your hands and head with Cockatoo's and Kookaburra all around. We had a wonderful time catching up and look forward to seeing more of them next year hopefully sailing with us on one of the legs. We spent five days in Aus before flying back to Vancouver.

We arrive back here on November 29th and started what now seems like a big blure. It was off the the dentist, doctor, eye doctor etc. Two days after we left for Calgary where we spent four days with our daughter and newest grandson Liam who is just starting to walk so lots of fun. Back in Vancouver it has been more shopping and medical stuff (nothing bad just routine stuff) and visiting family and friends. We have had Andrews house for the last week as they all are off to Mexico for a quick sun break so it is different for us to be in a house. The big screen TV is something we are not used to but it is pretty neat. We will go back down to our power boat called also Kilkea,where we will live on, until we head back to New Zealand in January. Kilkea here has electric heat as well as a furnace so it is very comfortable and at least there is some movement in bed to rock us to sleep.

That sort of catches us up for now. As everyone is at this time of year we will be busy with the family and all our friends here and it will be just a blink before we are back in New Zealand enjoying the warm weather and seeing all our cruising friends.

We wish everyone a Very Merrry Christmas.

New Zealand

Hello all. We have survived another passage and are now in Opua New Zealand. We left the Isle of Pines on Tuesday morning and had a good sail for five and a half days arriving here on Sunday evening. The winds were as we had hoped and on average were in the 20-25 knot range with seas that were not too big.
Here in Opua they, the local enterprises, companies and local government have a week long party to welcome the international cruisers to the country. There is a big marquee in the parking lot with lots happening all day and dinners and drinks in the evening. Marian has been at a vineyard wine tasting for the afternoon and tonight is pizza night with local entertainment. Never a dull moment in this cruising life. I would say on average we are out socializing with friends old and new at least five nights a week. The thought of coming home and living on the land is rather scary for us as we are much more active here that we would there. Oh well it does not matter as we have the house rented for another two years  and have cruising plans beyond that. We know it is a tough life and get no sympathy from any of you.

Our plan now is to sail the boat down to Gulf Harbour where we will leave her and fly over to Australia and then back to Vancouver for Christmas. We should be home by December 1st and we hope we will be able to visit all of you in Vancouver and Calgary then.

Isle de Pins

We are back in this most beautiful island enjoying a quiet time and waiting for what we call a weather window so we can set off to New Zealand. We could go pretty much anytime this week but are waiting for the perfect window which of course we will never manage to do but enjoy it here so it is tough to leave. So will open another bottle of wine and enjoy a few more sunsets which are perfect from here. We have not had temperatures below 25C for a long time and looking at the NZ weather we will be needing shoes, socks and sweathers. When we do get down to NZ we will be heading back to Canada and hope to be there at the end of November so that will be very cold for us. Today is Halloween and we have talked to three of our grand children, two who are old enough to be very excited about going out trick or treating. I imagine that they will be rather wired tomorrow with all the candy.  I will try to remember to let you know when we leave as it will take us five or six days to complete the passage.

Back in Noumea

bring the baguettes home in Lifou

Floating on air in Ovea

Marian on the beach with no one on it

Dinghy floating behind Kilkea

Yes another sunset

From the Isle du Pines we sailed up the east coast of New Caledonia stopping for a couple of nights at anchorages that were pristine. We were the only boat in sight with no trafic on the radio's either. We were going north so that we could visit the Loyalty islands which are sixty miles or so off the east coast. We first went to Ouvea which has the best beach we have seen anywhere in the South Pacific! Miles and miles of white sand beaches with no oe on them except the occasional turtle. It reminded me of Grand Cayman 45 years ago but a longer beach. We spent a week there swimming and just relaxing. There were a few other boats around who we knew so still lots of happy hours. The next island is to the south of Ovea called Lifou and is more of an island rather than the atoll that Ouvea is. Here we enjoyed a little more civilization with nice walks and fresh baguettes daily. Lots of big turtles here and we enjoyed just watching them all around the boat at anchor.

We then did an overnight passage back to Prony Bay on the south end of New Cal and spent a few days at different anchorages. We did a walk up to a light house with great views over the south lagoon which is the biggest in the world. There are a number of lovely islands around that had resorts on them but for whatever reason most of these are deserted with everything still inplace in the buildings including dishes and furniture. I guess the economic downturn combined with what people now demand of resorts put most of these out of business. We think New Caledonia is little known to the world and so far away that they do not have that many tourists.

We came back to Noumea and the marina and are enjoying some more time in town. We watched the final of the Rugby with a bunch of New Zealand friends last night and were relieved that NZ won as the country needs some good news after the earthquakes earlier this year.

Right now we are waiting for a weather window that will allow us to sail down to NZ. You have to go pretty much straight south towards Norfork island and then turn east as the winds change. There is a huge change going from the tropics to the more temperate regions. It seems the dividing line is around 30 degress south where the weather changes. This seems to create confused seas and is generally not a pleasant passage. Hope we guess right.

Kilkea at anchor in Ilot Mato

A beautiful islet.

This is five miles from shore surrounded by reefs

View from Pic N'ga

yachts at anchor

Marian feet sinking into the soft sand

Wow what a beach

Sails in the sunset

If you look close you will see a sleeping whale and her calf

and you wonder what we do all day out here!!

Anne up the mast on Callisto

view from up the mast

Isle des Pins

We are at one of the most beautiful islands we have seen in all of the South Pacific. More on this later but will tell you first how we got here.

We spent two and a half weeks in Noumea where we had a great time with friends from other boats. It is a great little town with all sorts of culture and great walks. We did a lot of these with s/v Callisto, and s/v Tahina walking miles to visit the aquarium and the zoo plus the local museums and shows. We managed a good number of dinners and lunches out at great reasturants along with many evenings having happy hours that went on until close to cruisers midnight which is nine pm as that seems to be as long as any of us can last. Marian got a good checkout by the doctors and she is now certified to sail on for another few years.

On Sepember 16 three of us left Nouema for a little islet called Ilot Mato. This is a small uninhabited island surrounded by reefs out in the lagoon that surrounds New Caledonia which is itself in the largest lagoon in the world. We motored most all the way and after five hours we, s/v Callisto, s/v Tahina, arrived working our way through reefs into an anchorage that would appear to be wide open except for the reefs. The colours of the water were just amazing with great clarity so a swim was in order before another get together to watch the sunset. We stayed the next day and enjoyed dinghing around the reefs walking about on the island and swimming in sapphire gin coloured waters. What again, you guessed it another happy hour this time on Kilkea. Well someone has to do this sort of stuff.

The next morning we upped anchor at 0830 and headed off carefully avoiding the reefs to the Isle des Pins or the Isle of Pines. We had a lovely sail as the seas are flat in the logoon with little swell. On the way we saw humpback whales breaching and blowing. About two miles from Isle dis Pins we had to alter course as we came across a mother and baby whale asleep on the surface fifty meters ahead of us. It looked to us that the baby maybe had just been born. When the whales sleep they are hard to see as they do not put out much breath so the spout of water is very small compared to when the whales are moving about. We arrived into this beautiful anchorage and for a change we all stayed aboard and had a quiet evening.

The next day was a slow day as we got our bearings with a good walk sight seeing one of the most beautiful bays we have seen. The beach is pure white and has the consistancy of flour and the colours!! We resumed our sundowners on Tahina, played a scrabble game and made it home in time to go to bed.

On the 20th we did a climb up Pic Na'ga which is the highest spot on the island. It took us two and a half hours to walk, (climb) up and an hour down. The views were just amazing and will try to enclose some with this blog. If you want to see some real good photos go to tahinaexpedition.com and look at their pictures that they provide to Google. Frank and Karen were the originators of the Google blog and know all sorts of neat stuff. It was a wonderful walk/hike and we finished off in one of two hotels here with a few beers and late lunch.

Again we had to get together to watch the sunset which always puts on a good show and again for some strange reason miss dinner.

Callisto left early this morning heading back to Noumea as Anne is flying out to visit their pregnant daughter in England. Michael is having crew arrive and will then head for Sydney so we will not see them until next year somewhere up on the Great Barrrier Reef.

After they left Marian and I along with Ken and Lori off s/v Trim, and Graham and Sheri off s/v Serenity all went aboard Tahina, which is a big catamaran,50 feet, and sailed out five miles to anchor and then take two dinghies five more miles to a small islet in the middle of a reef system to the south of us called Nokanhui. On one of the three islets is a sand bar that is truely one of the most beautiful south seas scenes we have encountered. After a day out in the sun and sand everyone just had a quiet evening just waiting for cruisers midnight to arrive so we could call it a day.

Isle des Pins

Breaking news

I think I have mentioned that a fellow yachtie from England that we met back in the San Blas island who is a writer has just had his first book published as an e book with Amazon. It will be out in paperback in October. The name is A Man Out Of Time by Peter Bernfield.

The interesting about Peter is he sometimes has a little black cloud flying around him. If there is going to be a problem it will be with him on his boat, a catamaran, called Troutbridge. He managed to drag anchor in the Tuamotu island in French Polynesia and went on a reef. They managed to float it off having only put a few small holes in one hull. He managed to get it all fixed up in Papeette and continued down to New Zealand last November. In May he left with a lot of us to sail up to Fiji. He is by himself and takes crew on from time to time but is not at all good at picking them. The crew up to Fiji was a gal who decided she was going to sleep all the way. So Peter was sailing into Suva at night and being very tired had a cat nap and sailed onto another reef. This time it took two weeks to get it off and it sunk completly with two six to eight foot holes in both hulls. After the French Polynesia experience the insurance was too much for him to afford so he had no insurance and now is trying to rebuild the boat.

If anyone is interested they could help him a lot by buying his book.

He has a blog which he updates three or four times a week and is an interesting read.
blog.mailasail.com/troutbridge

New Caledonia

Hello all,

We are now in Noumea in New Caledonia. When we left Fiji we joined a New Zealand rally group of 18 boats and sailed 500 miles over to Vauatu arriving in Esprito Santo island and stayed in Petersen lagoon beside a resort called Oyster Bay island. It was a very pretty resort but the operators were less than helpful or friendly. Fortunlatly they did have internet and we managed to get a lot of business done and were there for a week. Vanuatu bills itself as being the friendly islands but our experience is the opposite with the people always trying to charge you for everything even walking on a beach!! After Fiji this was not at all to our liking. Also being with the group of boats some of whom we have no idea how they got this far, was not to our liking at all. So after a week the group went one way and we another sailing south to the capital Port Vila. Again this place is dirty with nothing that held any interest for us. So after two weeks we left and did a two night passage south to New Caledonia.

Arriving at Noumea the capital was a very pleasant experince. Not only is the views and country that we saw sailing in very pleasing but so were all the officials we had to deal with at the marina. No problems and everything done correctly in a very efficant French way. No charges at all compared to Vanuatu which cost us close to $300 for the formalities. The city is clean and we feel like we are back in the first world and will be staying hear for a couple of months. The climate is very different from all places we have been in this year. The temperature is cooler and dryer. It is much more livable as you are not continually sweating. The prices are higher here as well but all is French and the food is fantastic. The wine and cheese with baguettes are fast becomming a nightly tradition much the same as we had most of the time in Europe. Lots of fun with lots of good people to enjoy time with. We are starting to have a big meal a lunch and then just snacks in the evening. I will update some more fun stuff soon but just wanted to get this update published.

In Port Denarau

Hello,

I finally put some pictures up on the blog as we are in Nandi now and have good internet. This is the first time in two months so we are pretty excited. We have had some parts flown in from France which arrived and we have now fixed our grey water pump. Also our am/fm/CD player is being repaired in Nandi and is ready for pick up today. They had to re solder the mother board!! If we were home it would have been a throw away for sure.

It is really strange being back in civilization. Lots of noise and restaurants and bars and we are thinking why do all these people enjoy this so much. Maybe we have gone a bit to native! We are going to go over to Suva on Saturday and come back on Sunday so will actually sleep onshore for a night and that hasn't happened for many months. We are going over there, which is a four hour bus ride each way, to see our friend Peter, who crashed his boat on the reef into Suva and spent two weeks getting it off. It sounds like it will take him a year or so to get it fixed and he had no insurance! He is a writer who has just signed his first publishing contract. I guess writers need to go through as many tough times as possible to have the material to use in their craft. We will let you know when the book comes out. I imagine it will be first an e-book but don't know at this point.

We will be here until Monday when we go to Musket Cove for the week and then will check out of Fiji and sail off to Vanuatu which is six hundred miles to the west. We do not know what will await us there but we do know it has a lot of malaria so have all the drugs to take to keep us healthy. The last bug bite I got has taken three weeks and two bouts of antibiotics to get under control so I am going to be very careful when in Vanuatu.

We hear summer has finally arrived on the west coast so hope you are all enjoying the warm days.

Fiji July 29th

pictures of Fiji

Big feast at Kia island

at anchor in Kia

our hike up to the top of Kia to see the cannon

View of the reefs from on top of Kia

going to church on a Sunday morning

A normal market scene

Marian trying to get an internet connection!!

House on Rambi island

outrigger with a tarp for a sail

internetting under a palm tree!!

Another beautiful sunset. Yes we are spoiled!

Marian and Pam playing

up a creek for a swim in fresh water

dinner being prepared

cooking in the ground

A bamboo raft that the Fijians use to get out to the reefs which are miles offshore

Kilkea anchored in Savusavu

Vanua Levu

July 13th

Yes we are still alive and well. We
have gone rather native here in Fiji on the island of Vanua Levu with us being
out of touch for weeks at a time. Rather nice to not know what is going on in
the world.

We spent a week in most places we have
been rather than running around sailing every day. A week in Viani bay with 8
other yachts. We went out on a power boat, a Nord Haven 62, with about 15
onboard to the reef which is about 4 miles from the anchorage to do some diving
and snorkelling. Beautiful corals and lots of fish. The village in the bay has
about five buildings and the school which kids(45) arrive to in the morning via
boat. They had a Lovo which is a dinner that is all cooked in the ground for us
yachties. Usually these sorts of things which are fairly common in the south
pacific islands are fun but the food is bad. Fortunately this one was the
exception with the food wonderful.

Next we moved to the north end of
Taveuni Island where we had a big celebration on one of the catamarans who were
celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary. It is amazing how many people cat
can accomodate. I think we had 16 or more onboard. You couldn`t do that on any
of the monohulls. The next day 11 of us loaded the local bus to go around the
east side of the island. Well the road which was paved ran out after a mile
then turned into a track full of potholes and whatever for about 25 miles until
mercifully it came to an end. Actually the views on the road were beautiful as
we were along the shoreline most all the way. We did go by some small villages
which were clean and tidy and everyone waves and smiles and calls bula to you.
The bus is a 1930`s machine with open windows that have a tarp to pull down in
case of rain. When it rains here it really rains and if inside one of these
things it is really hot. At the end of the road we went for a walk which was an
hour and forty five minute each way. It was mostly along the shoreline with
bananas, lemons, papaya etc all along the way. Towards the end we turned up a
canyon following a river up to a pool of clean fresh water. We swam up through
two pools and into a caldron with two waterfalls. It was wonderful to just
soak! At least we got some of the salt out of us. When we got back to the end
of the road where there was a village we had arranged to have a couple of vans
pick us up for the return journey. Well the old bus was bumpy but the vans with
no suspension were a lot worse. After that trip back eight of headed to a bar
reasturant, sort of for beers and something to eat. I think we drank them out
of beer!! Did I ever mention that yachties drink a lot of beer.

So after six or seven days, that is
always hard to keep track of, we set off for Rambi island. This island was
given to the Banaban people of Ocean island in the Gilberts around 1945 as
their island was mined for phosphates to the point where they dug everything up
and the sea invaded, sinking there island. Great planning eh!! Anyway Fiji gave
them this island and another for their use and ownership. Today the people here
are Gilbertese and they still use their language on a day to day basis as well
as some English. They are smaller people than the Fijians and a lot shyer. We
were anchored in Albert cove which is picture perfect and could grace any
yachting magazine. We stayed here for about 10 days as the weather kept us
there, which was fine for us as in the bay all was well with happy hours on one
of the six boats each night and more beer! I did say it is hot down here.

Finally we all left Albert cove, three
of us going around to the north side of the island and the other three heading
back around the south. As chance would have it all of us going north were
Canadian boats from Vancouver and Victoria. We had a good sail, the first in a
long time, and arrived through a pass in a reef to a very low lying island
which we got some shelter from the 20k wind that was blowing. Around here you
need to have good light to navigate the reefs which go out seven miles
offshore. The charts are marginal at best so you need to be looking out
carefully. The next morning two of us went outside of the reef and then
re-entere where we had better charting and worked our way past Labasa, the main
town on Vanua Levu, to a small resort of Palmlea. Once inside the passage we
found we could connect to the internet sort of. So for about two hours Marian
fumed about the connections coming and going. Anytime we get an attachment our
mail bogs down and then fails and we have to start the whole procedure again only
to have it happen again.I know how sorry you feel for us!

Palmlea resort was great as the owners
Joe and Julie had been cruisers and know what we need. Beer!! Yes we were
running dangerously low. The resort has just six bures and will accommodate
only twelve people and it is lovely. We ran a tab and had some dinners and
lunches with them. They took us to town, about a half hour drive, three times
to do shopping and for John and I a trip to the dentist. The doctor was an
Indian Fijian and very good I think. At least the cost of repairs was
inexpensive. At Palmlea they have a lap pool that the girls enjoyed and on July
1st they did us proud with a big Canada Day dinner party joined by two other
Australian couples and a good time was had by all. An interesting story about
one of the couples Bernie and Evelyn on a boat called Australia 31. When we
were in Tahiti last year around this time we heard Bernie put out a may day
call on route to Raiatea as Evelyn had passed out. The long and short of it she
was medivaced to Tahiti where it was discovered she had a stroke. It appeared
she had had it. What happened was Bernie had her medivaced to Australia where
he was told she would not make it and that the doctors wanted to pull the plug.
So he and his two daughters decided to do that but when they went in to tell
the doctors they were told that she was responding. Fast forward to Fiji a year
later and here we are having Canada dinner with them. Amazing and did I mention
that she has cancer and he is doing her chemo onboard their boat. I think that
they are a little crazy as we would stay home but it what she wants and they
plan to sail the boat to Australia this fall.

After a week at Palmlea we went out to
Kia Island which is only about 10 miles away and out on the edge of the reef.
Now this is like going back a hundred years. There are four hundred people
living on this island with three villages. When you arrive you have to do what
is called sevusevu where you present yourselves to the chief and give him a
gift which is kava. The women do most all the work in Fiji and the man drink
kava all the time. Just like us but we like beer better and our women seem to
like it as well so that puts us one step ahead of them. Just kidding. We are
just the two Canadian boats here and Marian and Pam went to Sunday church
services at one of the villages. They ended up sitting and standing for a
couple of hours, no chairs, and got an invitation for lunch for all of us at
the third village on the island. It was a big affair with at least 30 sitting
cross legged on a matting with plates in front of us with a huge layout of
food. As you would expect lots of fish and plantain, cassava, curried pork and
greens. All very good but after an hour sitting cross legged our back were
giving out. Pam was laid up for two days after this. This was an unusual feast
as it was in remembrance of one of their villagers who was lost while fishing.
They found the boat and nothing else. So it was their way of celebrating one`s
life.

When we arrive at any of these
outlying villages we find we are surrounded by the children which is a lot of
fun and then the head man will ask us if we can help them do something. These
people seem to know nothing of anything mechanical or electrical but somehow
will have a big screen tv but no electricity to run it let alone a station.
John on Passages is great with this stuff and fixed a starter motor on a
fishing boat, with no radio or safety gear onboard which was towed here by
another yacht as they we drifting for the Solomon island a few thousand miles
away. Next we tried to fix a water tank that had a foot long break in it. We
left before we knew if our patch work would hold but hopefully it will. The
next thing that happened was one guy asked if we could fix his portable generator
a little Yamaha. The problem was the fuel had dirt in it and needed to be
cleaned but as soon as others saw us helping with this one two other generator
showed up that did not work. All of these generators are new but no one here
knows how an engine works or how to fix it or anything electrical. They also
have no money so cannot pay to have them fixed so when a yacht arrives it is a
big day for them as they know we can fix some things and have spare parts. It
keeps us busy but it does at times get too much.

Onward to the Yasawas which are an
island group on the north west side of Viti Levu. This was an overnight passage
of 100 miles for us as we needed to be here with good light to anchor. The
passage was fine but was blowing hard when we arrived. The day before we left
Kia Marian and I with the village head man hiked up to the top of the island
where there is an 1800 something cannon! This climb was on no trail so we were
bushwacking and most of the time on all fours climbing mostly straight up. I
think I said it is hot here but now this is really hot. The view from the top
was fantastic with all the reefs going from horizon to horizon. When we ever
get online with a good connection I promise I will add a bunch of photos. The
way down was not much better with Marian going down backwards most all the way.
On this hike I got a bug bite that by the time we got here my foot was getting
rather swollen so now am on some strong antibiotics and told to sit with my leg
up with no swimming and worst of all no BEER. Oh well a few days will probably
be good for me.

I will try to do better with the blog
but no promises.

Back in the Tropics

Hello and yes we are still alive and well.

We did finally left New Zealand. I know a lot of our cruising friends will think us really crazy when we left on Friday the 13th! Their is a superstition that one should never leave a port on a Friday but where it stems from I do not know. For us we had a relatively good passage of seven and a half days with winds of 20-30 knots for most of the way and they were helping us most of the time but not always. We did have some thunder storms and squalls to work our way through along with lots of heavy rains. It is one of the less desirable passages to or from New Zealand as one is going from the tropics to the temperate zones of the planet which does cause winds and seas to be moving all over the place.

We arrived in Savusavu which is a small little town of maybe 500 and have stayed here for the last 12 days just relaxing and enjoying time with all our friends new and old. It has been very social as most all of the boats have arrived in from New Zealand and not everyone had as easy a sail as we had. This translates into meeting at the yacht club around 4 or so and then greeting all the new arrivals, having a few drinks and then off to dinner with about ten plus every night going out to one of the restaurants. Marian is really liking it here as she is not have to cook as it is just as cheap to eat out as to cook it yourself. We are having great dinners for about $15 for two with drinks and dessert! We may never leave.

Our plan is to sail around Vanua Levu counter clockwise and just stop here and there as we go with no plans of moving the boat more than four hours at any one time. We plan to be here now through the beginning of August when we will head to Vanuatu. We miss the summer that you all will be having but will just have to put up with the winter weather here in Fiji

Back in the Tropics

Getting ready to set sail

We hauled Kilkea out of the water on Thursday and found only the propeller was fouled so we cleaned that and as the bottom was clean and had lots of paint left on we relaunched and went back to the dock. Friday through Sunday were wet and windy as part of a cyclone blew by. Now is Monday and the sun is making a reappearance with the temp around 20C so pretty good. There are probably 60 yachts waiting for the weather to be right for their journeys north. It will be interesting when everyone leaves as we all are waiting for the same weather. It looks like Friday may work but we will wait a couple more days before making a decision on that. Otherwise all is well the boat is provisioned!! We have enough food and stuff on board to last a long long time!! It seems every time you do a passage you end up going back to the stores and buying more and more until you almost need to repaint the water line.

Opua New Zealand

Hello we are back in New Zealand arriving back from Canada on the 16th of April. We had a busy three weeks at home with work but manage time with the children and grand kids. We watched as Hudson took his first steps and how delighted he was. We took Eamon and Callum out on their bicycles while we walked and managed a trip to Calgary to see Liam who is nine months old now and getting more interesting. Elise, was the princess as always. We were very busy and the whole trip was a bit of blur.

We left Gulf Harbour after a week of finishing off most all of our boat projects and motor sailed up to Opua in the Bay of Islands where we met many of our cruising friends and have been socializing late into the night since being here. I even won a bottle of wine playing darts at the Cruising Club. Today is the 28th and we are hauling Kilkea out of the water this afternoon to have the bottom and propeller cleaned and painted. We will be out of the water for the weekend and hope to go back in on Monday. Not much fun out of the water as we will be living on board and will have to go up and down a ladder! Also the boat yards are not the cleanest places to be.

Next week we will start looking for weather window for our sail up to Fiji which should take us six or seven days as long as we get decent weather. It will be nice to get back to the tropics and warm waters.

Back in Canada

Hello we are home for ten days and then back down to Auckland and start our sailing again up to Fiji. We had a great time with Larry and Elaine doing some sailing and some driving around the country. I will update the information when I have some time.

March in New Zealand

Hello, We are still in Gulf Harbour and have been busy the last two weeks with all our boat projects. The list is getting shorter but there is always something more to do.

We needed some down time after the grandsons left the boat with there parents so had a few days of doing very little. Then we caught a cold somehow and are now recovering from that. On Tuesday the 08th of March we have Larry and Elaine arriving from Vancouver for a holiday so we will be doing some sailing as well as some land based travel to see the sights. We plan to go out to Great Barrier Island for a few days then maybe do some tours of the vineyards. Its is very nice for us when our friends arrive as we can really catch up which is something that never really happens when we go home as we are so busy.

This last week or so has reinforced our decision on our sail plan for the year. It will add a year to our overall plan but with the pirate attacks on yachts in the area between India and the Red Sea an extra year may help the world to get this problem under control. All the yachties are most concerned and are all reevaluating their travel plans. We have talked to a British crew and they are shipping their boat back to Europe via the Panama Canal. Another yacht here is sending all their female crew home and are hiring mercenaries fully armed to take the boat up through the area at great expense. A number of shipping companies are adding dates where one can have there boat shipped through the Red Sea and up to the Med. These are out of Puket, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Mombi so you have a choice as to how far you want to sail. Seeing as our plans now would be to transit this area in either 2013 or 2014 we will have to wait and see if anything changes. We are not holding our breath on this changing anytime soon. Sailing back the way we came would be against the trade winds and currents so not too good. We could go north either up through Hawaii or to Japan then up to Alaska. Not what we want to do though but we will keep all options open. Any way for now we will just keep enjoying New Zealand and look forward to moving up to the islands at the end of April.

New Zealand

Liam and Granddad

Callum and Eamon helping Granddad sail Kilkea

Andrew and Eamon

Eamon and Callum at a waterfall NZ

Grandad and Hudson at Christmas

I know I know that I have not posted anything for a long time and have heard the complaints.

Well here we are on the 20th of Feb and will try to catch up on our travels.Marian and I both arrived back in Vancouver on December 12th. Marian from Ireland and me from New Zealand. Marian was exhausted and is just now starting to catch up.

Christmas was great as we were living in a house that our friends Henning and Linda lent us for the month and we were able to entertain some friends and the family. We had our daughter and husband over from Calgary for three weeks with our youngest grand son Liam who was four months old at that time. We were very busy with the family coming over a couple of times. We had five grand kids and their parents and uncle Nick over a few times for dinners. It was great to connect with all our friends again and catch up on their lives. The five weeks we were home went by in a flash and we only managed to do half the things we had on our list.

We came back to New Zealand via Sydney mid January a week ahead of Andrew, Lindsay and the two boys arrival. We had a great time with the boys running all around the boat causing me much concern that they didn't start moving sails or starting the engine and other such stuff. They had a lot of fun swimming around the boat and hiking up trails to waterfalls and playing on the beaches. Andrew and I got in a couple of rounds of golf and we did some land tours to visit Lindsay's aunt and uncle so were very busy every day. We bought a Mitsubishi six passenger mini van so we could all fit. It is a 1998 model and we hope to lasts a few more months.

Reflecting on the year 2010 we feel rather numb as we did so much with the sailing and then loosing both of our mothers and having two new grand sons that it is going to take a while to get our batteries recharged. We will have to go back up to Vancouver at the end of March for a week to take care of more estate stuff of my mothers which limits our ability to really see this country. We have changed our travel plans as a result and now will leave here around the beginning of May and sail up to Fiji, Vanuatu, New Caledonia and then back here to New Zealand arriving back here around the end of October. This will entail moving Kilkea II about four thousand miles which is now a short distance for a year after what we have been doing for the last five years! Wow it is hard to believe that we have been at this that long! I guess the saying that time flies when you are having fun is true. We feel that it would be just too much to sail all the way to Singapore this year so we will defer that for a year.

We are enjoying it here as the people are very relaxed, the scenery is pleasant and the language is English!! So with two summers here should get to know the county reasonable well.

We hope to have most of the boat projects done in a week or so. So far we have had all the manifolds on both the main engine and generator fixed up and the engines gone over completely with a few surprises, as always, found and fixed. Much better here that when we really need them. The new seat cushions for the cockpit are here and they should be starting the new bimini top this week? The electrician is finishing up after we installed a 3000 watt inverter and a new brain for the charging system through the alternator. Also this week our new genoa sail should arrive along with 100 meters of new anchor chain. That should take care of the majority of fixes that need to be done for the next few years. Our feeling is that if you do not take care of the boat she will not take care of you so we should be in pretty good shape. Well no promises on the next update but I will try to do better.!?