Engine trouble.....

Well the last week has been fairly uneventful, we sat out a bit of a blow at Kaiarara Bay, then had to move as the wind swung around and we were on a lee shore (the rocks were about 15 ft away). We motored over to Smokehouse Bay on the 23rd (my birthday) and on the way over we managed to catch a big Kahawai on the towing lure. So again we had fish for my birthday dinner, that is the 3rd year in a row that I have caught a fish on my birthday. No luck since then though.

After doing a load of washing and having a hot shower in the shower house we came back to Kairara Bay yesterday 26th. We went for a walk on the DOC tracks and then had a lovely bath in the river. Today we dinghied over to Port Fitzroy to get rid of our rubbish and get some butter & eggs.

The one thing that has happened, and we have been noticing it for a while is that the gear box on the motor is leaking oil, it was only small amounts, but it seems to be increasing. Paul had a look at the gear box and it looks as though a seal has gone around the gear lever. So in a week or so's time we have decided to head back to Whangarei to get the seal replaced. We try not to use the engine too much, but it is always best to have it in tip-top shape at all times. It will give me an opportunity to catch up with my Sister who will be visiting from Australia, and to buy a few more supplies.

The other thing that has been happening is the increase in the number of Pateke (Brown Teal) that we are seeing here at Great Barrier. Brown Teal are the rarest duck in the world, they have an established colony over in the Kaitoki Swamp on the other side of the Barrier, but their numbers seems to have gone up in Kairara Bay as well, this morning we spotted nine of them feeding in the shallows in the estuary. They also seem to like our dinghy, as they

come and perch on the side, they are so cute we don't want to scare them away, inevitably they leave little calling cards.

Its a small world

17th of February saw us motoring over to Matiatia Bay again to top up the tanks with water before we head for the Barrier. Ferry traffic was pretty intense, so after lunch we scarpered out of there and went around to Owhanake Bay. Owhanake Bay is a lovely anchorage, but very affected with swells from fast moving launches shooting past the entrance to the bay. We stayed on board and enjoyed a quiet night, until some "Jafas" (just another F....in Aucklander) decided to have a party on their launch and throw beer bottles over the side, etc, etc. I do generalise a bit which is bad, they are not all like that, well I hope not.

18th we motored away from Waiheke Island and the hubbub of Auckland, no wind today and none for the next few days, so we decided to motor all the way to the Barrier. 7hours of motoring on fairly calm seas it was pretty cruisy. We arrived at Smokehouse Bay at 1515hours, it was beautiful and the Kaka's were there.

19th We had 3 weeks worth of washing to catch up on, so off to beach at smoke house we rowed. The bay has laundry tubs, the old concrete variety, and wringers mounted on top of them, also there is fresh running water. Yachties paradise.

20th motored over to Kairaara Bay, towed the lure but we did not have any success. Inflated my christmas present, a kayak, and had a play around on it, then went into shore for a feed of cockles and mussels (alive alive oh). I made a clam chowder for dinner, Paul was really impressed, He is not really that keen on shellfish, but really enjoys a chowder.

Now to today, and the reason for the heading. We were sitting in the cockpit this morning having our usual coffee, when the expedition cruise ship "Orion" came in and anchored. Not long after a number of large inflatables left the mother ship and headed for Blairs landing (just around the corner from our anchorage), next thing one of the inflatables comes over to us. On board was Matt Jensen-Young the Chief Mate of the Orion, and a past crewman on Kabuki. Matt sailed with Ross the previous owner of Kabuki, from Seattle to Mexico. As I said what a small world, Matt was blown away to see Kabuki again. So Matt came over later for a coffee and a chat, and to get some photo's. He then asked us if we would like to look on Orion. Well we never miss an opportunity for adventure. So we clambered on board the large inflatable and were whisked away to paradise for a short while.

The Orion is a 5 star adventure cruise ship, it is Australian owned, and does trips to Antartica, the Kimberleys in Aussie, New Zealand, the Islands etc. It carries about 100 passengers and has 75 staff, as you can imagine it was very posh. Matt showed us the ship, he was actually really busy with sheparding the passengers etc. We got to check out the bridge, restaurant, lounge's, I now know what I have been missing all these years. The ship was due to leave at 11am, so we said goodbye and they took us back to Kabuki again. Unfortunately in our excitement we forgot our camera, so no photo's.

After that we walked over to Port Fitzroy, and low and behold the chippy shop was open today, so we had chippies for lunch and and icecream from the shop. Some days are just manna from heaven.

The whole story

On the 8th of February we decided to head to Waiheke Island, we have not had great past experience at Waiheke so we were a bit dubious about the whole thing. We motored over to the Island getting to Matiatia Bay at about 9.30ish. Matiatia Bay is where the Ferry from Auckland comes into the Island, so it can be very busy and congested. We were lucky though and found room to anchor. We walked into Oneroa one of the suburbs? of Waiheke, looking for a B'day present for our Daughter Hollie. Oneroa is the "Tourist spot" of Waiheke, all the shops, cafe's, restaurants etc were aimed at the tourist's, definitely not our scene. But we found a gift for Hollie and posted it off to her, then we had lunch, Chips :-) When we got back to the boat we filled the tanks up with water at the wharf and then scarpered out of there. We motored over to Patiki Bay and anchored up next to a buoy, we both questioned what the buoy could be for, but decided that we weren't too close. At about 5.30 (wine time) we discovered what the buoy was, it was the yacht racing mark for the local club, so after watching the first rounding of the mark at very close quarters, we upped anchor and moved away to a more quiet spot.

9th of Feb saw us rowing into Ostend, another suburb/village of Waiheke, we had been told there might be a laundry place, so we took our washing on the off-chance. Walking was pretty warm and it ended up being a few kilometres to the shops. The laundry place wanted to charge us $28 dollars a load ( get real) so we passed on that. We found the supermarket and bought some peaches, plums and meat then headed back to the boat.

10th Feb rowed into Shelly Beach hoping to experience Waiheke's famous wine tasting, vineyards etc. We walked up the hill to Goldwater Estate, we had to kill an hour because they opened at 12, we then went in the vines were pretty cool, but the charged $10 for 5 tastes of wine, and the cheapest bottles of Red were $28, so we gave that a miss as well. We rowed back to the boat and had a lovely homemade salad sandwich and a glass of Chateau Cardboard, way better value. We then motored over to Awaawaroa Bay (and yes that is how you spell it). We stayed in Awaawaroa Bay for 2 nights, we managed a feed of mussels off the rocks but then the wind picked up and kicked a chop on the 12th, so we motored around to Kauakarau Bay before breakfast. We went for a bush walk around the regional park, up to a place called the "Cascades", a very tame waterfall, was a lovely walk.

13th Walked around the shore track from Kauakarau Bay to Putiki Bay, when walking on the Te Whau road we found a Olive Oil place, so we stopped in for a gander. It was great, they had Alpacas which they shear for their wool and make garments from, and they also sell lovely Olive oil. We did a tasting (way better than wine) and bought a bottle. When we got home I made a loaf of Foccacia bread, and we had that for tea with the Olive oil, delicious. 14th We caught the bus over to Ostend to stock up for our trip to the Barrier, it was actually quite fun, and they have a great Bus service here. 15th We motored around to Patiki Bay again before breakfast as a roll had come in over night, we had breakfast, then walked up to Placemakers for a new bucket.

Now that brings us to today, we sailed off the anchor this morning (without any mishaps) and headed over to Motuihe Island, in the hope of seeing some of the Mega-yachts that are here for the Millenium Cup. Didn't see much of the yachts but had a lovely walk around some of the island, then back to Kabuki for a rest. It is almost wine time again, we will be able to sit here in the cockpit over looking Rangitoto island and the skyline of Auckland, bliss.

Catch up time

Paul and I motored out of Kawau Island on the 6th of February, we were a bit rusty on a few of the procedures for getting ready for a sail, we had a fail on the raising of the dinghy to the deck. But it all worked out in the end. We motored out to the Rosario Channel and then we put some sail up in the increasing SE wind, by the time we got halfway to Tiri tiri Matangi Island the wind had piped up to gusts of 30knots and the sea state had built up with the 1.5 metre swell with wind chop on top. We made it around Whangaparoa Peninsular without mishap and the sea's and wind died down to a more comfortable state. We decided to head up the Rangitoto Channel to Rangitoto Island for the night so we navigated our way through the maze of weekend fisherman, having to drop sail for safety purposes. We motored into Islington Bay by about 1615.

7th of Feb saw us scaling the heights of Rangitoto, and extinct Volcano just off Auckland. After a look from the summit and an explore of the Lava caves, we started the trek back to the boat via the coastal walk track, this took 2 hrs and was hot and rugged, so a swim was definitely called for when we got back.

The photo's show the mid point of the Lava cave that we went through, we had to have head torches for this, and the other is the track through some of the lava flows, which still do not have regenerated bush on them after 800 years.

Mansion House visit

Saturday 4th & Sunday 5th Feb.

Paul and I motored over to Mansion House Bay in Fatima at about morning tea time, hoping to explore more of the Reserve area. We tested out some walking tracks that we had not tried on our last visit. One of these was the Miners track to the old copper mine, going via the foreshore at low tide. It was a lovely walk with great views over toward Mahurangi. On arrival we noticed that DOC is re-instating some of the Pumphouse sandstone walls to stop further erosion by the sea. The Pumphouse was built in about 1854 when the coppermine was re-opened and tunneling was extended to seaward.

My Great, Great Grandfather came over to New Zealand from Cornwall in 1846 with His family, to Manage the copper mine on Kawau Island (see article in Rodney times). I love going there and imagining what it was like way back then, how hard it must have been for them. It makes you realise how easy we have it today, with our showers and electricity, washing machines etc.

Paul managed to get some photo's of the mine shaft at the Pumphouse, as you can see above it is flooded with sea water, the copper on the wall was an amazing blue.

After walking back to the Mansion House we lunched on the front lawn in fine style, and then boarded Fatima for the motor back through the "wind against tide" chop. I arrived back with a wet butt but very happy. We then had a visit from Marc on Obelix, who needed a hand with a winch repair, so over we went, Paul and Marc fixed the winch while I chatted to Dotta (i hope I have spelt that correctly). We had a lovely visit with them, it is amazing the people you meet out here. The wind has picked up again today, Sunday, so we have spent a quiet day on the boat. We had a swim/bath this morning, it was a bit bloody cold in the 25knot wind but very refreshing. This afternoon Paul spent about a hour watching the Spirit of New Zealand come into anchor in Bon Accord Harbour. The wind still blows. Here is hoping tomorrow it will dissipate some, as we hope to head for Waiheke Island in the morning.

We are away again

After racing around getting last minute supplies, saying goodbye to family, organizing my Mother, organizing our stuff at home, we are off. Paul and I left Whangarei on Wednesday 1st Feb, for another extended cruise along the Northland coast. With a forecast SW breeze of 15 knots we decided to head SE to Kawau Island about 60 nm from Whangarei. Luckily the wind proved to be more of a Westerly and it piped up to about 25 knots in the afternoon, before it turned S/SE. We managed the trip in 11 hours, averaging about 5.7knots, We had to motor the last 4 nm due to the wind being right on the nose as we came around Taketu Point into Kawau Bay. Kabuki handled the conditions beautifully, was a great first sail of the summer, and even better, I didn't get sick (always a bonus)

We anchored up in Bon Accord Harbour and settled down for a wine. Thursday was a rest day, recovering from our first sail for a while, and a Migraine that I developed after all the stress of leaving home for a extended period. Today the wind has been blowing about 20-30 knots from the East, with cloud and slight drizzle, so another rest day was called. But the outlook is better for tomorrow, with winds of 10knots predicted. So we will be off to explore the Island and do a bit of tramping around.