Navire's blog

Passage to Ono June 13 Janet "This is like being in the Sounds, only warmer," I said to David as another howling gust slewed Navire around on her anchor.
"Yeah, but we're not on a mooring," he replied, as he set the anchor alarm on the GPS in case we dragged in the night.
*** "The gribs show 20 knots south east, 2.5 metre swell, and showers." I relayed.
Gribs are surface pressure charts with arrows that show wind direction and velocity.
We'd had enough of Suva Harbour, engines running all night, diesel streaked water, ships weaving their way through anchored yachts, and grey muggy weather. We were ready for the tropical experience, sunshine, turquoise water, diving, swimming. The social life had been good in town, regular drinks with other cruisers and a meal out, but many boats had headed off to outer islands, time to go. Shopping done, fueled up, my cold in abeyance, the only thing to sort was the weather.
*** "Is it light out there yet?" David called from the V berth, rudely awakened by the alarm.
"No, but it will be by the time we tie everything down," I said.
As David wound the anchor up, half expecting it not to budge having perhaps wrapped itself around some rusting old car body, he called for a bucket. The snubber line and anchor buoy line were coated in slime threatening to sully the decks. Suva's last gift to us.
We motored out through the coral pass in the grey dawn. David has a penchant for famous last words. Outside the harbour the boom was slatting as we motored over large swells, no wind in our sails.
"I'm really concerned we are going to have to motor all the way." He said grimly.
I just laughed. The first of these prophecies that he lived to regret was when he uttered the words "Looks like we are in for a trouble-free trip," on our delivery trip bringing Navire down the east coast from Auckland in 2007. The following day we encountered 70 knots of wind off Palliser Bay (64 is hurricane force), got towed in to Wellington by Lady Elizabeth (police boat), and ended up featuring on Coastwatch.
Sure enough a few miles off Vita Levu the wind rapidly rose to 20 knots, 25, 30 and peaked at 40 just north of Kadavu, five hours later. It was grey all day and wet in frequent squalls. Waves splashed over the boat, mostly missing us as we huddled under the dodger, a miserable pair singing to keep our spirits up.
I actually reefed, twice (did the cabin end). There is hope for me yet as a useful crew-member. The wind kept shifting left and right making it hard to keep our course.
Not far out of Suva our navigation computer went down. I hadn't set up a back up route on my Mac, the second of our three computers, normally standard practice.
Now me and going below were not compatible, but David wasn't 100% either, so I took a deep breath and went below to enter the route and connect the laptop to the GPS. I had to scramble for the rail a couple of times but finally it was heartening to see Navire trucking across the screen, faithfully following her route.
Now ideally you navigate coral reefs in full sunlight so you can see the various colours that indicate depth. Brown is not a good colour, brown with foaming is definitely not good. We stared at the wall of gray where the chart said Ono was. It appeared and disappeared in squalls. Bloody hell we were going to have to trust the GPS completely, which they say you should never do. Just outside the reef I had the inspired idea of copying the coordinates of a track someone had given us, from another computer, onto the Mac. As we were entered a bay on the east side of Ono the cloud lifted and we could see the island. At least we wouldn't bump into that.
Anchor down, engine off. I was completely buggered. Encrusted with salt, I stripped off and wiped down. I heated up leftovers, threw in an instant curry and ravenously made up for the day's complete lack of food, the fish well fed on the way. The couch beckoned. It swallowed me. 7.30pm saw us in bed, our promised margarita relegated to another day.
***

Suva May 22 Day 1 Fiji Janet Like a possum stunned by car headlights I almost didn't know which way to turn.
The city a garish rainbow, red signs, purple, yellow, women in bright pink saris, Fijians in loud floral shirts. Signs, signs, Digicell, Vodaphone, Coca-Cola, Curry Eat Here. Every second shop had loud music blaring into the street, one shop shrill Indian tunes, next place western top of the pops, then lilting Fijian melodies, punctuated by a cacophony of car horns. After two weeks of various shades of blue and grey and the only noise the swishing of the ocean around Navire's hull, being in downtown Suva was like tripping on acid.
*** It was glorious to wake up that first full day in port, not be shaken awake by a crew mate in the dead of night, and having to climb into the cockpit, jostled by stormy black seas, but slowly coming to, the day gently seeping in. Just for a moment anyway.
Chaos reigned in the main cabin. We'd cleared the V berth of detritus stored on passage to use our double bed. Now provisions were strewn around the boat, piles of salty sailing kit threatening to grow mildew, and a day's dishes littered the galley.
That first day we were on a military mission. Shopping lists, two weeks rubbish, dirty laundry, fuel and water jerry cans to fill, and officialdom to satisfy. We only had one day in town before we headed off for a few days rest and recreation at a nearby anchorage to give Piet some tropical time before he flew south again.
Everybody wanted a form filled in and had their hand in our pockets. Up the hill from central Suva we entered the first building of many in this official mission.
Ground floor - 'not this office, go to 4th floor, not here, wait here, ah yes, go around the corner and pay, go to 2nd floor,' each time we were taken through a warren of office cubicles, through the staff cafeteria, the cloakroom. We'd find the right person, she signs, 'now go to immigration,' the well dressed official pointed to a building on a map, on the other side of town. We walked back down cluttered chaotic streets to the city centre.
An hour later we sat in a Hare Krishna cafe picking at a curry, dazed, trying to sort out our phones after visiting the Vodaphone shop. They'd made an easy task incomprehensible. My sleep-deprived brain reeled and could barely absorb the simple instructions the staff gave us. The youthful staff probably had us down as untech savvy geriatrics.
Communication systems semi-sorted the next most urgent tasks were applying for our cruising permit, and harbour clearance. We weren't allowed out of the Suva without these bits of paper. It was now Friday afternoon, and I hadn't even got near the market yet.
Note to self. When arriving in port, 1. Make a list of what needs to be done, 2.
Estimate how long it takes to do, 3. Triple the estimate. Did the first two, but failed on point 3. And then point 4, locate everything on a map first and don't take anybody's assurance that everything is in the same building.
*** Cruising permit place on one side of town, harbour clearance on the other. As we plodded wearily along the edge of the harbour the Grand Pacific Hotel, its huge white portals a bastion of colonialism, beckoned us, lured us in with the prospect of air conditioning and cold beers. Two minutes later we parked our weary bodies in white cane chairs, poolside, with a waiter loitering, ready for our order.
We loved the hotel's luxury and Europeaness. Beer was cheap, internet was free, clearance was relegated to the morrow.
Got 109 emails and all your comments. It feels wonderful that some of you followed right along with our journey *** You'd think we'd know better than to rush straight into provisioning, water, fuel, phones that we could do without for another week, having done the island cruising thing once before. But no, seduced by the trappings of civilization, we rushed on. Anchored next door was a boat called Midnight Sun, its crew John and Wendy, relentlessly cheerful friendly Australians, with 20 years sailing the Pacific under their belts. They knew the drill.
"There's no rush," Wendy often said when they came by. They just anchored and waited, looking ever so relaxed. Even sunbathed on deck. How could this be? I was still trying to clean a month's worth of grime from Navire's innards, and instill some semblance of order aboard. But I watch and learn from them.
Alas we paid the price for our haste. David has written of our ill health, UTI and diarrhea. I continued the trend, falling over at the yacht club and spraining my thumb badly, then laid low with a cold for a week, and all the while suffering the debilitating post-passage tiredness. Is there a message in all this? Wendy would say so.
We belatedly learned from several other experienced cruisers that we need to allow several weeks, not days, but weeks, to recover fully from the demands of passage. Note to self....
***

Music In The Park January 20, 2015 I'm calling this a retrospective as David was a little late posting it David On Barrier Radio Janet caught a brief ad “Music in The Park at Okiwi. Bring your own instruments.” This sounded like us. What clinched it was Loma, from whom we had hired a car, who was intending to go and offered us a lift.
Loma, large as life and well into party mode, roared into the Port Fitzroy parking lot not much more than an hour late. Janet and I and our instruments piled in.
We soon learned that Loma is one of eleven. She has six of her own, eighteen grandchildren and a couple of great-grandchildren. She looked about sixty, if that. But not much about her said Maori. She appeared bottle blond, light skinned, a little ditsy at first meeting, voluble, irreverent and great fun to be with.
We took to her immediately. In describing her lack of sea legs she quipped, “Before I’ll take the ferry to Auckland it’s got to be calm enough for me to apply lipstick in my reflection.” She turned out to be foundation tangatawhenua.
The length of time your family have been on the island, as elsewhere, is defining, third and fourth generation conferring unparalleled status. "We moved back to the island about four years ago," Loma said as she negotiated the narrow, winding road to Okiwi. "But we've been here more than seven hundred. Weíre Ngatiwai. Just the one iwi which makes things simple although there’s two hapu." Thatís about thirty generations of continuous occupation.
“I’m not that familiar with my tikanga,” Loma confessed, a little wistfully. “Some of my grandkids who have grown up in kohanga come and speak to me and I have no idea what theyíre saying," she laughed. Sheís tried learning. “It goes in and then goes out. But I've enrolled again.” Loma eased the car along a near invisible track, overhung with trees that momentarily blocked most of the sunlight. Once inside, the space opened out to reveal a cosy glade, a small grassy clearing enclosed by native bush thick with ferns and nikau palms. There were people gathered on rugs under a huge spreading Puriri tree and others standing around barbeques and chili bins of beer. As the sun slid across the sky small groups moved to occupy other patches of shade. A stage had been set up, complete with amps, mikes, speakers, even a fold-back speaker so that the musicians could hear themselves.
Loma found us a space under the Puriri and settled into her chair where she held court with family and friends all afternoon. She had a constant flow of grandchildren making requests and waiting on her. It slowly became clear that she is a much revered kuia, related, one way or another, to every Maori on the island, many of whom were at the park. There was always much banter and laughter emanating from around her spot.
It was an intimate group of no more than forty with people coming and going.
We felt we had gate crashed a large family gathering but, attached to Loma’s coat tails, we were soon absorbed into the fold.
Elaine, a diminutive copper-haired woman with an arresting, effortless, Aretha Franklin voice, played MC. She provided backing vocals and took the stage herself from time to time, supported by her husband Opo, on guitar. Remarkably she and Opo live on remote, exposed Mahuki, the outermost of the aptly named Broken Islands. They are the unofficial custodians of the island’s gannet colony.
A dozen or so musicians, including the two of us, performed solo or in varying combinations. Elaine joined us during our second set which was a treat. There were several performers who would have been well received on much larger stages, especially a trio of gorgeous, young sisters from one of the two Katherine Bay marae. One guitar, three voices, sublime harmony. And Elaine could rival any diva.
Janet and I rowed back to the boat in the lengthening shadows, warmed through with music, people, food, beer and sun and with a pocketful of invitations in the anchorage and across the island.

image Now where are we? image David retrieving anchor Passage Log 2 *** Minerva Reef Day 8, May 16 Position 23 39.484s 178 54.282w Janet *** Shortly after sunrise on Friday I was on the tiller steering through a narrow passage into Minerva Reef. What a buzz. Large swells were breaking on the coral either side of the entrance, the tide pouring out of the lagoon causing eddies which could easily slew Navire towards the coral.
"10 degrees to starboard," I heard David's voice in my headphones. "Now 20 to port." He was half way up the mast where he could clearly see the underwater coral jutting out into the pass.
We'd been sailing north for seven days, no land in sight, when 300 miles south of Fiji we saw a reef. This isolated chunk of coral was like a roadside layby where you pull over and have a rest before you continue your journey. Beyond the crashing waves of the ocean meeting land I counted four masts, we were not alone out there.
Suddenly we were in, there was no swell, the surface of the water was flat, the boat on an even keel. No more night watches for a couple of days, no keeping a course, no more reefing the sails for sudden squalls. Breathing out, I felt myself relax.
David and Piet had retrieved the anchor from its well at the bow where we keep it at sea, and we dropped it into 20 metres of crystal clear water. The moment I'd finished reversing and digging the thing in, I killed the engine and stripped off. Lathering my hair in shampoo to deal to a week's grease and grime, I dived into the turquoise depths. What a glorious temperature, no wincing, not breathtaking, just silky water caressing my skin. I swam around the boat and climbed out and washed under the solar shower Piet had set up.
"How about pancakes and bacon for breakfast?" David asked.
"Yes please," chorused the crew.
I broke out the bubbly I'd stashed in the fridge back in New Zealand.
*** "A whole night's sleep! Yahoo. Can't wait." I wrote in my journal.
Doing an ocean passage in a small yacht is like bashing your head against a brick wall because it feels so good when you stop, or like getting to a tramping hut and taking your pack off after a particularly arduous trek.
*** 4.30pm It was gloriously sunny when we arrived at Minerva but as the day wore on the light was rapidly falling. To the west was a large dark mass of cloud. The front we’d raced up here to avoid at sea was bearing down on us. David and Piet put up our water-catching gear in readiness for a deluge. We discussed running an anchor watch overnight if the wind got up too much. So much for the whole night's sleep.
We overheard someone's radio conversation on the VHF saying there was going to be a four-metre swell outside the reef. We knew that at high tide the sea slopped over into the lagoon putting constant pressure on our anchor increasing the risk of dragging.
"Winds up to 30 knots," said Piet glancing at the wind instrument. Bugger, I'm on the double watch tonight. Maybe Saturday I'll get the eight uninterrupted hours.
*** Day 9 Sunday, May 17, Minerva It was too windy and the sea too rough to launch the dinghy and go and stand on reef, so we spent the day aboard molested by an uncomfortable slop.
That afternoon a strange looking launch came through the reef entrance. As it came closer we could see it was a yacht without a mast. Later we learnt that it had got all the way to Minerva intact then as it was tacking outside the reef the whole rig came crashing down. Apparently it had just been checked. I'm sure every boat in the lagoon felt for them, it could of happened to any of us. They left the next day facing a very rough and rolly 300 mile trip to Fiji.
Anchor watch again. The alarm went off regularly as the boat slewed around in the wind. Better than being at sea though.
*** Day 10 Monday, May 18 1130 Headed back to sea. We’d debated staying longer and enjoying this haven but we needed to get to Fiji by Friday to avoid extra clearance fees on the weekend. Forecast was for lighter winds. David and Piet stowed the anchor and raised the main as I steered us across the lagoon to the reef entrance. I wasn't looking forward to the predicted three metre swells but I reassured myself only three more days to endure.
Piet got the day's gonad award for putting our position in as east instead of west.
Distance 79 miles. Feels like forever to Fiji.
*** Day 11 Tuesday 19 May, 22 38.179s, 179 17.430e Back across the dateline again.
"Day after tomorrow, day after tomorrow,” was my mantra. I felt a hungover kind of seedy and like I'd been in a barroom fight, my shoulder hurt. I was sick of the 2-3 metre lumpy swells, then being slammed by occasional squalls. I don't think I'm very good at these passages, I just wanted to get there. I meet people who seem to take it all in their stride, make it look easy. I wish I was one of them.
85 miles to go to Kadavu, and 132 to Suva.
Day’s run 145 miles, excellent progress.
*** Day 12 Wednesday May 20, 20 15.573s, 178 59.007e We took bets on how long it would be before we saw land but heavy cloud obscured Kandavu Fiji’s southernmost island. We sailed past it that night and only saw a lighthouse flashing.
We were on even more constant alert with land nearby, and land also means fishing boats, sometimes unlit ones.
Suva tomorrow. To keep myself going I kept visualizing the cold beer I would drink on arrival, complete with the droplets on the outside like in the ads. I visualized the fresh crunchy produce from the market, and best of all, a whole night's sleep.
Last night on watch.
Day’s run 95 miles *** Day 13, Thursday May 21, 18 23 .73s, 178 30.524e At dawn we could see the welcoming peaks of Vita Levu.
The harbour entrance looked comfortably wide but much of it was taken up with coral reef just below the surface so we followed our course closely.
Suddenly after nothing for nearly two weeks we had to navigate reefs, marks and a plethora of rusting hulks. David was back up the mast peering into Suva Harbour's murky depths .
The Fiji authorities regularly confiscate boats that are fishing illegally and tie them together in decaying flotillas, anchored to sea-bed, seemingly randomly around the harbour. We gave them a wide berth. In the yacht anchoring area was a hulk that just showed above high tide, a concrete shed, and a large barge. There wasn't a lot of clear space to anchor in. As we arrived the port authorities were radioing a nearby anchored yacht to get out of the way for a ship coming through. They weren't on board though. The ship went very close to them making us nervous about where to put down our pick.
We dropped the mainsail and raised our flags yellow for quarantine the pale blue Fijian flag. The anchor slid out through the fairway, I let out a big sigh and turned the engine off. Peace and quiet, for just a moment till all the relentless sounds of a busy harbour filtered in.
I radioed Suva Yacht club to arrange for customs officials to be brought out to the yacht. First the health officer cleared us, taking $180 Fijian for the pleasure. Then biosecurity checked us out but didn't take any of our fresh or frozen food away, as they can do. Customs wanted to know how much alcohol we had aboard and impounded half a dozen bottles of wine but later we paid the infinitesimal amount of duty on it and got it back.
"Welcome to Fiji. You are free to land," said the immigration man, after he'd stamped our passports right there on our dining room table.
But we didn't land, we just put our feet up and reveled in not doing anything.
Distance 13 miles.
*** At times the journey felt endless, the sea relentless. I felt for David with having the constant overall responsibility for the ship. At times I felt crazy for being out there in 12 meters of one inch thick plastic, and other times intrepid. Often I felt weak and inadequate, then had moments of feeling strong and in tune with my environment. At times I loved the vastness and emptiness of the ocean, of the flat unfettered horizons and glorious unadulterated sunsets. But I also felt anxious, lonely and vulnerable and wanted land, and friends and familiar landmarks to guide me along. I got sick of the saltiness, everything got saltier and saltier as we went on. I wanted a long hot shower and clean clothes and to sleep 12 hours in quietness.
But like childbirth the memory of the pain soon faded and I felt an incredible sense of achievement.