Sailing through our first Indonesian Islands! Should be in Tual by lunchtime. What are the chances of getting checked in in an afternoon...?

Fishing boats are back en masse. Putting along amidst some pretty great sea life- dolphin friends, jumping marlin, schooling tuna, giant jellies and snakes! Pretty entertaining for a motorboat ride. Should get in to Tual early afternoon tomorrow.

We have run out of wind but also seem to have moved away from the fishing fleet which is nice. Holding out hope for some wind this morning. All is well aboard.

Wing-on-wing, baby! Fast out the gate, though a little slower today. Spent the early morning navigating fishing boats and all their nets. All seem well lit so just need to keep a sharp eye. A squid found its way onto the deck and made quite a mess.

All is well aboard.

Wing-on-wing, baby! Fast out the gate, though a little slower today. Spent the early morning navigating fishing boats and all their nets. All seem well lit so just need to keep a sharp eye. A squid found its way onto the deck and made quite a mess.

All is well aboard.

Wing-on-wing, baby! Fast out the gate, though a little slower today. Spent the early morning navigating through fishing boats and all their nets. All seem well lit enough, just need to keep a sharp eye. A squid found its way on to the deck overnight and made quite a mess. All is well aboard.

Adios, Australia. Out the gate with the current and en route to Indo. Breeze should see us through to Saturday, likely motor from then on. Beautiful day for a sail.

Made it to our departure gate. Strong winds and crazy tides, sitting on anchor for a cycle before we get off the boat. Horn seems to be the better anchorage, so we'll see about taking a ferry over to Thursday where everything seems to happen.

0900 - Anchor down off Cape York. Wide open bay but beautiful and perfectly comfortable. Having a good feed and spending the night. 20nm to Horn/Thursday in the morning.

0730 - Albany Pass. Timed the tides just right and getting swept through at good speed. Almost too fast as it's a very pretty route.

0900 - One day out of Lizard, headed to T.I. In a bit of a hurry so took outer channel. Minimal shipping traffic, only 6 commercial boats encountered between sunset and sunrise. Zipping along wing-on-wing at 7+ kts, wonderfully calm seas inside the reef. Very dark with no moon. No plans to stop along the way.

Arrived at Lizard at 0800 after an overnight from Trinity Park. 23-hour trip total. Staying for three nights before continuing north on Saturday. Beautiful island, lots to do.

Arrived in Cairns. Found our honey-hole along the way and snagged a macky and a tuna. Bath-time for boat and crew.

Not much wind past few days. Motoring north for a night off Cape Gloucester before heading on to Magnetic. We'd rather be sailing, but the seas are flat as and the whale sightings have been unreal.

Well, Mackay was pretty neat :)

All stocked up on veg and fishing gear, so back out to the islands we go. Kite is up and lures are in the water. Wish us luck!

Spinnaker run to Pear Bay after a few adventurous days at Great Keppel Island. Hoping to land a fish here soon as we chop away miles.

Well, Cavalo and crew is officially off galavanting for another season. Holed up in Pancake Creek waiting for the wind to shift, then off north towards warmer weather. In the meantime- great lighthouse walk and flat anchorage. Lots of boats around and feels good to be back in the cruising community... any sparkies around that want to come fix our wind gen? Again?

Home Sweet Home for the next half-year. Got ourselves a pilot boat in, courtesy of the good ship Kiapa. Cavalo's all put away and crew is clean. Heading to town to check it all out.

Pit-stop in Gold Coast for a secondary pest inspection. Blah. Fortunate to have good friends in the area. Heading south once we get the green light from Bio.

Anchored Pelican Bay. The rest of the Straits were wild to sail through, lots of shipwrecks and wiggling around. Will cross the Wide Bay Bar in the morning. A handful of others are doing the same - safety in numbers...

So much rain! Went blindly careening through the top bit of the Sandy Straits, managed not to run aground. Anchored off Kingfisher, headed to shore for a hike and feed.

Arrived in Bundy just after midnight. Will check in with officials later in the morning.

Bit of a slow day yesterday, must have been some current on the nose, fairly frustrating... Now just waiting foer the wind to fill back in so we can polish off the final 116nm.

wonderful night under the stars, hoping the breeze picks back up soon. 219nm to go

Rolling along fairly downwind making good way. Trying to eat all of our food in anticipation of arrival. All is well aboard.

Lovely morning though the wind has been getting a touch light in the early morning hours. Moving well in the right direction and all is well onboard. Hoping to make the coast before the weekend.

A bit bouncy out of the gate but we are moving in some nice wind so are happy. All is well aboard.

Westward Ho! Departing New Cal thru Passe Ouano bound for Bundaberg. Should be a bit of a romp out the gate but we are hoping to make good time. Au reeoir New Caledonia, until next time.

Wonderful day yesterday, easy sailing and finally landed a MahiMahi! Wind is back now moving us along briskly but comfortably, may even have to slow down to catch the tide in the Passe Havannah. All is well aboard.

Wallowing our way downwind with the pole out, making good comfortable progress. 2 big hits on the fishing gear this morning, so we also have that going for us.

Mellow night last night until we tuned on the motor at around 0400, still chugging away hoping for some more wind before lunch. All's well

Bit of a raucous start but we are eating up the miles. Poled out now wallowing our way towards fresh baguettes .

Moce, Fiji. You've been the best. Headed to the pass and turning right towards New Cal. Weather looks fine, time to start fishing again.

Cleared in yesterday. Cleaning up, drying out and happily letting other people cook for us :) Swell looks dynamite so trying to be quick!

In Fijian waters! Navigated through the Yasawa as the sun was rising, now we're sunny sailing along in wonderfully flat water. Making our way to clearance, cleaning up the boat, thinking about how to cook up the Walu in the fridge. Pretty stinkin' stoked.

Less than 100 miles from land, and a bit more to Vuda. Almost seems impossible! Attempting to slow the boat down so we can navigate the reefs tomorrow morning. Swell has eased up a bit so things are more comfortable, but still very, very wet.

Spirits lifting, finally making respectable miles under sail. Getting pretty darn excited to get to Fiji where hopefully we can get our hands on a dehumidifier- if this boat was any wetter she'd be underwater. Tally-ho!

Long night of rain, more lightning, and wonky wind. Wondering when we are going to get out from under this cloud.

Beautiful sunset followed by a hectic night, lots of convection, way more lightning then we would like, winds up and down with each passing cloud. Still pushing out way due south incase there is more SE in our future. Not much sleep happening but all is well aboard.

Continuing south, they say there will be wind soon and hoping we find it. Getting excited in our final stretch with 555 miles to go and a much better forecast. Putting a real dent in our canned food supply.

Looks like the wind gods are not on our side and a pit stop in Tuvalu is in order if we don't run out of diesel first. This is super dumb.

Motoring. Again. Super squally, lots of lightning and thunder last night. Waterspouts and a marlin on the rod- took the lure but we got all our line back. I think we'd happily trade all of these things for some wind...

Sweet Poseidon we're sailing! Made it into the southern latitudes earlier today and enjoying the lee of the atolls for now. No fish yet, so we'll be having a celebratory trans-equatorial dinner of Cornish game hens tonight! We so fancy.

Had a spectacular time in Kiribati. Heading out the pass and pointing the bow just east of south. It'll be a light start but it's a beautiful day, and we'll be back in the Southern Hemisphere soon!

Mauri from Kiribati! Clearance took 24 hours, but we finally have our stamps. We were going to top-up on diesel and keep on moving, but there's better wind if we hang out till Saturday. Relocating to the east end of the atoll and putting on our adventure floppies.

Slow progress but still sailing. Wind should die completely, so we're strategizing a stop in Tarawa. If we turn the motor on now we could be there tomorrow late afternoon, but it's a hard call to make when you're sailing along just fine...

Screamer last night fizzled shortly after sunrise. Managing to keep the sails full and the boat moving, but struggling to keep our easting and not going very fast. Lovely day, though, and we appear to have this place all to ourselves :)

Out the gate and headed south! Dismal wind forecast, but we've got a chance to get some good easting in. Stoked to be on the Big Blue again, hopefully the unpredictable weather around here works in our favor. All is well aboard!

One last swim to clean the dingy before she comes on deck, hitting the big blue tomorrow headed south for Fiji.

Well we've stitched up the jib, fixed the backstay, and more or less gotten ourselves and the boat ready to go. So now of course there isn't a breath of wind in the forecast...

Back in glorious Majuro after a cruisey 36hr run from Ailuk. Hooked 2 marlin (not our target species), now we have 2 broken rods, one less rod holder and no fish in the freezer, but boy are they majestic when they jump.

Slowly making our way south again, stopping to kite along the way!

Anchored off Enejelar Island at the north end of Ailuk Atoll for a couple of days.

Moved a bit farther north yesterday in search of new beaches to comb. There look to be a couple good pinnacles to explore as well so hopefully some fish for dinner!

Anchored off Bio Island. Tucked right in much closer to shore where the water is calm enough to get the SUP board out. Matthew drank island water, so no kiting until he's feeling better. Canoes sailing past morning and evening, very fun to see.

Anchor down off Ailuk, Ailuk atoll after a quick and uneventful 36hr passage. Despite dragging lures during daylight hours only one recorded strike and the smallest flying fish found on deck means no fish for dinner. Glad to be here none the less and with some steady winds forecast and full moon low tides its time to break in the kites and wrangle some lobsters.

Mail has arrived, stores are stocked, time to go sailing. Heading out island this afternoon. Time to go test out our new kites!

The wind has not been kind. Still motoring and poured the last of our diesel into the tanks. Seas are calm, though, and we're only 20nm from the pass into Majuro; hopeful that we can get onto a mooring before sunset and don't run out of fuel before then. Ready to get there.

Back in the Northern Hemisphere! Motoring just east of Tarawa, but it looks like we won't be making a Kiribati stop this time around. Wind should fill in this afternoon and get us to Majuro before Christmas where hopefully we can settle in and do some much needed laundry. Cavalo is pretty salty, but there's rain in the forecast so maybe she'll get a bath.

Had a fantastic sail yesterday and last night till about 0400 when we lost the wind. Nothing like gliding behind atolls on a smooth ocean under an almost full moon! Running the iron genny now, poking our nose north in the hopes of more wind.

Found some more wind! 12-15 NNE means we are bumping into it but moving right along. Double reefed main and single reef in the jib seems to be doing the trick. Should be tucking in behind some of the Kiribati atolls soon so looking foreward to some smooth sailing. Finally landed a Wahoo yesterday afternoon, fish for days!!!

Sailing under full jib and main. Making good headway, though haven't caught any fish. Sun's pretty hot up here.

Finally raised the anchor about 1330 yesterday and out of the pass a little before 1500. Have been motor sailing since and are making some good progress 6+knots at 340ºM, must be some current helping along the way. Other then a few squalls thru the night we enjoyed the full moon from sunset to sunrise which made for a relatively quick night. Still no fish though we do have some gear out, hoping to find a touch more wind this afternoon and do some sailing.

Ran out of wind this afternoon, now motoring with some main up dodging squalls. Lovely out here though we miss the wind. Should make Tuvalu tomorrow.

Another day motoring along in no wind, about 40nm from Rotuma so should be in by sunset. No fish.

Cleared out and officially on the move. One last glimpse of the Yasawa and we're well on our way north. We even have wind!!

Back in Denarau, playing the old "provisioning game" and a waitin' on some favorable weather...

Had a lovely day exploring the marine sanctuaries. Now its back to fishing for keeps, today we are moving up to Blue Lagoon via the seaward route for fish sake.

Fishing our way to Manta Pass, been towing lines for 3 days now with nothing to show for it. Otherwise its a lovely day out, no wind and lots of sun!

Fiji! Surfey surf and coconut time :)

They wont starve as caught a 30lb tuna yesterday. had a night of wild wind but all well on board.

Wild night of wind and waves, been flying across the breeze pushing 8 knots with a triple reefed main and sliver of jib. Caught what Annie is calling a 30lb(13.5kg) tuna yesterday, actually caught 2 but one sheered the rod holder off and stole our lure(rod leashes are a thing and they work), must have been a big one. One is enough for us to eat like kings and make friends so we are stoked. Looking like breeze on again today, hoping we have saved enough easting to crack off a touch as get closer, fingers crossed the lights in Navula pass are functioning as we will most likely arrive there just after sunset.

Conditions settled a bit after getting tossed around last night in 4m seas and 25-28 kts. Might try to catch up on some sleep today... Definitely warming up, though, and the hats have been put away!

Bit of a motor yesterday morning to top off the batteries in light winds then have been cruising in slowly building SSE, took in a 3rd reef about sunset and have been keeping it cruisy all night. Other then a bit of rain and some up and dow winds just chugging along climbing the latitude ladder.

Cranking out the miles, though a squally morning has slowed us down a bit. Eager to get to Fiji and have decided to skip Minerva this time around.

Have had a lovely sail since dropping the docklines yesterday about noon. Wind has calmed a bit but is still pushing us along nicely. A touch cold last night, can not wait for the butter to start melting!

Arrived in Opua yesterday! After a full day bashing SE from NorthCape to The Bay of Islands, warm showers, hot food and some much needed rest.

Made it to North Cape, slowly turning the corner as we speak. Glorious morning just wishing we were a little closer for pictures sake.

Have had a wonderful 24hrs sailing wing on wing just about dead downwind. A bit or rolling around yesterday arvo but has since calmed right down and we are happily ticking off the miles. Hoping to be at North Cape tomorrow mid morning.

Sliding along nicely with a good breeze for heading north. A touch cold but we are making good progress towards Opua, hoping for some calm conditions as we round north cape Saturday.

We are off! Heading out the cut and up the west coast for Opua. Bye bye snow capped mountains, may this cold wind blow us north!

All stocked up and ready to roam, waiting on the wind gods here in sunny Nelson, hoping for a window at least as far as Northland soon.

Running down Tasman Bay, final few miles into Nelson. Had a better then expected spinnaker run yesterday till about 1800 and have been motoring since. Other then a chilly and very damp fog for most of the night today is shaping up quite nicely, oh the sweet smell of dirt and pine trees!

The rain took our wind away last night, or at least it is fading. Had the spinnaker up at first light still making some decent way, see how long this lasts.

After a slow start the NW has filled in to a nice 12-15 knots pushing us downwind, ran all night under main and spinakker, hand steering so a bit tired. Hoping to get a few more knots and we will pole out the yankee and keep slip sliding our way into Nelson.

Have sailed ourselves into the high, motoring SSE waiting for the warm front to bring some NW breeze.

Sailing still in good wind after a bit of a slog last night. 20-25knots for most of the night at 45 degrees apparent with a fair amount of lump and bump, its days like these we are glad we have a solid heavy boat. Going to keep sailing this way unti the wind runs out then make the turn for Nelson, maybe this afternoon. Here is to hoping for some wind at our backs and sun on our faces. All is well.

Sailing again after a slow night of lighter then expected winds and 3m seas, yarr.

Moving nicely to the SW for the moment awaiting the front to come along with its SW'erly wind change. Hopefully then backing quickly to the S then SE so we dont get blown to far to the NW. Last night was a good run though its getting bumpier as is expected and have we mentioned its cold.

Motoring SW in no wind awaiting the front to pass this evening. Have made the decision to head for Nelson direct.

Slip slidding down to NZ now, after some rainy cloud and squalls yesterday midday we found the SE and have been romping SW at a good clip. Still no fish

Lost the SW wind about 9pm last night, been motoring since. Lovely moon last night and a wonderful morning, waiting on wind to start sliding down towards NZ

Happy Halloween! Good sailing yesterday and into the night before the wind decided to come and go a couple of time, i guess we needed the exercise... Finally pulled itself together around 2am and we have beec cruising along since. Cant wait for the SE wind shift, would love to be headed to NZ and not off into the southern ocean.

Motorboat ride yesterday under beautiful sunshine, still no fish. Found the front about 4am this morning with rain and a wind shift fun. And now its cold.

Wonderful sailing till we ran out of wind just after midnight last night. Now motor sailing south into a mixed sea with lures out.

Had a pleasant night to start, moving nicely with a few friends out here. Hoping the wind holds like this for awhile.

Departed Vuda 1330hrs NZ bound. Thank you Fiji for the wonderful times, we look forward to coming back real soon. Vinaka Vakalevu!

Fueling up in Denarau, heading to Vuda to check out soon then out onto the big blue highway bound for New Zealand

In Musket Cove waiting for weather to head south to NZ.

Gliding along, starting to straighten up, should be at the Q dock this afternoon.

moving nicely just off the wind, should be at our turning waypoint in a couple hours to head south towards Opua. We could be in by tomorrow night??? Lets not get ahead of ourselves.

ticking along, smooth calm seas, a bit of a headwind, hoping it goes more west, arrival by thanksgiving looks promising.

Motoring again, ran out of wind about daybreak, making miles in the right direction, just hoping we have enough diesel...

Found wind yesterday about noon, slowly backed to E/SE 14kts. ETA hoping for tuesday but could be Wednesday

Motored all night, waiting for the S/SE to fill later today, fingers crossed, otherwise been a mill pond

after a night of the iron genny we are back under spinnaker making our way south west for Opua.

POS 23º04S 177º46W Slowly bobbing along when the breeze gets up to 8 or 9 knts, headed slightly for Minerva but dont think we will get in by nightfall so could just be continuing south if the weather sounds good for it.