December 19 – 27, 2018
(A Rare, Current Post from Cyndi)
I believe the decision to make our most recent passage from Fiji to New Zealand warranted some explanation after we arrived. Now that it’s taken some weeks to write about this, I hope the reasons will become apparent over the coming posts. In a nutshell, after encountering a difficult passage, we encountered something maybe worse: a betrayal of sorts by a country we’ve always considered a friend, a second home. Thankfully we can report that after time spent in several marinas, the “kia ora” spirit is still very much alive here in New Zealand. Unfortunately, I’m not sure it exists in the ports of entry, Opua in particular.
The morning of December 18 began very typically for our final days in Fiji: sunny and warm, a beautiful day lay ahead. By now most areas of Fiji were uncomfortably hot, but Pacific Harbour had the saving grace of clouds that consistently formed over the inland mountains before making their way over our area, bringing frequent cloud shadows and pleasant temperatures. Our daily routine actually included a half-mile walk along the beach to the Arts Village (an area of shops and eateries), something we’d never do in very hot weather.
This was a pleasant time, but there were a few flies in the punchbowl: the ever-present ticking clock along with the feeling of time passing, the concern about getting to New Zealand with enough time to head to the South Island, the inevitability of another heat wave in Pacific Harbour, and the worry about the developing cyclone season.
If you look at our blog post on December 18, you can see we’d had yet another morning of looking at, then soundly rejecting, a possible weather window. By the end of the day, we’d reconsidered and decided to take that window. What changed? Rich explains one reason in his “Got Outta Dodge” post (a couple of posts ago). Another reason was that when we checked the weather again late in the day, the weather near New Zealand looked to be improving. We decided we should probably take this window and notified Bob McDavitt, our weather router. He wrote back commenting that this was not the best window but could be do-able with some carefully set waypoints.
Normally these comments would have made us to reconsider, but we just felt like we should roll the dice and hoped things would continue to improve with the weather situation. We’d have to pass through a front, but the winds would be from behind us so we decided we’d rather endure 24 hours of possible rough conditions than days of worry if a cyclone formed anywhere near Fiji. Our greater concern, though, was the probability of encountering some southerly wind conditions as we approached New Zealand.
And so on the evening of the 19th, we headed south into five days of beautiful motor-sailing conditions. It was warm but so calm we could keep hatches open. Aside from having to run the engine, the conditions were lovely and our speeds terrific. So terrific, in fact, we decided we might be able to beat the southerlies. Thus, instead of heading for Bob’s waypoint (adding an extra two days to the trip), we made a run more directly for New Zealand. In hindsight, we should have stuck with the original plan, but we were feeling lucky. (Note: Generally this is a feeling–not to be confused with instinct–that often proceeds our doing something we end up regretting.)
Unfortunately our gamble did not pay off. We didn’t mind the warm front: it turned out to be warm and rainy and not rough at all. But it seemed the warm front had a friend, a cold front traveling right behind it, which abruptly turned the wind south so we had to heave to (a method of using the sails to stop the boat’s forward movement). This cost us a lot of time as we waited about six hours for the nasty little cold front to pass – rough and unpleasant.
Finally it did pass and we once again headed south, but we were now getting the effects of the “Christmas Low” passing over New Zealand. It had moved north and was stronger than previously forecast. Our winds were in the 20 to 28-knot range, ahead of the beam, and the seas were rough. It was very difficult to move around the boat and pretty miserable. Things were a little better the next day, but between the heaving to followed by wind ahead of the beam, we hadn’t gotten as close to New Zealand as we’d hoped and thus encountered a longer period of southerlies than anticipated. Neither our boat, nor the “little girls” on it, do well going to weather. We honestly were not sure how, or when, we’d finally get to Opua.
On our final day, the worst of the low had passed, but we had to fight both southerly winds and a counter current as we slowly worked our way towards the New Zealand coast. Thankfully we caught a break and things eased up enough so we could once again head directly for New Zealand (as opposed to northwest or southeast of it). We kept our final watches sitting outside together, both hoping our luck would hold as we watched the shoreline gradually get closer yet knowing we could not breathe easy until we made it into the harbor at the Bay of Islands. Not only was this trip taking longer than anticipated, but we were now disconcertingly low on fuel.
Late that afternoon we finally made it into the calm, protected waters of the harbor. We were very relieved but still had a couple of hours of motoring to get to the customs dock. We knew we had enough fuel to make it but not much beyond that. We were more tired than happy at this point, definitely our least enthusiastic arrival ever. Little did we know we had one more ordeal ahead of us, but that will be the subject of an upcoming post (hint: terrible customs clearance experience).
As for the next upcoming post, we have a video of the passage. Before we left, Rich thought it would be cool to take video along the way in an effort to convey what a passage often looks like for us. He got some beautiful footage of calm seas, sunsets, sunrises, a bright full moon, and what it looks like to be out in the middle of the ocean. He also has some very honest commentary he made during the miserable period.
Not surprisingly, most of the footage we have is from the calm, beautiful period, and one might wonder what the heck he’s complaining about. But when the passage was at its worst, it required two hands to hang onto the boat. Waves bashing over the cockpit made it impossible to simply hold a camera at the companionway, much less take any footage outside. In essence, while we do have some footage of feisty seas, we don’t have any footage of things at their worst. Thus, when Rich talks about how difficult things were, the viewer will just have to take his word for it.
Actually there’s a scene from the TV show, Breaking Bad, where they’re using a giant magnet mounted in a truck to try to break into a police evidence locker. I think the action in the room and the truck create a pretty good representation of what happens inside a boat when the winds and seas are high and ahead of the beam.
As in the clip, any items not lashed down end up sliding (or flying) to the lower side of the boat, including the people in it; then it feels like being pinned there as if by a magnet. Naturally it’s very difficult to move around yet just as difficult to stay put as it takes two hands hold on. One slip of the hand can get you flung across the boat, and it’s amazing how time slows down in those cases, long enough to let you wonder how bad the landing is going to be. Yes, this can be dangerous, but thankfully we have yet to incur any significant injuries. Mostly it’s bloody uncomfortable. This is why, when people ask us if we’re ever afraid we’ll die; we tell them we’re more afraid we won’t. Keep in mind in that while in the film clip they can “turn it off,” we can’t.
Thus far, and I think I can speak for most cruisers, nothing is permanent. Crappy conditions, assuming you survive them, always improve. And for most of us this improvement accompanies an amazing loss of memory of what was endured. After all, it worked out; so how bad was it in the end? And this is how we’re able to continue with what we do. For those of us who keep journals or YIT posts, perhaps we best not look at them for a long time. I know of more than a couple of people who insist they had a “great passage” when, if they read over their YIT posts, might be in for some unexpected, unpleasant memories.
As for our passage, we had some amazing days and two or three difficult days. Had it not been for our difficult arrival, we might have been easily able to put the difficult days at the back of our memories.
Update: January 24, 2019:
Because of the events that happened upon our arrival at the customs dock in Opua, we remained traumatized for a time (thus the noticeable lack of blog posts on our part). I’m hoping to now start writing again and get us back on track with both our stories and posts.
Thankfully the “kia ora” welcoming spirit of New Zealand has not disappeared overall; it’s just gone from the Opua marina and their customs agents. But we thank the marinas of Tauranga, Gisborne, and Napier for their amazing hospitality and warm welcoming spirit. We are so grateful that our “family” of New Zealand has not abandoned us at a time when our home country of America seems to have gone insane. Yes, some whack-job relatives greeted us at the door, but our friends still awaited us inside (including the merchants of Opua, Pahia, and Kerikeri, still amongst our favorites in our Kiwi family).
Enough said for now. I’ve finally finished this post and will now work with Rich on wrapping up the difficult video post. At some point, I’ll address the events of our arrival and talk about what’s going on (and going wrong) in Northland. Meanwhile I’ll get back to my Fiji posts. Why suffer through bad 2018 crap when there’s so much fun stuff from 2013?–Cyndi
