Our first shark sighting!

It’s a beautiful evening here.  The half-moon is illuminating the water, revealing almost perfect reflections of the surrounding boats, and it is absolutely silent, except for the occasional huge splosh of an enormous fish jumping.  It is six weeks since we left the UK, and five weeks until our earliest planned departure date from New Zealand to Tonga.  This is, of course, weather dependent, so we won’t know more accurately until nearer the time.  Five weeks sounds like a long time, but with each day that passes, the air of urgency on board is becoming more palpable.

On deck in Shark Bay

When I last wrote, we were on our first little adventure and had made it safely to Shark Bay, Kawau Island, where the anchor held perfectly, the junior crew slept on deck and the weather was idyllic.  We had Angus’ friend Brett with us, who barely allowed himself to leave the galley during his entire stay, except to entertain the children, take amazing photos, or sneak away on yet another shopping trip to source more Michelin-grade ingredients.  What we need, I have realised, is not an extra crewmember to help us sail the boat, but someone who knows how to cook, is good with kids, and doesn’t bat an eyelid at the sight of a small sink and a mountain of washing up.  I’m sure with a little training we could instil the key principles of offshore boat cooking; try to use as little gas and water, and as few pots and pans as possible.  This seems unimportant when in a marina or at anchor, but is crucial when heading further afield, and does not always come naturally! 

Kawau Island cast a magical spell over us, with its nature, wild beauty and historic landmarks.  Shark Bay lived up to its name; George and I nearly fell overboard with astonishment when we saw a hammerhead shark swim by, just a few feet from where we were standing on deck.  A dark shadow approached at speed, and for a moment our eyes couldn’t work out what we were seeing, but then there was no mistaking the body shape; gracefully yet forcefully sliding through the water beneath us.  By the time we had called to the rest of the crew to come on deck, it had slipped away, just as fast as it had appeared, leaving us to tell our story, stretching out our arms in wonder, “It was this big, wasn’t it, George?”, “No, Mummy, it was this big!”, with both of us pointing at the water as if we might conjure it up again for the others to see.

Big trees on Kawau

Ashore in Kawau, we swam, played on the beach and explored the island.  The vegetation felt almost pre-historic, with ferns so large that it seemed as though a dinosaur might poke its head out between them at any moment.  We followed walking trails through forests with the tallest trees we’d ever seen, and then before we knew it were descending mossy wooden steps beside water falls, past ramshackle lodges built on the side of the hill, one with twin open-air bath tubs installed on decking overlooking the bay.  There were no roads or cars, and we saw almost no-one else, except in Mansion House Bay, with its café and beautiful gardens, where several boats were anchored, and the resident peacocks ruled the roost.  We watched in disbelief and amusement as one of the pea-hens hopped up on a café table and did its business.  With one of his most serious facial expressions, George reported the incident to the café owner, and was horrified when she thanked him very much and asked if he would like to clear it up!  Brett taught Eloise, George and Jack how to leave trail-markers with sticks to find their way back, and they were amazed and delighted when they navigated one of the return journeys with marshmallows. 

Dinghy trip ashore in Shark Bay

After two nights in Shark Bay, we up-anchored, and that’s when our first major problem presented itself.  We have a very heavy anchor with a very heavy chain, and a huge electric winch to haul it up “at the push of a button”.  Predictably, having bought a thirty-year-old boat which has been sailed around the world for the past seven years, we are finding that one or two things are no longer in their first flush of youth.  The anchor windlass (winch) is the latest thing to declare itself in this category.  With the anchor half-up-half-down it gasped its last breath and gave up, making only a pathetic click-click-click sound when Angus pushed the button.  Luckily there is a fairly simple plan B for getting anchors up, but the bigger the boat, the more effort this requires.  Angus and Brett set to work with a chain hook and a rope, hooking the chain near the bow, and leading the rope back to a winch on the mast, and inch by inch they hauled up the anchor.  When it was finally up, we headed around to the other side of the island to explore Copper Mine Bay.  Down went our heavy anchor again, and off we went for another wonderful trip ashore – swimming, clambering over rocks, exploring disused mining tunnels by head torch, and reading about the brave and ingenious men who mined copper there in the 1840s, digging their tunnels sixty metres below sea level, and relying on a coal fired pump to keep the water out. We rowed back to Victoria and Brett and Angus toiled, sweated and occasionally swore on the foredeck to raise the anchor once again.

Exploring in Copper Mine Bay

Back to Gulf Harbour we headed, motoring in a flat calm sea with no wind and glorious late afternoon sunshine.  The plus side of having the engine running is that it not only charges the batteries, but also chills the fridge and freezer.  We’ve never had a fridge on a boat before, let alone a freezer, and we are constantly amazed by having cold milk, chilled beers, frozen peas and even ice cubes available just in case we need one for a gin and tonic.  The downside of having the engine running is that it’s a bit smelly, and it’s very noisy, especially if you are Eloise and your bunk is directly above it.  It’s not only noisy, but also gets gradually hotter the longer the engine is on.  That day, it was very warm, and Jack fell fast asleep; a little ball of sweat with his hair plastered to his forehead.  It smelt quite a bit of diesel, too – in fact, after a short discussion, we all agreed the fuel smell was much stronger than usual.  Moments later, Angus had the engine housing off to investigate, and discovered that we were leaking fuel into the bilge.  Luckily he was very quick to find out where it was from – a result of a loose screw from an engine job with Jim a couple of days earlier – and the leak was soon stemmed.  That still left a diesel clean up in the bilge to sort out; poor Angus - I’ll volunteer for the washing up any day over that!!

Girls on deck!

Back in Gulf Harbour, muddling along now that Brett has gone back to Canada, we are preparing ourselves and the boat for going offshore.  We have a jobs list as long as your arm, and it’s growing.  Offshore preparation shouldn’t be a problem for us; Angus and I have done this before, when we were preparing our boat for the Clipper Round the World Race.  That boat, bizarrely, was also called Victoria.  But on the first Victoria, we were just two people in a crew of eighteen, plus a professional skipper.  We’d divvy up jobs in the morning, and once we’d finished one we would report for the next, like a well-oiled machine.  If we needed any spares, we’d ask the race team who’d either have what we were after, or would source it for us.  How different it is this time, with three small people who are not really interested in boat jobs; our progress is painfully slow!  The fact that Jim built this Victoria himself and has fitted every system on board makes it interesting to say the least.  Everything works, somehow, but only Jim really knows how.  There is no manufacturer’s manual for this ship.  And we are fast realising that most of the “spares” we have on board, are the old parts that Jim replaced because they had stopped working, but he kept them anyway, just-in-case…

Farewell Brett! - George, Brett, Laura, Jack and Eloise

In recent days, I’ve become a real expert at replacing micro-switches.  A week ago I hadn’t even heard of one, and my A* in GCSE physics (twenty-four years ago!) has not proved particularly useful either.  We carry 1000 litres of fresh water in three water tanks, and there is a single fresh water pump to get the water out.  Fairly frequently, the pump fails to fire up when a tap is turned on, and the problem is a sticky micro-switch.  The fool-proof short-term solution is to reach for a screwdriver, open a small wooden hatch beneath the sink, tap the switch with the screwdriver, and hey-presto, the pump starts whirring and water comes out of the tap.  The long-term solution would be to replace the switch, which I have tried and failed to do twice so far.  Each time, having carefully disconnected the water hoses, and managed to undo the wires without losing the tiny screws forever into the bilge, I have selected the best looking of the “spare” micro-switches, all of which are well used.  Both times, I have finished the job with a mixture of pride and trepidation, only to turn on a tap to test the new switch, and get nothing whatsoever from the pump.  So both times I have ended up putting the original dicky-but-just-about-servicable switch back in again, and leaving our trusty screwdriver nearby in readiness for its next call to action.  Today Angus splashed out and bought several brand-new switches, so “Change micro-switch – Laura” is back on the jobs list again for tomorrow!  

                         

microswitches - my new specialist subject..             

micro-switch in situ with wires attached

With Easter approaching, we are very aware that we are away from our usual communities – family, school, and our lovely neighbourhood in Winchester.  We went with some of our boat friends on an Easter Egg Hunt last weekend, where there must have been at least a hundred families, and we were strangers to all of them.  It made us think of the Easter celebrations back home, with our families, at school, pre-school, and Church, where we take it for granted that we will see lots of friends.  That’s not to say we are not forming new bonds here.  Eloise has a friend called Tiia, Little George has Big George, and Jack has befriended “Pirate Dan”, a retired Maori deep sea fisherman living on a tiny motorboat behind us.  The live-aboard community here are an eclectic bunch, and we are surrounded by new friends on our pontoon.  Some are living the dream; two other boats are preparing to head to Tonga at the same time as us, one with boat kids, who ours are good friends with.  Many of the others seem to have achieved part one of their dream, leaving part two with no defined timeframe.  The boat is bought and they are living on board, but it’s not clear yet if they will ever actually cast off the lines and sail off into the sunset, which was the original plan.  There’s a bar at the top of the walkway, Yogi’s, which seems to be the undoing of many people here.  From Monday morning until Thursday lunch time, there’s a general sense of purpose and hope for change, but once Yogi’s doors open at 12pm on Thursday, the temptation is too much.  One pint in the sunshine leads to another, Thursday blurs in to Friday, then Saturday and Sunday.  At 7pm on a Sunday, the bar closes its doors, but it’s not long before midday on Thursday rolls around, and the inevitable cycle begins again…

Selfie on the ferry to Auckland

Luckily we are so busy with children, home school, boat jobs, and worrying about how much 3G data we seem to need in our current wifi-free existence, that there is no chance Yogi’s will suck us into its abyss.  It looks like the weather is going to be fantastic for the Easter weekend, so after a couple more days here in the marina sourcing stores and spares, we will head off and explore some more of the beautiful coastline nearby.  Jim and Angus have fixed the anchor windlass, so let’s hope we don’t break anything else.  Once this is posted, I’ll get back to my spreadsheet, finalising the estimated quantities of food we will need for six months in the pacific islands, and then I’ll go to bed, hoping that it’s going to be third time lucky on my micro-switch job tomorrow!

With love from all aboard the Good Ship Vicky, Gulf Harbour, Whangaparaoa. Xx

 

The smarter end of Gulf Harbour - we are in the cheap seats