7:30am, what a great sleep in after a long drive and late
night but there was plenty to do before setting off before high tide (or at
least the lower limit of the tide), after a chocolate croissant and a cuppa for
breakfast we made short work of filling the water tanks, emptying the remainder
from the car and stowing all the gear before finally dropping the lines and
heading for the fuel dock. After several attempts at getting the pay station to
work and one phone call that went unanswered to the company in charge we found
another one that worked so managed to take on 120L of diesel before motoring
off into the channel. The water was so different today, it was brown with mud
from all the rain over the last couple of days and it was like playing bullrush
at school all over again trying to dodge the huge logs and patches of debris
that was getting brought in with the tide. We finally cleared the marked
channel and cruised through patches of beautiful sunshine followed by brief
heavy rain then back to sun again. Fortunately the sun won over the rain and we
had a pretty nice day after what was predicted to be god awful. The miles flew
by and before long we were facing some good swells rolling in through the heads
and wind was blowing 15kn out of the N-NE so should be good when we hang a left
and head to Whareata Bay. Unfortunaly the swells were beam on and the boat was
lurching around as the swells passed under us every few seconds, this did not play
well with Emma’s stomach and she was soon hanging over the side looking pretty
miserable and probably wishing she was anywhere but here. Thankfully it calmed
as we got closer to D’Urville and she fell asleep below. We arrived into the
bay around 5pm and the daylight was starting to die. Much to our disgust the
waves seemed to just roll on in here and the boat is a bit ‘wobbly duckling’ as
dad put it, so out went the dinghy and I launched a stern anchor to try keep us
bow into the waves and
make it slightly more bearable, so far it’s a bit of a
let down but at least its not as bad as the night anchored off Ft Lauderdale.
After a good feed and some relaxing to music it was time for a movie to wind
down for the night. If you want a laugh get your hands on a copy of The Croods
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