Tag: Sailing

New Zealand

Live The Plans You Make

Rated NFM (Not For Mom)


The time had come for us to get Dazzler ready for her 1200 or so mile passage southbound to New Zealand. All systems checked, serviced, inspected an evaluated for passage. The land of Fiji flat water sailing had come to and end as well. My game face is on and it’s time to put on our big boy pants and get into a good mindset to make this passage. Jilly always knows when a passage is near. She calls it my passage face. Hell yeah! Two souls are at risk under my watchful eye. Serious stuff Maynard!

There are some who know this passage too well and others that are novices. Although, the fact that we have completed a passage to New Zealand last November from Tonga and then back to Tonga last April in NO way makes us any kind of expert. We put on our foulies like everyone else. One leg at a time. For the last few weeks I’ve been pawing over weather GRIB files and pretending that I know what I’m looking at like a man obsessed with cute little wind arrows and chart graphics. Hell, all those arrows and I didn’t even see any Indians!

The stars were starting to line up into what looks like a good departure and passage window. We have hired a weather router to assist us on this passage as well and a firm date for departure is confirmed. It’s is amazing the difference in weather models. They either look similar or are 180° from each other. Which one do you use? The answer is all of them. You can never have enough input to make a weather related decision.

We had cleared Fiji Immigration and Customs and were ready to go. Now the game of hurry up and wait. We positioned Dazzler in Momi Bay for our departure. All systems are now go for launch. Wait a minute! Do I remember how to sail in the big water? It seems everywhere we’ve been for the last several months we motored or motor sailed and the passages were mostly short hops on flat water. Hummmm! Well, it must be like riding a bike. Right?

As it turns out, once we cleared the channel through the reef we were met with our first task in the Big Water. 2.5-3.0 meter swells in 18 knots of wind. As Jilly would say, “Bamm! Sausage!” Here we are, no easy re-introduction into sailing with flat seas or warm 15 knot trade winds. Nope! We were instantly back in the big game. Every move in the cockpit is slow and methodical as we orchestrate a sail plan change from full main to a double reef and the staysail was rolled into a triangle half its fully deployed shape. That’ll do Donkey! Oh I forgot to mention the passage through the reef we had just come through, we had a large tanker following us from a mile to our stern. The tide was going out during our transit and there were some unusual currents, upwellings and standing waves. But, nothing like atolls we’ve experienced before.

Okay. Back to the passage. While settling into passage mode there were cries from the cabin of “I don’t want to do this. This isn’t the cruise I signed up for. I want this all to stop. We’ve never had anything this rough before.” I guess flat water sailing can become your Achilles heel when you transition back to the big water, so to speak.


I have to admit that if I have a choice I, like many of my friends, would chose flat, long, rolling, following seas, a 15 knot wind on your quarter, writing your name in the ocean from the downwind rail and cocktails with little umbrellas on the aft deck. This wasn’t going to be one of those times. Nope!

As the day progressed the winds built into the mid twenties and then up to the low thirties with the swell remaining constant in size, yet closer frequencies. I’m not going to lie to you, I was wondering why we didn’t just haul Dazzler out in Fiji and forgo this passage. You know I’m not a spring chicken anymore. LOL! Our vessel insurance requires that Dazzler be south of 27° South for cyclone season and we still have a car to deal with in New Zealand. So, here we go.

Everything was starting to settle out and we were getting set into our passage routine. You know close all the hatches, drink plenty of fluids to stay hydrated, watches and the peace of the sea. The peace was still roaring at 30 knots and then it happened. The big one. The mother of all swells decided to slap us square on the beam. We got doused with water. Sea water was everywhere. The cockpit was like a bathtub. Jilly yelling up from down below, “Jesus! There is water everywhere.” I expected to see Dazzlers floorboards floating around when I looked down the companionway, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought. Jilly was there crying and saying she didn’t want to do this anymore. And, next time she’ll fly to New Zealand, etc…which didn’t sound too bad to me right about now. But, stiff upper lip and all that, Right?

The forecast isn’t for these strong winds for the whole journey and in fact we will have some periods that we will have to turn on the auxiliary engine to keep our speed up. I’ve heard it said that passages to New Zealand are not for the faint of heart and not about the journey. But rather to get there. Don’t waist time trying to be a sailing purist. Just get there to avoid the potential weather transitions.

Weather on a good forecast is usually good for about three days. After that changes can and do occur. It can go either way. Better or worse. I like the better myself. Luckily for us we download weather twice a day or more via our Iridium Go. Very remarkable device. Although it’s slow it is very reliable. We have a back up for downloading weather and that is the high frequency radio. But, linking up to land based stations and unsuccessful downloads become problematic. I literally have spent a few hours attempting to linkup with a station and obtain a successful download. The HF radio is a valuable tool for communication. Every nation including our own wants to have their own regulations for use of the HF radio. Luckily there is an international system in place that helps regulate usage worldwide for good, bad or indifferent.

Anyway, that’s my story from the cockpit on our first day of passage to New Zealand.


Cheers!
Captain Dan

Fiji, September 2019, South Pacific, The South Pacific

It’s Not An Easy Life

For those who think cruising life is easy or is “the life of Riley”, we’ve got some news …. it’s rarely ever easy! Aside from the daily tasks of water and power maintenance, the scavenger hunts we call grocery shopping, the litany of chores such as cleaning stainless, decks and woodwork, engine maintenance, sail maintenance, anchor monitoring to be sure you or you neighbors aren’t sliding, troubles at sea as well as hiding from the weather….there are the big problems. The ones that we have to fix to be able to live in our home and continue to sail. 

Today we were all set to go to shore for some quick provisioning then come back and get ready for dinner with some friends who are here from New Zealand. As we were about to leave Dan noticed water coming out from the area under the seat at the table. That locker houses our Spectra water maker. We had it running and yep…it had sprung a leak! Arghhh!

We shut it down and headed to shore. We needed some provisions because we plan to leave tomorrow and Dan was certain it would be an easy fix. We shared a light lunch, got our supplies and then headed back to Dazzler so he could fix the leak and we could get ready to go to dinner.

There’s a saying in Water World that goes like this. “Every boat project is just one broken bolt away from being a three day event.” It’s a saying as true as “Nothing is free or easy in Water World.” Today it seems the “easy fix” comment was just waiting to bite us in the butt.

Dan replaced the end cap and put the water maker back together. We fired her up and within seconds he noticed another leak…this time in a piece of stainless tubing. Sure enough he found a hole in it. Okay, not a huge problem as we have a spare piece to replace it. Out comes the water maker again and he places it on the table. Understand that this is not a small piece of equipment and it’s rather awkward to handle. There’s the added issue that taking it apart means water … saltwater, goes  everywhere. No, not a fun project at all but Dan, ever the patient man, continues to work on it. I call Sean and Donna and explain that we need an extra hour to which they say, “it’s all good”. I start getting ready for dinner while Dan continues to work.

With the tubing replaced he puts the water maker back together and hooks it up again. He has me fire it up while he looks to be sure there are no more leaks. I hear “shit” come from the other side of the counter. “Shut it down. We’ve got another leak.” He says. 

“Another one? Really?” I question disappointingly. I know now this is going to be a much bigger deal than expected.

Sounds like we will not be going to dinner after all. I call Donna and Sean and let them know we’ve got a problem and can’t leave. You see, on land you turn on a spigot and water comes out…as long as you pay the bill of course. On a boat we either have to make our own water or we have to bring it in water jugs to the boat, which means we are tied to marinas and places where you can get good water. That can be a problem in third world countries. It’s also a problem when you have a nine day passage to get back to New Zealand coming up so Dan continues working.

I sit in the cockpit playing my tin whistle while enjoying the beautiful views while poor Dan is breaking his back to fix the water maker.

This time he replaces a bad O ring. Of course it requires the full removal of the water maker from the cabinet again. More water…more aggravation. I change clothes back into my boat attire and head to the cockpit. At this point I’m just trying to stay out of the way. The thing about boat projects is that they are messy and usually require a lot of things being strewn about as you dig through lockers to get to parts and tools so I know that keeping out of his way is the best way I can help.

It’s not long before I see Dan putting the unit back in the locker. From my seat at the helm I watch as he starts it up. I’m holding my breath this time and of course have said a little prayer. It runs for about thirty seconds. Dan kneels down in the locker and before I know it he’s turning it off again. It appears that the cylinder must have a small fissure in it.

This easy project has now become a huge problem because that’s a spare part we don’t have on the boat. Why? Well it’s an expensive one and one that isn’t likely to fail. What was that I said about the broken bolt and three days? Yes…this is going to be a much bigger deal. Of course the worst of it all is that we can’t just run up to the store and get one. Nope…it’s likely going to require having one ordered from the US and then shipped which makes an expensive part just that much more expensive. As we sit right now we are making water as the water maker leaks and we have a tub collecting the leakage. Tomorrow we will go to the marine store ashore to find out just how costly this is going to be and how long it will take to get the replacement cylinder. You know what they say about the word BOAT…Break Out Another Thousand. 

I’m NOT complaining about our life….not in the slightest way. We absolutely love our life on Dazzler. We see places and do things that most people will never see or do. We are blessed beyond words with what we have here. The point is that it’s not an easy life out here like most people believe. We work our butts off to be able to do this. Whenever new cruisers ask our advice we always tell them that if you don’t absolutely love it and aren’t willing to work like a dog to do it then you shouldn’t even consider it.

Excuse me now as it’s time for us to clean up all the water and put the boat back together so we can move around again. After that I guess we’ll heat up some soup. It’s certainly not the meal we planned. HA HA!

Until next time,

Jilly & Dan