It's been a while or as they say in Bislam english in Tanna, longtime no talkum to you. So, here we go again, another tale of woe and misery on passage! And then they good times roll. Read on....
You'd think were actually bad passage planners by the trips we've had. But we can't seem to take a trick. Some how our karma is on payback overtime. It started out with another good forecast and a 15 knot easterly to get us under way from Musket Cove in Fiji. Aiming for the passage at the south tip of New Caledonia our trip would be 627 nm. All day the wind steadily increased, hmmm? By dusk we had SE 20 – 25 knots and rolly confused seas, again! At least we were doing decent speeds. It was a clear night but got pretty rough, so rough that during Geoff's on watch shift, he'd dozed off on the settee bunk and I was awoken by a large thump! Geoff had be thrown off the bunk onto the cabin floor!! It wasn't very funny at the time and was very indicative of the night. You really had to hold on, even if you were asleep. The next day we were averaging 6 knots and had a ENE at 20 knots. It was Fathers Day, so phone calls to Max and Bob were made. By that night the winds backed off and we were only doing 5 knots in sloppy confused seas. Urk. Day 2 and the wind was now 10 knots from the East, yay and we had 361 miles to go to the passage at New Caledonia. But of course for us things changed, winds got lighter and lighter. By 3pm we were motoring and it was a nice stinky 30 degrees. Sometime during the night Geoff woke me to say he was seeing lightening to the SW and dark clouds....oh boy, here we go. Early near dawn on watch you could see the sky filling in with high level clouds and a big bank of cumulus clouds. It was getting ominous and I said to Geoff at dawn as we stared up at it wondering what it meant, that I thought it looked like the sky before the arrival of a Low or a major trough. We didn't get any lightening near us, or thunder or rain? But by 8.30 the seas were glassy and we were motoring. Slowly the wind did it's thing. It went round to the North and backed off to nothing, then picked up, 22 knots with a dark moody sky and a squall line to the south west. Over the next couple of hours the wind went round to the SW and picked up 10, 15, 20, 25 and then 30 knots!!! And settled in from the SSW....just where we needed to head! Bloody hell, this is not funny anymore! We have had more headwind sailing in this trip than in the whole four year circumnavigation!!!!!! Were not happy. And just to add to our misery, we have a good solid 2 knot current against us.
Wednesday morning it got worse about 2 am, the seas picked up to an unpleasant size, the wind was hitting 30 -35 knots from the SW-SSW and we were getting thumped trying to sail into it. Poor Sea Otter was doing her best, but it was bone shuddering and tiring. We heaved to. The boat sat pretty comfortable but was healed over at about 20 degrees. It still wasn't perfect but it was better than beating ourselves up. We were slowly drifting NE towards the island of Anatom or Aneityum the southern most island in Vanuatu. In the morning we were in a good position to pull the sails up and head straight for Anatom. We thought Port Patrick sounded good, I mean it is called PORT, so we made the silly assumption that it would be port like! Ha. First of all it was just about impossible to find, the position given in the guide book didn't add up to what we were seeing when we got there. So we took a chance and headed in to what we thought was the anchorage. Tucked in between reefs in between two breaking outer reefs. It wasn't the most comfortable anchorage, but we were glad to be anywhere but out in it. As we hadn't cleared into Vanuatu we could not go ashore but that was okay considering the concerns we had about Malaria. But we felt pretty bad as local villagers had come out on to the shore and it looked like we were just ignoring them. However we found out later that Anatom has a very bad problem with Malaria currently and there have been many deaths on the island!!!! The anchorage wasn't good and it certainly didn't fit the name of Port Patrick! There was no jetty, no real protection and not a lot of space...so the name is a bit baffling? Maybe Captain Cook named it after one of his officers that he didn't like?? We ended up deciding to move. We had looked at the guide book and there was another anchorage about 4 miles to the west. Anau un-se. We took off and we could see that it was a much calmer place even before we got in there, but this was one tight little anchorage!! The entrance between the two reefs left about 30' of deep water to squeeze through and inside there was definitely only room for one boat to anchor and swing between the shallows and the coral bommies. But it was calm and the anchor snubbed in well. So it was here that we spent the night. Under the haze of numerous mosquito coils, with our hatches closed so the little suckers (literally) couldn't find a way in....we slept a deep sleep typical of a post rough passage.
It was so calm the next morning we had great hopes of a nice run to New Caledonia. Yay, lighter winds and hopefully dropping seas. So we upped anchor early and motored out. Checking each other over for any signs of mossie bites. It was a very overcast morning and cloud hung over the mountain tops, drifting down like a heavy fog. We weren't far out of the anchorage, when we hit a strong southerly wind and a big choppy sea? Hmmm, the anchorage was so calm, maybe it is just funneling around the island? We'll keep going a bit further and see if it settles down once were out of the lee of the island. Hmmmm still strong winds, in fact increasing and the seas are getting a lot more white caps! Oh bugger! Here we go again. Yep nothing had really backed off at all, we seemed to have been anchored in a wind shadow and the reality is, it's still very rough. Decision time. Do we go back to that anchorage? We shouldn't we are supposed to clear in to Vanuatu and being stuck on the boat is a drag. Do we push on and hope it backs off? Do we run north to Tanna and clear in? Yes well of course as you know by now, we are in Tanna. It was a wild and woolly 42 nm run north. Big ground swell around 20 foot and a nice steep wind chop on top of it. The good thing was Geoff felt it was perfect fish catching weather. His theory is that fish like wild and woolly weather! He put the trolling line out and about 10 miles south of the island of Tanna, I noticed two large dark shapes following the lure. Big dark shapes.....ah Geoff I think something monstrous is following your lure......We both watched these two torpedo's hunt down the lure, have a few snack attacks at it and then.....Bang. Something big took the lure and disappeared deep with it. We watched it for a few minutes and nothing surfaced. Oh oh. By this stage we were surfing down the waves and looking back we finally saw something being very unhappy about being caught on Geoff's lure, it then took a leap and we saw the long spear like beak and a black colour, and a sail like fin.....oh my god! Geoff has hooked a big Black Marlin!!!!! What do we do now? Geoff shakily stated that he wasn't going to try and haul that thing in! A few more minutes of watching the monster slash and fight and leap and then.....Bang. It was gone with the lure and trace. Ah phew! But Geoff was pretty chuffed that he had actually hooked a Black Marlin anyway and decided to put his last squid lure out and hope he got something smaller and less threatening. 20 minutes later, bang another hit and we saw a big Mahi Mahi hit the lure, but after it disappeared behind a big wave and white water, all we saw next was the hook, no lure. Oh well, the hook dragged through the top of the water for about 10 minutes then I said, ah Geoff you have a fish! Yep a small 2' Mahi Mahi, obviously a desperate one, hit the hook dragging on it's own!? Incredible. So not wanting to loose this perfect two person fish, we hauled him in and bagged him until we got into Port Resolution.
Port Resolution Tanna Island, Vanuatu
Port Resolution is a long narrow harbour indented into the NE coast of Tanna, just a few km's away is the very active volcano Mt Yasur. Apparently the most accessible active volcano in the world. It was going to be a must see! Geoff had to catch the bus (a 4wd ute) to the other side Lenekal to clear in. Just a nice bumpy, dirt road for 2 hours there and then the usual formalities, Customs, Immigration, Quarantine, Health. 10000 vatu approximately $110 aud just to clear in!! Ouch, it was going to be an expensive week. I didn't go as only the captain should leave the boat to clear in, so at 1pm when Geoff returned I was keen to get ashore!! The village of Port Resolution is a wealthier village than some of the others around the bay. However, what you see is thatched huts, no mod cons, a hand pump for water, chickens, pigs and lots of children. It was a neat, pretty village and they obviously took a lot of pride in presentation. The only gleaming oddity was the mobile phone tower that stood proud in the village paddock.
We spent our time there hanging out with 45' Aussie catamaran 'Ozz Magic' from Mooloolabah! Kevin, Erica and two of their six daughters Mary and Abby. A beautiful boat, so much space compared to a mono hull!!! We shared a traditional village lunch with them in the thatched hut on the white sand ocean beach, swapped books and dvd's and I made the girls brownies, cookies and caramel slice. Apparently their going to miss my baking, since we've headed in different directions. But hopefully will catch up with them in Brissie, as their eldest daughter lives at Kangaroo Point.
Now the volcano, the visit is a pre-organised tour in the back of the ute with 8 yachties packed in for 3500 vatu each. You leave just before sunset (but our driver was late) so we didn't get going until 5pm. You are taken through the hinterland jungles, very jurassic park and lush. The roads are black ash and after the rains we'd had very rough. Geoff thought we were going to die. Bouncing around trying to hold on in the back of the ute, left us both with bruises for the next few days. I'm sure our bottoms were black and blue!! You slowly climb up the hills, then the roads get absolutely terrifying....ok now I thought we might die! Our driver was 15, no license but very conscientious. And stopped at the bottom of steep, slippery rutted out sections to lean back and tell us to hold on! Up we climbed into the dark, then with the full moon rising, we could see the large dark pyroplasmic clouds coming out of the volcano. Then we hit the ash fields, where the driver took off at about 50 kms up to the base of the volcano. Then it's just a 5 minute up hill walk along the ash path, to the crater edge. It is shocking to get to the top and walk along the rim and there is NO fences, barricades, rails nothing to stop you from going anywhere. You just go stand at the edge with the 20 other tourists in the dark and look down into the glowing pit. Then with a deep, crackling rumble and large glow emits and bang 100 metres into the sky lava, rock and smoke is thrown. It is absolutely terrifyingly beautiful, scary, unimaginable and hypnotic. Every 20 or 30 seconds boom another explosion. Some take longer, some are bigger, some throw glowing rocks just 10 metres away from you onto the ledge below. It is fantastic, but deadly. Last year two japanese tourists were killed by large boulders blown out of the volcano. There is a rating system for danger levels, we were at 3. 4 is no tourists allowed, 5 is evacuate closer surrounding villages. Hmmmm...this could kill us. It was also cold and windy, but with the full moon shining down you felt at least you could see your way around the rim and the walk back down. What a night, we survived our drive back and literally glowed for hours after talking about it.
Heading up to the Mt Yasur volcano!
So a few more days enjoying the snorkeling on the outer harbour reef, Geoff surfing the 1-2' break on the same reef ...then we knew we had to go. The risk of malaria, was real and the risk of getting lung cancer from the mossie coils probably higher! We took off with a good forecast..yes again, for 10 -15 SE, maybe even ESE?? And guess what? We got it!! woo hoo!!!
It is about 220 -240 nm from around the corner at Port Resolution to the entrance of Havannah Passage on the SE corner of New Caledonia. Or we could go to the island of Lifou in the Loyalties. But we decided since the weather was being so kind to may hay while the sun shines and keep going. The wind got lighter and lighter on the second day and we ended up approaching the passage with little wind. Not good considering the current runs through the pass at about 2 knots. So at 8 pm we found ourselves motoring and at about 1 am we hit the passage. The seas were dead flat, no real ground swell, a fairly full moon and little breeze. Perfect conditions to enter, even so we still got some solid wind against current chop, eddies, tidal overflows and a speed of only 1.7 knots. But once we got through, lovely calm conditions to motor through the night. It is about 32 nm from the passage to Noumea, we decided to keep motoring rather than find an anchorage in the dark. So we followed beacons, leading lights, our radar and GPS. To wind our way through the islands, channels and reefs. We got about an hour sleep each, as we both needed to be on the ball to watch the radar, pick out the lights and keep our course. Slowly daylight broke to a rainy, cool day and we were 12 nm away from Noumea. Then it poured, which was nice to clean the salt off the decks, but man it was cold. We aren't used to this 18 -20 degrees anymore. Brrr.
Our arrival in Noumea harbour ended up being a bit depressing, the latest info we had was that the Port Moselle Marina has a visitors berth for arriving yachts and that they call all the officials down for you to clear in. Sounds sweet. But when we radioed, they had no space and said we should go off and anchor then go to each of the official offices to clear in. Doh!!!! We couldn't find space to anchor in the main harbour so had to go around the corner to Baie de Sud and anchor there, then unpack the dinghy, blow it up and motor all the way round to Port Moselle marina. By the time we did that and picked up a map from the office to show where Customs, Immigration and Quarantine and headed off to them, was it was lunch time! So we waited and grabbed a wonderful crunchy baguette, yep just like in French Polynesia for our own lunch. Cleared in after lunch and of course as a treat after being in the nether regions of westernised culture for the last month...treated ourselves to a McDonald's sundae!!!!
So here we sit in the busy Port Moselle, our marina eventually found a vacancy that afternoon and we snapped it up! It means we have water at the boat, showers, toilets and rubbish bins and only $35 aud a night. Luxury. Plus we can get our washing done at the local Laundromat, only serviced ones here...so pretty expensive. But saves me a day of hand washing a HUGE pile of dirty clothes from Musket Cove to here. They have a fabulous market place on the waterfront, full of fruit, vegetables, gifts, crafts, seafood, shells, pastries, flowers, you name it! A great chandlery...but that's REALLY expensive and a normal supermarket. But that too is expensive like in Tahiti. It cost us $240 aud to buy groceries today and trust me it was only 4 bags worth.... not much at all. Not a lot of chocolate (too expensive) no lollies (they don't have snakes, jaffa's or clinkers) not many chips $6.80 for a bag of Lays!!!! Not even much dairy as a 500 gram block of Mainland Mild cheese was $8.90!! Oh maybe I'm grumbling too much and maybe prices in Oz have gone up too and I will get home and be shocked, but it is very scary buying normal groceries here. You actually start to feel poor! And Internet! Well it's hard to get, no real reliable service to the yachts and the Internet Cafe is charging 1000 CPF for an hour, that's $15 aud!!!!! So this may be our only and last Blog entry. I have so many great photo's and would love to have spread the tales of Fiji to Vanuatu to here a little further...but you will just have to make do with this mammoth entry, sorry.
So, from here we will head out to the Isle de Pins a veritable minefield of white sandy beaches, atolls with clear water and great anchorages. Hopefully lots of snorkeling, fishing, swimming, shelling and just generally laying about. Possibly a trip up to Ouvea Atoll on the east coast then over the top of New Caledonia and down to Koumac...or, we could just stay in the Isle de Pins? Making the most of the our last foreign port before crossing the puddle to Australia. It was a weird feeling yesterday to look out towards the west as we motored into Noumea, to realise there is nothing between us and home now, but ocean. No more landfalls of paradise, no more fanciful dreams of idyllic islands, no more languorous days, sigh......Reality calls and with a potential 6 day passage of 760 nm, we will be home in no time. But for the next 3 weeks or so....indulgent lolling about on beaches on order!
See you at Dockside, Kangaroo Point sometime around mid to late October, or early November...depends on how much lolling we can take!!
Au Revoir.
The anchorage at North Straddie
The calm before the armada!
Ben flying over Sea Otter
