First boating weekend of the season...

[John B]

School holidays too, so the boy and I shot away for 3 days and a bit.
First decent weather system for a month or so so it was a nice change.. only problem .. very little wind.

sunday morning at drunks bay after an early afternoon start on saturday.. The lovely Bruce Clark design Innocenti beside us. Innocenti is three skins of Kauri and just one of those boats, beautifully built, extremely well maintained and with an ownership provenance/ history you'd be very pleased to be part of yourself. That boat campaigned hard in her early years( mid 1980's construction ?) but has subsequently been around the world and made numerous pacific islands trips.. most recently up to tahiti and back down and around to Hobart and then back here. She has a Gary Mull look to her to me.

.. we stayed the night with one other boat at the back of Rakino island after a nice wee sail and an unsuccessful fish.
Monday very light, thats the Noises in front of us



I always enjoy looking at the land in the various threads we see here from the PNW or Casco bay or intracoastal or Montreal.... this is your typical Hauraki gulf island look.. The flat NZ green.

[John B]

I tell you what amazes me every time I experience it. Its that there's another world out there, a parallel universe where there's few people and tons of room. Its called the working week......

We fancied a bit of fishin so we dropped a line or two unsucessfully until the turn of the tide, and drift fished with softbaits...

bite time..



the boy complete with school soccer trip away hair crime..



Love those baits .. always mouth hooked if you want to release.

[L.W. Baxter]

Nice pictures, John B. Looks like some good bonding was had.

...there's another world out there, a parallel universe where there's few people and tons of room. Its called the working week.....

Yeah, no kidding! Got out last Tuesday for tuna with some wooden dory fishing friends, on some of the flattest water of the year. We were all alone from the jetty tips to 40 miles out and back. No competition at the ramp, either. Kids are back to school, so I played hooky solo.

Taking license to add some photos to your thread...heading out of Tillamook Bay in the a.m.


Our wing boat, a glen-l Hunk, builder and one-time WBF member edsr at the helm


My best albacore of the season, headed for the deep chill...


And back to the barn, late afternoon...

[John B]

Excellent fish there Lee! The tuna we pick up ( usually on passage somewhere up the coast) are either skippys or much smaller albacore than that one.
Here's our snapper after a couple of hours, we put a few back and only kept the smaller ones if they were damaged.
Fed 2 boats and the rest home for family tonight.


Hey, I got that tld25! trolled a bit but nothing happening.. nice to use though.. very nice.

[Phil Y]

Nice work John
Phil

[Larks]

In a T-Shirt????? Seriously now John, you're not really in New Zealand are you mate!!!!! (or has that bleach gone through to his brain as well??)

Depending on how our ally' boat refit is travelling, I'm hoping to be over that way for Christmas again this year....'you likely to be up around Kerri Kerri over the festive season for a beer or two? (and an excuse for me to escape the out laws)?

[John B]

Thanks Phil.

Larks, I really had to work hard to get that boy to wear his T shirt and shorts for the photo as its still really cold here.
Bitter .. bitterly cold, just between the rain squalls .

The plan this year is to go north this christmas as it happens and if we can juggle it'd be great to catch up. Its still very fluid ATM though, dependent on family matters a bit and also because if we have westerlies, we'll be staying away from the BOI.
But lets talk closer to the time eh.
Coming to AKL?

[Larks]

Coming to AKL?

If I have my way we'll have a day either side in AKL, last time I agreed to go over to the outlaws I did so on the condition that I could have a day or two to wander around the viaduct and so on, but somehow the only connecting flights to KK had us in to AKL at 10.00pm and out at about 9.00am the next day with a three hour turnaround on the way back. Now I'm also really really keen to check out that chandlery (forgotten the name of it, a thread on here a while back??) so may push to hire a car rather than fly up (though if we do fly up the outlaws Jag becomes mine for the time I'm there...so it's not all bad).

[StevenBauer]

Nice fish!

Funny how our seasons are just exactly opposite. Here now each sail could be the last of the season. We'll be in the water for about 2 more weeks. Hopefully two or three nice sails.



Steven

[John B]

We've had a brutal weather sort of september Steven, I'm hoping its the equinox a bit early and it improves from now on. Normally its october thats all over the place weather wise.
This weekend looks like a boomer so we'll try for another long one .... 3 or 4 days if I have my way ( while the school holidays are on).

[StevenBauer]

Take pics. We'll compare next week.



Steven

[John B]

Fosters. Its about a block from the viaduct so easy to get to. There's quite a collection of the Southern trust's boats building up in the viaduct now too.. Wairiki, Rawene , Tucana etc all over where Arcturus is moored.

[John B]

Second boating weekend of the season, with only one I've forgotten how to do this newbie type kerfuffle as opposed to the 2 or 3 last weekend. Full boat with 3 kids and Kirsty and I and 3 1/2 days as its still school holidays.
Good breeze.. 20 knots or so sat , 10 knots sun, nil mon and tues morning. Met up with our cruisy mates Contour for a night







didn't catch any fish all weekend.. not even any bites, just this dude


who was happy to go back

[Larks]

with only one I've forgotten how to do this newbie type kerfuffle as opposed to the 2 or 3 last weekend

At least you get to do that in relative privacy at this time of the season, I had all of mine in one hit in front of the whole mob at the WBF EBS at Fingal when I tried to put Kate in the drink........(I hadn't had the sails up on the Hartley for quite a while)

[John B]

Oh yeah ... at least last week it was only in front of about 6 or 10 boats.. later in the season it'd be 50 in the same bay.. this weeks little episode was in front of one.

The trend is going the right way anyway eh.

[Robbie 2]

Some nice Smapper there John.

[John B]

Gotta love em Robbie. I'm looking at flys as we spoke about and now those small flasher rigs and wondering if a set of those on a trace on a softbait lure would entice the trevally?.. hmmm. even just one on its own trace for the fly idea.....

This weekend is labour weekend .. 3 days , this is the forecast for sat/ sun / mon



what should we do ?

[Thad]

Have fun!!

[John B]

There must have been a hundred or so of these guys out there..



but a bit later these big units 8 or 9 ft long came in and this guy just haunched himself in under the bow with his dorsal fin on one side and head on the other and went for a free ride, being pushed along by the boat..Stayed there for ages it seemed.... Hilarious.

[rbgarr]

Thanks as always, John, for showing us your world. It's dreamlike.

[ShoestringMariner]

There must have been a hundred or so of these guys out there..



but a bit later these big units 8 or 9 ft long came in and this guy just haunched himself in under the bow with his dorsal fin on one side and head on the other and went for a free ride, being pushed along by the boat..Stayed there for ages it seemed.... Hilarious.

What a fantastic experience!

[John B]

Third boating weekend

We did thankyou Thad.
Unreal weather, enough to get a bit of a sail in and the rest was glassy calm. Not quite so calm at the anchorages we ended up at but too bad , thats the way the cookie crumbles.
Saw just an amazing number of dolphin out on Sat.. lots of the little common ones and two pods of biguns/ porpoises?.
A nice night sat night with the Ngatiras plus our two cruising mates and two launch fulls of friends as well. Quite the foursies on the beach. Went fishin at four o dark on one of the launches, we kept 18 snapper for the 5 boats and had some interesting sport with 3 barracouta and a couple of odd orange fish( red cod and a little scorpion fish)
Caught up with Wairiki out for her first weekend sailing!

excellent time .

[John B]

Cheers Dave,although its not really quite so dreamlike most of the time. The fact is the weather cycles here are often in 3 to 5 days of good and 3 to 5 days of wet and often windy. So its unusual to get fine glassy conditions like these for the three weekends we have been out so far this season( this thread).. to have the weather good cycle fitting in with the weekends has been very lucky.

Its a La nina year this year so that means lots of spectacularly good and lots of spectacularly bad with a probabilty of cyclones dropping down on us from the tropics.

Using these years as a guide, the forecast for the Nov 2010 to April 2011 season is for 9 to 12 named storms (9 is average). 3 are forecast to reach at least category 3, and 1 is forecast to reach at least category 4 (average winds near centre of 64 knots or more). The Coral Sea and surrounding places west of 180 have an elevated risk of Cyclone impact.

[Chip-skiff]

Great photos of the Gulf- thanks.

Snowing sideways, here.

[John B]

Isn't that a bit early Chips ?

Another day out on t' water.
Seems to be extended good weather here ATM, although the one day ( sat ) we had aside for a daysail with relatives here from Cali forn eye eh turned out to be a little bit blustery and overcast 15, 18.. 20 ish knots. Still, I wore me laughing polar bear cap and me phoenix T shirt (under the other 3 layers) and tried to enjoy myself. Terrible difficult it was, especially when I discovered one was phobic( not a true medical state) about rocks. I mean to say ... 20 knots on the wind, cold drizzle in the face and a bucketing tide PLUS some mildly exhibited fear/ stress as I pointed out each lurking hard thing.

Fantastic.

[Chip-skiff]

Isn't that a bit early Chips ?

Actually, rather late. Our house is about the same elevation as the Hermitage Lodge near Mt. Cook. We have a 45 day frost-free season and our first snow usually arrives in early September.

While you were sailing and fushing, I was rigging a climbing rope across a cliffbound reach of the North Platte, to boat-survey a last cross-section before the freeze. The water was about 3-4°C: after a bit it feels like it's burning your skin.

Maybe that's why I revel in your sailing adventures. Go with Tangaroa, mate!

[John B]

He'll do me . But they're hardly adventures... all a bit mundane really, such is life.
My sister in law from Mammoth was telling us about the bears that regularly wander around and one in particular the kids had taken a photo of( turned out to be a bit close when she looked at the picture).
That's adventure.

[John B]

It cast a pall on the day for me.. more for the bird I'm sure, but later on the sun came out and we settled down in a favourite bay not many people go to.. the kids even went swimming although with the water temp only at 15.8 C.. a bit too cold for moi.

[John B]

A Sat night out but it didn't start well at all. Part of my new rod purchase for this season was a lure recommended by the fishing guy . The labour weekend when we came across the Dolphins as above ,we had moment when some gannet were diving close to where it was trolling behind the boat. Odd, I thought, and reeled it in just in case, but knowing from 30 years sailing that they're too smart to take a lure.


Very shortly after this photo, 4 sails set, a gannet did hit it and hooked up. What a nightmare, We were all just horrified and did the best we could to get it in, free it and send it off as fast as possible. I think he was ok, the hook was though some wing tissue .... I cut the barb to remove the hook but we were gutted it'd happened at all. Thats the end of that lure,its just too realistic and its designed to walk the dog at only 3 or 5 ft down, I'll buy a diver with a bib instead.

[Hwyl]

Glad to see you still like the mizzen staysail, What is the light line under the main boom / sheet.

Coupla more wraps on that jib sheet winch, unless you're very attentive, which you are.

[John B]

The light line is just a lazy jack gimmick which catches the first half of the sail,it needs a tidy up.
Yup you're right, but it was 7 gusting nine on a broad reach and the load was not significant. Nevertheless I can see I'll have to put my Queeg hat on and have a sharp word to whoever may have sheeted that sail. On second thoughts , I wonder if you'd mind doing that for me.

Not that she's very scary or anything... but geographical advantage and all that.

[Hwyl]

Would that entail me coming to EnZed. Ngatira is just stunning isn't she?

Just read the Bob Perry Book, he admits to getting ideas from Laurie Davidson and they were chums.

[John B]

It'd be safer from offshore but .....


I think I knew that and I have his Yacht design ( according to Perry?) book although I don't particularly remember it from there.. probably something said on SA I think.

I met Laurie Davidson briefly when we were hauled , I understand she's still one of his favourite designs. I looked around when I was working under the boat and saw him standing back looking at it. I asked a couple of questions but forgot all the ones I wanted to ask , like why the tumblehome?

I went aboard one of his production boats on sunday, It's a Cavalier 45 from the mid 1980's I think. they have a good reputation as weatherly, big volume cruising boat here.
14 tons compared to Riada at about 11.

I can see some similarities up about the cove line where our freeboard ends, but below the waterline they're a lot fuller too





Very interesting man and family. They stepped off a mull 42 about 18 months ago halfway between Tonga and NZ. The boat was sailing really well in about 35, deep reefed etc etc but they fell off a wave and broke the main bulkhead. A while later they fell off a second wave, the deck moved up ,hull breathed in , rigging went slack and the rig dropped over the side.
Further significant structural damage ( on investigation) caused him to put his family first and they pinged the epirb.

[Larks]

Looks quite flat and calm to have the main reefed down so much, I gather this must have been taken around lunchtime? Or are those grey clouds something rolling in?

BTW, I'll be up Kerikeri way from 23 to 30 Dec if you're anywhere near for a beer - I will have a car to escape the outlaws again.

[peter radclyffe]

It'd be safer from offshore but .....


I think I knew that and I have his Yacht design ( according to Perry?) book although I don't particularly remember it from there.. probably something said on SA I think.

I met Laurie Davidson briefly when we were hauled , I understand she's still one of his favourite designs. I looked around when I was working under the boat and saw him standing back looking at it. I asked a couple of questions but forgot all the ones I wanted to ask , like why the tumblehome?

I went aboard one of his production boats on sunday, It's a Cavalier 45 from the mid 1980's I think. they have a good reputation as weatherly, big volume cruising boat here.
14 tons compared to Riada at about 11.

I can see some similarities up about the cove line where our freeboard ends, but below the waterline they're a lot fuller too





Very interesting man and family. They stepped off a mull 42 about 18 months ago halfway between Tonga and NZ. The boat was sailing really well in about 35, deep reefed etc etc but they fell off a wave and broke the main bulkhead. A while later they fell off a second wave, the deck moved up ,hull breathed in , rigging went slack and the rig dropped over the side.
Further significant structural damage ( on investigation) caused him to put his family first and they pinged the epirb.

like why the tumblehome

John , apart from aesthetics it is used sometimes to reduce the beam when heeled, which as you know increases speed