The plan is to head 190-200T until 25S, then turn left and head for New Zealand. Winds are forecast to be light. It should take us 8 or 9 days. So no blog entries until then . Wish us bon voyage......
John has arrived and we are all organised to go. Pay the marina, fill up with diesel, take Diva up to Lautoka, clear customs and go.
The plan is to head 190-200T until 25S, then turn left and head for New Zealand. Winds are forecast to be light. It should take us 8 or 9 days. So no blog entries until then . Wish us bon voyage......
0 Comments
Friday 19th October, stayed in the Blue Lagoon and made passage meals. The freezer is filling up with little one person meal containers.
Saturday 20th October heading south in a nice E breeze anchored at Cuvu Bay 17 09.51S, 177 12.22E Sunday 21st October left Cuvu Bay at 0900 and after an on again off again day sail-motor-sail-motor arrived at Musket Cove at 1600 17 46.27S, 17711.21E Monday 22nd October stayed in Musket Cove and finished making passage meals. There's now 24 single person meals in the freezer...for 3 people that's 8 meals plus we have some pre-prepared indian currys that just need heating and rice..so we have enough dinners for at least 10 days. Rigged the storm jib and checked the sheet leads; it will sit in a bag hanked on to the inner forestay ready to go. Checked all the shackles are tight, lifelines taught, need to check the screws on the bimini frame that holds up the solar panels, lots of "putting away" still to do. Tuesday 23rd October - bacon and eggs for breakfast !! Will head off to Vuda Pt Marina later today. John arrives tomorrow night. Current plan is probably to clear out and leave Fiji on Friday. Waiting to see what Bob McDavitt has to say about the weather, but it looks to me that Friday would be a good day to go. The SPCZ is descending on Fiji / Tonga this coming weekend so I think it would be good to leave before that arrives as it brings rain and gales, which we really don't want. so ooroo from Musket Cove for now. Next blog update will be when we leave and then nothing on the trip as no internet at sea. Our Sailmail address is [email protected] if anyone wants to make contact...but PLEASE no attachments and keep the text message short as its all done by HF radio and it's not fast ! Tuesday afternoon off to Sawa-i-Lau. Went into the village to meet the chief..very well spoken man, nice house. Did some shopping at the market on the beach and headed back to have lobster grilled with butter for dinner !
16 50.86S 177 27.99E Wednesday morning, looks like rain is coming...man did it bucket down. In about 2 hours the dinghy was nearly full !..We should save some of that for washing !! While it rained I made some meals for the passage, spaghetti bolognaise, 6 containers of it. By midday the rain has gone and the sky cleared so set off to Yasawairara. hooked a walu on the way up but before I could get it on the boat, it broke free......damn Beautiful white sand beach, very tidy village , new house building going on. Met a well spoken chap who told us about the resort project where the village is leasing 75 acres to an NZ busness man. He's coming in two weeks to start the development. The village gets money for the lease of the land, jobs for the villagers at the resort and 7% of the profits...not bad ! 16 42.54S 177 34.47E Thursday morning there's a nice breeze from the east, set off with the main up and pretty soon we're broad reaching with main and genoa in 10 -13 knots, clear sky, sunshine just lovely...when Bang !, my fishing rod cranks right over and with a whack the line breaks..its 60kg braid...and it's gone..depth is 35m couldn't have been a rock surely ? Anyway that's par for the course...run out of luers and haven't landed a fish !! By early afternoon back in the Blue Lagoon. 16 56.65S 177 22.03E At 0700 this morning we heard "Bula!" outside. Up to investigate..A young man from the village opposite on a surfboard paddling. After introductions, Bula Alan, Bula Manassa, we got down to business. Two lobsters for $30..tthat's F$15 (A$8.50) each !!! One for dinner tonight, one in the freezer for another day. New page under Boat Pictures; Boats in the Blue Lagoon
I remember having this problem before...10 years ago. Temperature would go up then down, then up, then down. Its to do with the fact that the water pipes that take water from the engine to the hotwater cylinder are about 6 metres long and they come from the engine to the hotwater cyclinder and then back to the thermostat housing on the engine.
This happened years ago when I replaced the thermostat. At the time I asked the old guy that used to look afte all the mechanicals on Diva and he said, ah you don't have any holes in the rim to act as a bypass. The thermal inertia of all that water in those pipes is what causes the issue. Well the thermostat we put in on Friday had 4 holes in it. The old one we took out had 6. So this morning I've taken the thermostat out and drilled 2 more holes in it. Now the engine takes longer to warm up, but it doesn't get into this cycling business with the thermostat unable to control the running temperature. So, all good now ?....Let's hope so ! Left Vuda Pt for Musket cove on Friday afternoon...easy sail all the way into the bay.
Saturday up early and off to points north..heading for Waya Island. There's absolutely no wind and we end up motoring all the way. Rejected Waya as an anchorage as there's quite a strong NW swell rolling in so we carry on up to Cuvu Bay near Manta Ray on Naviti Island. 9.6 hours of motoring and then engine temperature sat on 80 all the way. Sunday morning start off to head for the Blue Lagoon...oops...engine is running hot 100 degrees ! Stop everything, let it cool down and go and look at the thermostat...can't find anything wrong...put it all back again and its sitting on 80....hmmm OK, off we go and shortly after rounding Nacialau Pt on the north side of Soso Bay, we're sailing in a stiffening E breeze. We're roaring up the reef heading for the pass and I think that if we keep really close to reef , we may be able to sneak through the pass on a diagonal, coming out at the SEend of the next reef. By the time we get there the breeze is really E and its 30 knots, we turn a bit east to negotiate the pass, but we can't lay the SE corner of the next one,so on with the engine and we'll drive into it. The depth in the pass is only 5-12 m so the sea from outside coming through the pass is mighty ! We're going OK albeit slowly when I notice the engine temperture is on the rise again...up to 100 !..what to do, turn around and head for Somosomo Bay or...then suddenly the temp drops back to 80, so we carry on. I think I know what's going on here !...more later We make it out of the pass and get back on a course of 025 M and head for the next pass that takes us in to the Blue Lagoon. We are tearing along over 7 knots most of the time with a half furled genoa and 30 odd knots true just aft of the beam. In no time we reach Kubo pass, turn left and run all the way in. Anchored in the Blue Lagoon, very peaceful. This is probably the best anchorage in Fiji..in the west anyway. WEATHERGRAM
YOTREPS Issued 14 Oct 2012 Bob McDavitt's ideas for sailing around the South Pacific. Disclaimer: Weather is a mix of pattern and chaos; these ideas are from the patterned world of weather maps, so please fine-tune to your place. Dates are in UTC unless otherwise stated. The Ocean: Equatorial sea surface temperatures SST of out widest ocean act something like a thermostat for the weather engine—when they are sufficiently warmer than normal it is called an El Nino episode. Well they have been above average across much of the tropical Pacific over the last few months but are now relaxing. An El Nino may still occur over the next few months but it now doesn't look as though it will be a big one. http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/indexis a good site for latest on El Nino and SST. The Atmosphere: The Southern Oscillation Index or SOI (30 day running mean) is relaxing after a bounce back from its low of -1.01 back on 25 Aug. It has been hovering near zero for the past few weeks and was plus 0.2 on 11 October. It’s now in neutral mode, and may swing back into El Nino mode over the next few weeks. These indicators show that, at this stage, the coming cyclone season may have an el nino touch to it but not much of a touch. NIWA are likely to add more info about this in the next few weeks. Cyclones: Still busy in the northern Hemisphere with PRAPIROON and a tropical Low southeast of Japan, RAFAEL in the Caribbean and PAUL southwest of Mexico. Southern Indian Ocean has woken up with ANAIS heading for Reunion Island making an interesting early start for the southern Hemisphere cyclone season. http://tropic.ssec.wisc.edu/#is a good site for latest on cyclones. The South Pacific Convergence Zone SPCZ has shifted in the last week to the north of its normal range and stretches from Solomons to Tuvalu/ Tokelau/ Northern cooks and occasionally around Marquesas. During the coming week it is likely to drift south, reaching Vanuatu to Fiji by the end of Tuesday and staying there until Friday. It is likely to arrive over the Tonga region the Tonga region around Friday 19Oct and linger there until it develops a Tropical Low that should then move off to the southeast early next week. AVOID planning any departing voyages when the SPCZ is visiting. It brings squally showers and these can be troublesome. SUBTROPICAL RIDGE STR STR is well defined at present. High that is crossing the Tasman Sea tonight is expected to move along the 25 to 30S latitude band by Thu 18 Oct. It has squash zone of enhanced wind both north and south of it. It followed by another using the 30 to 35 South latitude zone from Thursday 19 Oct to Sun 21 October. This high is expected to be gentler than its predecessor and only have a squash zone in the Coral zone. NZ/Tasman Sea The two Lows that crossed NZ on 8-9 Oct and 12-14 Oct deepened at the same time, bringing lots of wind and rain and consequent damage. This week we have a windy front crossing NZ on Thursday 18 and another on Monday 22 Oct- Note , that Monday is Labour day a public holiday in NZ commemorating NZ as the first place in the world to legislate the 8 hour working day (yeah, right). Next front over NZ is likely to be Thursday 25 Oct. These fronts are MOT expected to bring deepening Lows like last week, but it will be easier to arrive in NZ between them rather than during them. Between the passing Highs, NZ continues to be subjected to a disturbed westerly flow, with LOWS forming and deepening in the mid-Tasman Seas on Monday and Tuesday 8-9 Oct and again on Friday to Sunday 12-14 Oct. SAILING TO/FROM NORTHERN NZ. We will soon be approaching the interesting part of the migration season which I call Analysis Paralysis of the Minerva Yacht Club. Cruising sailors are world renown for their ability to gather data from almost everywhere even in the remote Minerva, and then sharing their ideas with their neighbours in a great “show and tell” even if its just over the radio. The result is a committee of motion but no commitment to moving. The problem is that if you over examine the data something somewhere will always say “don't go”. So let me simplify things so you can work out when to go or no. 1: Avoid departing when the SPCZ is overhead or nearby. 2. Respect squash zones—they are not much of a problem this week except in the Coral Sea. Sometimes they can't be fully avoided. 3. Try to time your voyage (depending on the speed of your vessel) to AVOID arriving in NZ on the same day as a front. See dates given above. 4, - a corollary of 3… Fronts at this time of the year are usually less than a week apart and the voyage to NZ usually take more than a week, so front’s can't be avoided altogether: better to arrange to encounter them near 30S in the STR where they are usually at their weakest. If things change then 30S is the place with deep water and open ocean, good for hoving to . I hope these 4 tips help you decide. |
Archives
November 2013
Categories |