Christmas in Auckland, New Zealand

25. Dec. 2015
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New Zealand
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1 Comment

Author: Pete

Location: Auckland and Waiheke, New Zealand

The collection of islands crowding the harbor mouth eventually parted ways and let Auckland’s pointy skyline peek out. The Sky Needle loomed as we sailed in, as did the freighters bulldozing out to sea. We did our best to stay out of the way and spread good tidings.

Slid easily into a berth at Westhaven Marina, right downtown Auckland. Due to it’s ideal location the marina is purported to be the largest in the southern hemisphere. It showed; our slip was on X-Dock and took Miranda twenty minutes to walk to the marina office to check in while I cleaned up the boat and made ready for our incoming crew!

When our friend Jessica arrived the next morning we wandered around the city, provisioned the boat for the imminent Christmas feasting, and then went out to dinner to get our palates readied for the gastronomic onslaught. Waddled our way back to the boat through the lit-up houses in Auckland. Got a kick out of the New Zealand Christmas Kiwi in place of our Midwestern Lawn Reindeer.

Christmas lights were up and shining all night on the boat. I don’t know how Chris Kringle does it, but he found his way to Tayrona without a problem. The boat isn’t fitted with a chimney and I’m not sure which through-hull he had to squeeze through to get aboard. Maybe I don’t want to know. But in the morning there were presents under the Christmas herb garden, and Sweedish Tea Ring baking in the oven!

After presents and breakfast we cast off and sailed out of Auckland harbor, running under full canvas in fifteen knots. The fair winds were a gorgeous Christmas present and all of Auckland was out on the water. We covered the fifteen miles to Waiheke Island and found our gaggle of boat friends in Oneroa Bay. There was ham and lamb, pierogis and mushroom soup, champagne, and a whole lot of bollocks in true sailor fashion. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Kawau and Tiritiri Matangi Islands, New Zealand

20. Dec. 2015
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New Zealand
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2 Comments

Author: Pete

Location: Kawau and Tiritiri Matangi Islands, New Zealand

After topping up water tanks and giving the boat one last wash, we threw off the dock lines and motored quietly out of Marsden Point Marina. Tayrona was happy to be out sailing again after a week in the captivity of a dock. Her exuberance was felt somehow by the ocean gods who sent fair winds and a dolphin pod to ride our bow wake south to Kawau Island. Along the way I picked up an island on radar that wasn’t supposed to be there according to the charts. It was the wrong signature to be a boat. Something wasn’t right, and we approached wearily. Turns out it was a house!

The island of Kawau is a twenty mile sail from Whangarei, home to a historic manor and the ruins of an 1840’s copper mine. Things are pretty low-key when it comes to exploring on your own and we nosed around the fancy mansion ground and industrial ruins with touristic impunity.

Another twenty miles south the island of Tiritiri Matangi is a bird sanctuary. The squawks and growls that emanated from the vegetation were something out of Jurassic Park. The sea life was pretty good too, with green-lipped mussels, burly Red Moki, and Bull Kelp dancing in the swell.

In the evening a small commercial fishing boat anchored next to us in the empty little cove. The two Kiwis aboard shouted for us to come over, and when we dinghied up they gave us two big snapper, saying they saw the US flag on the back of our boat and thought we might be hungry after sailing all that way. We offered to trade them some cold beer for the fish, but they insisted they couldn’t drink on the job so we brought them home made muffins early the next morning before they pulled anchor and went back out to sea.

Knot Tying in Texas

12. Dec. 2015
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USA
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1 Comment

Author: Pete

Location: Dallas, Texas

I was a little apprehensive about leaving my baby to fly all the way to Hal’s wedding in Dallas, but Miranda insisted that she’d take good care of the boat in my absence. Long flights don’t get to me, but it’s tough seeing the thousands of hard won miles of open ocean sliding effortlessly by under the 737, deceptively benign and maybe a little smug.

Hal picked me up at the airport and it was game-on despite the jet lag. Pre-wedding frivolities ensued which I will leave without description in the interest of dignity preservation. In accordance with Texas state legislature though, guns and whiskey were central fixtures of the wedding weekend. For safety concerns, these civil liberties were not enjoyed at the same time. Nothing pisses off a bride, even as chill as Taylor, like an unscheduled hospital run.

Hal and Taylor threw a couple incredible days of reveling. The ceremony was held in the oldest post office in Dallas. Sounds odd, but it was a fabulous venue. The upstairs courthouse that held the reception had once presided over the trials of Bonnie and Clyde’s cohorts and Roe v. Wade. Hal looked like a million bucks, with a smile as enormous as his personality beaming out from under that Grizzly Adams beard when Taylor came sparkling down the aisle in her dress. The ceremony was lovely; I think some residual sea salt worked its way into my eye at some point. Dinner, dancing, and debauchery followed in true Foster fashion, spiced up by some old Charlevoix amigos, Spencer and Brandon. You’d need to work hard to not have fun with a crew like that. I was, however, appropriately sad that Miranda wasn’t along to join in the merriment.

Another perk of the trip was getting to spend some time with my buddy Mike. We remedied the wedding hangover with a tour of the Dallas brew pub scene. Mikey is a master beer craftsman and is opening his own brewery this year in Boyne City, Michigan. We disguised our afternoon bar crawl under the official seal of Stiggs Brewing Company as “research and industrial espionage.”

Travel back to the other side of the world went as well as could be expected. Sixteen hours to Sydney with a ten hour layover, four hours to Auckland, and a harrowing three hour car ride on the wrong side of the road back to Whangarei. The total dissolution of December 14th completed my chronometric vertigo and rounded out the trifecta of days lost to the International Dateline. I’ll take jet lag over seasickness any day though!