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| Cape Moreton. Last Australian landfall for 14 months |
Well
the
three amigos made it! We had a good
passage over to New Caledonia. Sailed most of the way but had to motor sail the last
couple of days when the wind dropped. 867 nautical miles (1605 kms) in 7 days. We shared round the clock watches of 3 hours
on 6 hours off. It was lively for the
first few days and light the last few but generally we experienced fair winds. We were fortunate to have a full moon mid
passage so we had the moon each night, visibility was great and the stars were
fantastic. At times they were so bright
coming over the horizon, I thought there were fishing boats ahead!
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| Breakfast on watch |
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| What the boys get up to on passage |
You realise what a big ocean it is when for the 3 days in the middle of
the passage the only sign of life we saw was the occasional sea bird.
Cran did put out the trolling line while on passage however no luck
fishing. The Albatros were diving on the lure which caused a bit of concern.
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| One of the benefits of the dawn watch |
The boat went well, and our new sails were fantastic. One of the salt
water hoses to the water maker sprang a leak and we detected a coolant leak
from the Genset!! We started a new To Do
list for the boat even before getting into port, it keeps us busy as always.
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The high mountains were a welcome site on Monday morning after
sunrise. By 10:40 am we were tied up in
Port Moselle Marina and began the necessary paper work for clearing in through
Customs and Quarantine.
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| Readying new flags prior to arrival |
The Marina staff
organise for Quarantine to come to the boat.
They came after lunch which gave us time to cook some of our fresh food
so we wouldn’t lose it all. Not knowing
how long the passage would take I had fresh food for 10 days so arriving in 7
days meant that we had food that would be disposed of by Quarantine. The Quarantine process went well and we were
able to keep more food items than we initially thought. It was mainly the fresh fruit and vegetables
that they were interested in. As part of
the Downunder Rally we had Herve from Noumea Yacht Services to organise our
Customs clearing but as Customs are only open in the morning that meant a job
for tomorrow. At least once Quarantine
had cleared us we could take down our Q flag and leave the boat. That’s when we discovered the bar/bistro at
the end of the pier.
The French are doing it tough here in Nouvelle Caledonie - beautiful
reef fish, mud crabs, lobster, fresh baguette every day, tropical fruit,
wonderful cheeses, pate etc and of course the French wine selection is going to
be fun to explore.
It's cruise ship territory with a new boat arriving every other day.
Keeps the local economy ticking over.
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| The marina is often fall but they will always try to squeeze another one in |
We spent 3 days in Port Moselle Marina after we arrived. It was fun to
explore the fresh fruit & vege market and start using our very basic
tourist French. The local bar/bistro was
easier, beer is universally understood and we can recommend one of the local
drops - HavannaH. Pat and I explored
downtown Noumea while Cran spent most of his
time on the computer sorting out technology and some Body Corporate issues
apart from a visit to the Supermarket to purchase beer and wine.
While there the super maxi yacht Beau Geste arrived for “Le Cercle
Nautique New Caledonien”. A family
friend Ben Costello was crew for the race and gave us a tour of this amazing
craft.
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| Patrick living the dream at the helm of Beau Geste - or is he just dreaming? |
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| Beau Geste getting ready to race |
Before Pat departed we spent a couple of days not far from Noumea
visiting some islands. Our first island was Ilot Uere where spent
the night the on to Ile M'Bo and Ile Ndue. It was great to have his company and
support for the trip and we have enjoyed a few laughs with him along the way.
The last week has been spent fixing and repairing leaking hoses to the water maker and on the Genset - one of Cran’s favourite jobs, on his knees in a hot cupboard for hours at a time.
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| It's often the part you don't see that is the problem |
We had to stay in Noumea while Cran carried
out repairs so we could access parts and materials. Shopping for boat bits is always interesting but
it is much more challenging when the suppliers don’t speak English and we don’t
speak French. The suppliers were very
helpful and we got what we needed in the end.
The GenSet makes 240V power which is used for recharging the batteries
and running the water maker. We can
charge the batteries from our main engines but have no other way of running the
water maker so it was essential to get it working so we can have extended
periods out of port.
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| 300L of water at 60L per dinghy trip |
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| An advantage of being anchored off Noumea, great fresh breakfast choices delivered by dinghy |
We are now anchored just inside the reef in a lovely lagoon where we
continue to work on the Genset - its working but still has issues. We came up here on the outside of the lagoon
trolling for fish but had no luck.
Fortunately Cran caught fish this
morning that we will cook for dinner tonight, our first fish and we are looking
forward to them.
We plan to spend the next few weeks exploring the west coast and the
lagoon before our friends Neale & Robyn arrive mid October. Then it will be
time to plan for the trip to NZ.
We obtained a Wifi dongle from Herve for the
remainder of our stay here in New Caledonia. It has taken Cran several days to
get it to work with all our devices, he loves a challenge! It can be flacky at times but generally works. So you can email us on our normal email address. Will
keep in touch and post a few more photos on our blog.
