The Devil Wears Foul Weather Gear

Typical - no wind!  Motored south to Port Pegasus.  We are experiencing either no wind or too much wind! Spotted our first whale who was heading north.  Big swells coming in and 40 knot westerlies.  We are really in the Roaring Forties with huge wind gusts, breaking tips of the waves, spray.  Rugged, inhospitable coastline. Had a holy crap moment while furling in the staysail in 40 knot gusts and a sheet not released soon enough ... we tripped the circuit breaker (located under forepeak - boat tossing and rolling in rising swells, sloppy seas, had to go below to strip bed, mattress thrown through the bathroom to the next cabin, sheets flying through the air, plywood panel lifted to reset staysail circuit breaker.  Staysail flapping, turned off the wind to reduce flogging and then furled successfully.  The worst sound onboard a sailing yacht is to hear a sail flogging. Motor on, experiencing really severe wind gusts.  Wind and seas behind us, see ...

Wednesday 7am Bruce and Simon went over to a neighbouring boat, a beautiful expedition boat anchored in the same bay to confirm there was perhaps a weather window we could take to get us up to the Sounds. If we didn’t take this opportunity, the next weather window looked to be about a week away. And this is the Roaring Forties, a serious ocean crossing passage. 9am and ready to go to traverse the Southern Ocean/Tasman Sea.  Winds turning south, front coming midday, no real strong band of wind. Wind going from NW to southerly, wave height 4m - dropping to 2,3 m swells. Cold, drizzly, uncomfortable motoring. 3 hours down the coast of Stewart Island before heading out to open waters. Wind in the SE turning easterly.  40knot squalls gusting. Windy and Predict Wind seem to consistently play down the wind strength. Latitude 47 …. 2 crew down with sea sickness, conditions hideous! Big swells, cold, grey skies, unpleasant to say the least.  Set up our night watch system, 2 hours...

  Had the best night’s sleep and woke to blue skies and sunshine.  The first we have seen in our week at Stewart Island. Finally ... sunshine and blue skies! Launched the paddle boards for an early morning explore.  Absolute magic, beautiful shell covered golden beaches, clear water.  A bit of traffic in our secluded spot, 2 boats with hunters after the white tail deer and divers. This was another one of those “highlight” moments.  Perfect weather, Red Sand Cove an absolute stunner of a place. Crew spent a couple of hours getting jobs done before our next sail.  Cleaned the waterline of the small amount of weed that had grown, aired the laundry, opened all the hatches to the blissful warm sunshine.  Simon and Bruce worked on the davits so we could haul up the dinghy. Weather started to turn about lunchtime, cloud coming in.  A hearty lunch of venison burgers from Claire and Simon’s deer farm, paddle boards stowed, dinghy in davits and we set off ...

Left Oban early afternoon, heading south, destination Red Sand Cove, Port Adventure.  Staysail up, wind on the beam SW 8 knots.   Change in the weather and sudden wind gusts of 30+ knots.   Intense gusts, rolling seas, fighting to stay on course, both Claire and Simon helming today. Passed Tia Islands, home to what looked like a shantytown on the hillside.  Baches that had obviously been there forever and home to the families collecting muttonbirds. Anchored in picture perfect inlet at 5.30pm, in 6m of water..  With some difficulty we got the spare 40kg Delta anchor and 10m of chain plus 20m of floating rope into the dinghy to row out a second anchor to give us a more comfortable night’s sleep. Reached 47 degrees below today, our most southern position.  Celebratory bubbles followed by a delicious dinner of Spaghetti Bolagnaise.

 So here we are at Deep Cove, Doubtful Sounds.  A week without wifi but we are safe and sound, a bit cold and wet, with a few adventures and tall stories to tell!  Hope to get the blog updated this afternoon.  The good ship Mimu is going brilliantly well!

 New crew, laundry, provisioning, filling up of diesel and water, a quick tour of the island. Random facts from 2019 - Stewart Island home to 400 residents, 600 cars and 22kms roading and the beaches are either stunningly white or golden sands. Welcome Claire and Simon from Nelson Laundry day!!   It's the drying of the washing that's the problem! Ackers Cottage at Harrold's Bay Wild and exposed Lees Bay The Bragg Family Cemetery out on a headland surrounded by beautiful daisies

 Up anchor to cross the inlet to Goose Cove in Glory Bay late in the day.  Squally winds of 25 knots hit us crossing the bay.  Cold!  Grey seas with whitecaps. Lost the light as we maneuvered through the headlands and occasional marked rocks. Big 35 knot gusts hit us as we entered Glory Bay, by now dark, Mimu taking full force of the winds howling in the rigging, used the spotlight to maneuver as close to the land as possible for much needed shelter from the north westerlies. Anchor down, 4:1 scope, expecting a disturbed night, heating on, laundry pegged everywhere over the boat to dry, fantastic curry for dinner, bed at 8.30pm with wheaty bags. Wind howling and shrieking through the rigging, clanging and banging, anchor chain jerking, pulling, straining, Mimu pulling off to port, then to starboard ... 11pm rain on the hatch, 1.15am a slight lull, 3.30am dancing around, 4am severe tug on the anchor chain, 5am more rain, 6.30am quiet, a lull.   Lots of winda...