Kim, Mark and I had left Anthea in Opua before driving 10 hours south to lake Waikaremoana, where we met up with Anson and our good friends Kathy and Yannai. From there we hiked a four-day backpacking trip, or as New Zealanders say, tramping trip, around the lake. After that, we headed north to Tongariro park and slept at a cheek by jowl car camping site. Waking up at 5:00 in the morning was not a pleasant way to start the crossing. Packing up in time to start driving at 6:20, we were able to get to the parking lot at the end of the trail in time to catch the bus that delivered us to the start. The bus ride was a time for me to stew in my nervousness about the sheer mileage, 20 kilometers, and elevation change, 800 meters up and 1200 down. Especially since I had been on a boat with not many chances for walking for the last year, my confidence was quite low.

The start of the trail was flat, walking over rocks or low wooden platforms with clear mountain streams and low, alpine shrubs surrounding us. Ahead of us was a tall, imposing, mountain that was filmed as Mount Doom in Lord of the Rings! The crowds were also surrounding us. With around 400 people doing the crossing a day, there was never a sight without people dotted on the trail like ants on a hill. For the first four kilometers it was relatively flat. Then, it started to curve uphill. My feelings of trepidation grew as we approached the bottom of the saddle. As I started up the switchbacks my confidence rose, especially when I started to pass people. The path was gravely with the same small shrubs growing on loose gray rock, but we were high enough that mount ‘Doom’ didn’t seem so imposing.

I reached the summit 20 minutes after Anson and Yannai and was able to fully enjoy the view behind me. The alpine climate gently sloped down to merge with farm lands and forests before the landscape was covered with a low, dense, cloud cover. In the distance we were able to see a tall, snowcapped mountain peak poking through the low cloud veil. Kathy caught up to us soon after, but Kim and Mark took another 20 minutes, much of which was spent in a bathroom line. With what looked like only a slightly higher saddle ahead I felt surprised by how easy it felt to climb such an imposing trail. To reach that saddle we had to dip down onto mud flats, probably losing 20 meters of elevation. The mud flats were barren. With no flora or fauna to speak of they felt slightly oppressive, and I hurried ahead to reach the second saddle. I realized that this was not the highest elevation and that we had barely gone half way up! The trail curved to the left up the side of a second mountain instead of going down over the saddle! With nothing else to do I found a comfortable rock 20 meters off the trail and sat down to wait for the rest of my group to catch up. I saw Anson next and got up off my rock to join him. After a quick conversation I found out that Yannai had charged ahead to look for me. Apparently, Kim and Mark were worried because I had left without checking in. Now that Anson had determined that Yannai was ahead, he blazed up the trail to find him.

Finally reaching the actual top of the mountain (finding Yannai waiting for us there), the view was amazing. Emerald, sulfuric lakes were dotted around the path, with steam billowing fumaroles dotted around. To our right we spotted where a vein of lava had erupted and then eroded away, leaving only edges that were easily three meters thick and 100 meters tall!

Going down the side of the mountain was a great ride. The trail was a broad, sandy ridge five meters wide allowing for a fun, fast, screeing ride! The ridge ended after half an hour of skidding down the slope and turned into many different side tracks that led back to the main trail. The fumaroles produced a horrid sulfuric smell that singed our nostrils and triggered my gag reflex over and over again. The landscape was almost as barren as the mud flats with no life except bacteria in the lakes. It reminded us of Dragon Island in the Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

We had lunch by one of the beautiful emerald lakes, and unfortunately, a fumarole. A deposit of sulfur surrounded the fumarole, covering the rocks in the yellow element. We followed a path to a bigger fumarole and around another lake before joining back up with the main trail. Soon we were descending again and back in the alpine climate. There were a series of switch backs down the mountain that Anson, Yannai and I ran down.

With 3.6 kilometers left the trail descended into a forest and began to flatten out. By this time I was feeling tired and had to resort to “singing” “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” and “What do you do with a Drunken Sailor,” to keep myself going. The parking lot was a sweet site as I fell into the grass. When the rest of my family arrived we said our goodbyes to Kathy and Yannai and got into the car, exhausted, but feeling a sense of triumph.

Devon

Christmas Day
After a nice bacon and egg breakfast, and pulling half of the Christmas crackers and reading their jokes, we set off in the kayaks (one of us having to go back and pick up the third person because we only had two) and started hiking a trail. We hiked over forest hills and through Shire-like pastures, stopping at viewpoints were we could see the calm ocean. Sitting in the shade of a tree we looked out at the small swell hitting the cliff side. We could see the ripples on the water as a gust of wind swept through. The feeling of peace was profound as I saw the intricate patterns of wind, water and cloud shadow playing on the salty sea. Unfortunately, the rest was soon up and we continued on our way. Other view spots were dotted along the path, and one I especially enjoyed was a small inlet with clear enough water that we could see the sea floor, even though we were a couple hundred feet up. We arrived back at the boat for a late lunch and nap. Christmas day was finished with a delicious dinner comprised of an expertly cooked prime rib roast, potatoes, broccoli, popovers, and pumpkin pie. Boxing Day
On the 26th of December we changed anchorage to a protected channel between Moturua and Motuiekie islands. Fluenta (a boat with 2 children near my age and a 4-year-old) and Verakai (a boat with one twelve-year-old girl) were also there with us. Victoria, the eldest child on Fluenta, and I had planned to make a birthday cake for Ella, the child on Verakai. Around 1: 30, after a lunch of chicken sandwiches, I kayaked over to them. The birthday cake we made was a simple white cake. We made an easy frosting that we dyed blue and yellow. Using the blue icing, Victoria taught me how to basket weave the sides before we smoothed white icing over the top. We made a simple shell pattern around the upper boarder in yellow and white marbled icing. This took around three hours, after which I came back to Anthea for an early dinner. At around 7:00 we all piled into Fluenta’s dinghy and went to Verakai for the birthday celebration. The four of us kids went down below and started a game of spoons, and then monopoly. Half way through the game we were called for cake and singing. The cake was beautiful, but the taste was a bit bland. In the end Jonathan, the middle child on Fluenta, won monoply and the party started to close up. Shivering as we got back to Anthea, we immediately jumped in bed. New Year’s
On New Year’s Eve day, we anchored just off Russel, across from Pahia. Getting to shore was easier now that we had inflated the dinghy. There was a wonderful little museum that told us about the history of Russel. It even included a one fifth scale of the Endeavor, Captain Cook’s ship, which had traveled 15, 000 miles (by trailer)! Lunch was a bacon and egg pie with an apple treat, before going back to Anthea. We were about to leave to a more protected anchorage when we were told this was the best viewing spot for the fireworks, and we were invited to a party on Verakai. Fluenta was also there, along with Zest, a boat with two twin 13 year olds. The party started around eight and lasted to 1:00 am. The time was filled with talking, board games and card games. At midnight the Pahia fireworks started. they lasted for ten to fifteen minutes, after which, the Russel ones started up. At 1:00 we rode back to Anthea and dropped into bed, exhausted. Devon
Bay of Islands Marina, safely docked in the teeth of a rapidly deepening low pressure system

New Year’s Eve, Russell/Kororareka, Bay of Islands

It’s the cusp of the New Year. We’re anchored off the small village of Russell/Kororareka, the first (short lived) capital of New Zealand, across a small bay from the Waitangi Treaty Grounds, where the famous/infamous Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840. In brief, it’s the defining document governing Maori-Pakeha (non-Maori/white) relations – conflicting interpretations of it were at the heart of decades of war and conflict in the mid-nineteenth century (which Maori came extremely close to winning, despite being vastly outnumbered and outpowered). Maori activism, using diverse methods, never ceased to press for the “unqualified exercise of chieftainship” the Maori language version of the treaty guarantees. In 1975 a Tribunal was established to consider the issue of compensation due Maori for contemporary government actions and confiscations that violated the Treaty, and in 1985, after another decade of political activism and an influential Maori judge’s brief, the Tribunal was empowered to consider historic actions and due compensation. This unleashed an on-going torrent of claims, testimony, and efforts to seek redress that some argue have strayed from the pursuit of justice and have been overly Eurocentric. The national importance of the Treaty is suggested by the establishment of Waitangi Day, 6 February, whose purpose is to educate, enlighten, and enhance understanding of the historical importance and contemporary relevance of the Treaty for all who live in New Zealand/Aotearoa.

Meanwhile, on the home front, Anson is backpacking on the South Island. Devon is below playing Catan with three other age mate “cruising kids,” and I have a bit of time to set a couple memories from our passage here from Tonga “down to paper” before they get lost in the mist of time. They concern the importance of bilge pumps and a transporting night watch experience.

As “axle nut,” one of my many responsibilities is to see to it that all our bilge pumps function well. We have three, one electric (with either a manual switch or automatic float actuating method), and two manual. In the past, I’ve serviced, repaired or replaced all the components of these three pump systems. During most passages I operate one of the manual pumps every six hours or so, counting the number of pumps needed to empty the bilge, as a way of monitoring the rate of water inflow – mostly it weeps through the rudder post and down through the hawsepipe from the deck into the anchor locker and from there to the bilge. Between 25 and 65 pumps are normally needed to empty the bilge. However, on our passage down from Tonga, when we had a couple days of boisterous weather with a lot of water on the decks and sometimes in the cockpit, my normal method was no longer workable. I was reminded of this one evening not too long ago while Kim was reading from “A Ship’s Tale,” our current “read aloud” book. (We have a tradition of Kim reading aloud books on Anthea; the list so far includes Two Years Before the Mast, Joshua Slocum’s Around Alone, Animal Farm, Pax (thanks to Aunt Jennifer for that one), and a few others I’m forgetting. She’s so good at this that it could a second career.) An any rate, in the current book, the tall ship Bonnie Clyde weathers a gale in the English Channel and her gasoline powered bilge pumps must be run constantly to keep up with the water flowing down from the decks and seeping through the planking; indeed, petrol supplies had to be monitored to ensure adequate fuel for the pumps. This reminded me of how on Anthea, during those two days, I had to resort to using the electric bilge pump (officially rated at 8 gallons per minute) to keep up with the amount of water accumulating in the bilge. I first realized this when water appeared above the leeward floorboards in the main cabin. No one likes to see water coming above the floorboards. Fortunately, Anthea has a shallow bilge, so the volume was much less than it would have been on other comparably-sized boats. Due to the angle of heel, the float-activated switch did not go on. I first tried the usual method of emptying the bilge, but soon realized the manual pump would take too long, so resorted to the electric bilge pump and within 30-45 seconds I heard the reassuring and familiar air- sucking sound of the intake hose. For the next couple of days I used this method to monitor the bilge water and empty the bilge. It was somewhat sobering to realize that significant volumes of water were getting into the bilge, but so long as it took a consistent time period to empty it, all was fine and there was nothing to worry about. Fortunately, that was indeed the case, and after the weather calmed down and we had less water topsides, I was again able to return to my usual method of monitoring bilge water and emptying the bilge. So, the moral of the story, if there is one, is – three cheers for multiple, functioning bilge pumps!

The second memory concerns my last night watch before landfall the morning of 27 November. I had the 12:30-3:30 am watch. I relieved Anson. Watch changes are brief but memorable moments of connection when responsibility for navigation and the ship are passed from one of us to another. After giving me his report and sharing a few minutes together in the cockpit under the canopy of stars, he went below. The next couple of hours were sheer magic; I hope I never lose the visceral memory I retain of that night. We were on a beam reach, on port tack, with 14-18 knots of apparent wind. A minor low pressure system over New Zealand had created enough of a pressure differential to draw wind landwards, thus transforming what we had expected to be a motor into a memorable sail. The magic of the watch came from the combination of sea state, wind, and Anthea’s sea kindliness. Anthea was sliding through the water in an extraordinarily smooth manner. For though the knotmeter told me we were humming along at 7-7.5 knots, I had no sensation of the boat moving through the darkness. The only motion I felt was a gentle, rhythmic up and down sensation, perhaps akin to sitting on a merry go round horse. The dark night prevented me from seeing the water moving past us, and the bow wave was so quiet as to be barely audible. There was no rolling, pitching, tossing, lurching or heaving, just a gentle up and down through the undulating ocean surface. If the knot meter had not conveyed our respectable speed, I would have refused to belief that 12 tons of boat could slip through the ocean in such a magical fashion. I hope to never forget that feeling.

Best wishes for the New Year! May our collective hopes and desires for the new year be fulfilled.

Mark

Free Again!

Our flurry of work projects on Anthea was followed by a mad dash by bus to Auckland. A blog post solely about that trip would have been called “Money, Money, Money!” We bought a gently used ten year old car, fresh off the boat from Japan, and made our way across the bridge and beside the sea of masts to the southern side of Auckland Harbor. We stayed with friends Nigel (the professional sailor who crewed on Anthea for our big win in Tonga) and Joanna in their lovely townhouse with sweeping views of the city. Over the next two days we searched out every sale on backpacking gear and hemorrhaged money in an unfathomable way. Not a single sales clerk was from New Zealand; Brits, Israelis, USians, and Eastern Europeans all helped us spend our money on hiking boots, rain jackets, sun glasses, foam sleeping pads, a backpack and head lamps. We tracked down a used tent, and then Nigel saved the bank account by generously filling in many missing pieces with loans from their trekking gear. Their hospitality, including a delicious meal by the pool and gourmet breakfasts, kept us going. For six months we’ve hardly had the opportunity to spend money beyond basic provisioning, and in only three days we broke the bank. While we’ll put all this gear to good use, we felt like shopping zombies when we stumbled back to Anthea.

Shortly after our return, we got a taste of the Bay of Islands on a brief, two night cruise to Oke Bay, near Cape Brett. Meeting up with a Norweigan family on a 45 foot boat named Ghost, we shared a dinner and played an epic game of ultimate Frisbee on the beach. We, the old folks, aided by Emil, their middle son, won the game (ok, it was 5 against 4, but they had most of the youth and talent on their side). We were so hot we jumped in the water and had our first swim outside of the tropics. We only screamed for a moment then enjoyed ourselves – not bad!

The coastline is beautiful here, with numerous bays nestled within rocky cliffs; red-flowering bottle brush trees and gnarled, broad-branched trees laced with white flowers flow down hills spotted with green bushes and grass. A few rugged trees cling to the cliffs, roots draping the rocks, and hover above small, sandy beaches. The black and white Tui bird with its melodic song weaves its melody among the seabirds’ cries. Small sea caves open up into tempting darkness, inviting kayak explorations. Mark barely escaped a survival story when a swell rebounded inside the narrow cave he had entered in our inflatable kayaks. I turned my head away as I saw the breaking wave behind him and the large cresting wave in front. Looking back to assess the damage and initiate a rescue, I saw him paddle out, totally swamped, but no worse for wear and sporting a wicked grin.
This brief cruise ended abruptly as we returned to dock to see our friend Charmane from Vlakvark (with whom Devon stayed in Tonga). She had come to sell her boat and organize the gear to ship to Australia. We helped her close a chapter of her life – 14 years of boat ownership, including cruising the Antarctic several times – providing meals and support and listening to her many stories along the way.

With only a few days before Anson was scheduled to fly out for his first backpacking trip, with friends Kathy and Yannai, and with Devon signed up for a local sailing camp, we decided, reluctantly on my part, to stay dockside once more. Mark, ever focused on keeping our nearly 40 year old boat in Bristol condition, launched a project of cleaning and sealing our teak decks. We became a project boat once again, the sealant supplies vying for space with Anson’s backpacking equipment. (The decks look almost new now, and another project that didn’t even make it on the “to-do” list is complete.)

Anson set off on his adventure, Devon finished his camp, and we stayed yet another night at dock, as laundry still needed to be washed and provisioning completed before setting off for a 10 day cruise. It was only reasonable to stay, but I felt like a caged animal, my chance for escape cut off. I don’t know why I find it hard to be content to stay tethered to land, when my children are happy and the boat is being cared for. I only know that a yearning for the sea is buried deep within me, quenched solely by the feel of the boat, sails trimmed, slipping through the water.
The next day, although we set out in a drizzle, with the wind light and variable and the sky a dull grey, I smiled and let out a chortle of joy. Free again! While tacking into stronger winds, we crossed paths with Fluenta, a Canadian boat with three kids aboard, and made a plan to anchor together. Soon we were hiking to an overlook across the islands and making plans for an evening of sweets and Christmas carols. Devon baked a spice cake and their 14 year old daughter Victoria made fudge, which we devoured between songs.

This morning Mark and I kayaked around Moturaohia Island, threading our way between rock outcroppings and into the channel to play with the dolphins. A pod of 14 of these majestic beings swam by our kayaks, parting to pass on either side. Awe-struck by their size and power, we sat still and opened all our senses to their presence, drinking in the sound of their breath, the break of the water, the curve of their dive, and the baby’s leap as they passed us by.

A late morning sail, tacking in flat seas and 4-7 knots of apparent wind, brought us to Paradise Cove, on Urupukapuka Island, where we’ll be spending Christmas along with Fluenta, several other cruising boats, and a host of Kiwis.

Kim

Since we arrived in Opua twelve days ago, it has been work, work, work. We have replaced the attachment bolts for our toilet, which involves sticking your hand through a miniature access point, and trying to twist your arm to hold the nut that’s a foot farther in. We have replaced both our fresh water and salt water faucets, making us take out and reinstall the water maker. We have taken out the water heater and are in the middle of replacing it. We have gone up the mast several times to wax it and clean and check the rigging. We have, we have, we have. The list seems to go on forever.
Thankfully there are some benefits to being at Bay of Islands Marina, such as reliable internet in a comfortable lounge, stores with diverse foods, a hospital to take my cast off (that finally happened a week ago, dishes here I come!), hot water showers, and human interactions. For the first time this cruise I have met other teenagers! Mostly connecting in the lounge, it has been the most fun I have had in ages, except (of course) for the work. School unfortunately has also restarted. In algebra I have just finished quadratics and am now moving onto squares of binomials. For history I am reading about New Zealand, mostly about Maori and European Settler conflicts, and what is going on today to “reimburse” Maori, specifically reading about the Treaty of Waitangi (if you research the Treaty of Waitangi there are many different views, but the book I am using is Remembrance of Pacific Pasts, by multiple authors.)
We are isolated here in the small town of Opua, but just a few miles away there is a larger town, probably with a population close to 1,000, called Pahia. Most cruisers go there to provision. A few hours south of us is Auckland, where were are going Monday to purchase a car and backpacking gear! Our plan is to stay at Bay of Islands Marina for another week or so before cruising the Bay of Islands and the east coast of the North Island. We’ll come back in time to drop Anson off for his time in the South Island with our friends Kathy and Yannai, who are flying in from California. Devon