The beat goes on in Whangarei

As most of the fleet has left NZ for warmer climes, the good ship Bravo is holding down the fort here in Whangarei. 

Cindi's recovery from the accident is well underway.   She's not used to this degree of immobility,and at this point the biggest risk is death by boredom!!!   Thursday marked 6 weeks since her fall, and a visit to the clinic for x-rays and evaluation.  The news was pretty good.  Healing of the bone in her arm has progressed enough to have the cast removed.  Yeah!!!  Unfortunately it didn't wind up exactly in it's original orientation, and as a result, the radius bone is now a few mm shorter than it was before.  Likely will be fine, but could cause some issues down the road that a "simple" surgery could repair.  Ughhhhh.....  But at least getting free of the cast is a big relief! 

As for her back, the orthopod told her she could begin to wean off the brace.....The bits of the crushed vertebrae are largely done healing, and will continue to solidify over the next 6 weeks.  Will then be more x-rays and another progress evaluation.

While quite hot, the Xena the Warrior Princess look will hopefully soon be a distant memory!!!

The best news was the doc's opinion that Cindi will be able to go back to the voyaging lifestyle after physical therapy has been completed!!!!   YAY!!!!!   She will hopefully start P.T. next week.


With use of a walker, Cindi's been getting in a 3 mile walk around the waterfront on a walking/biking trail nearly every day, rain allowing.  Adam joins when back from the boatyard. 

The pile of cones waiting to be sewn!!!

Cindi's also been busy on a project, building a series drogue for the boat from a kit that we brought back from the US.  Made up of 139 sewn cones on over 300 feet of rope, the repetitive project is perfect for whiling away some hours stuck indoors. 















Projects back at the boatyard continue at a rather relaxed pace.  Currently underway:
-  Install of new B&G instruments, including forward scanning sonar, wind, depth, speedo, and chart plotter, all on the new NMEA 2000 data backbone.

depth/speedo/temp on left, forward scan sonar on right

-  Install of new electrical panels and battery monitor system

Old panels removed, circuits labeled, waiting for new panels.....Yikes, what a mess!

-  Install of new lithium house batteries
 -  Replace all mast wiring

Rewiring largely complete.  Ladder in background was site of Cindi's fall, from top.

-  Change fixed inner forestay to roller furler system, and retrofit the 2 staysails for the new system.
-  Install 2 new vhf radios and antennas
-  Nav station redesign and rebuild
-  New main and genoa sails
-  New "stack pack" main sail cover
-  Keel repair and bottom paint
-  Remove and rebed all port lights ("windows")
-  New stainless steel mesh "washboards" for the companionways to allow ventilation and security

Back at the motel apartment, Adam's inner geek called out, and he put a portable ham radio antenna outside the terrace.  He talks to friends back in Hawaii, Canada, and the Pacific NW every other evening.


Also time to brew a batch of IPA, just bottled last week ago.  Fingers crossed for a tasty brew!!!

New entry                      photo Kevin Boyle

 We've finally decided to sell our house.  It wasn't an easy decision, but keeping it as a rental from the other side of the world was just proving too much of a headache.  The Seattle market sounds good for selling and it's a great time of year to do the deed.  It's been a lot of work to get it ready from here, installing new flooring, designing a new entry, landscaping, etc., but it should go on the market next week.  A great team of builder, landscaper and realtor are making it possible.  Fingers crossed for a quick sale.  (If interested, don't be shy!!!)

New entry           photo Kevin Boyle

So that's the news from Whangarei.  Mostly good on Cindi's recovery.  We still await word from NZ immigration officials that we'll be able to extend our stay by a year to complete physical therapy, as our already extended visas expire in less than 2 weeks!!  Winter is rapidly approaching down here, but June 21 is just around the corner, bringing a promise of longer days to come.  We look forward to continued adventures and exploration in New Zealand in the coming year. 

Cheers, all, and thanks for the good wishes!


Will sign off with a couple of fun emails that had us cracking up:

Poem by Cruiser Poet Laureate Pat Ganz (sv The Rose)

There once was a  woman caught in a clam
She said "Damn! Damn! I'm caught in a clam"
Out stuck her head
Out stuck her feet
But all stiff in the middle the two couldn't meet.

IF she got an pesky itch on her toe
She called to Adam who smiled don't you know
A little to the left
A little to the right
He'd scratch and tickle till she giggled all night

And when they finally opened that clam
She said "I'm a wee bit taller I am!"
She stood so straight
And she felt so great
She could tie her own shoes and sail first mate

OR.........this one, by the Rev Glen Simms, never at a loss for words:

Down in the Land of the Kiwi,
Lies a most intrepid sailor named Cindi...
Now I can't tell you why, but she decided to fly,
And the "tail" had a terrible ending....

Cheers mates! 

BRAVO Refit - Weeks 10 thru 13

As we're entering our 4th month on the hard in the boatyard, life has taken on a rather hum drum rhythm....we wake up aboard (yee-hah!!!.....a great improvement as we moved back aboard from our camper van a week ago, as there is no more work going on in the aft stateroom), head into the yard's office kitchen for breakfast and coffee (they have refrigerators, sink, and microwave for hauled out boaties to use), and then start the day's projects.  We typically work till 6 or so, shower, have a beer or 3, make dinner in the office, watch a bit of awful tv on the bigscreen there, before the saunter back to Bravo for bed.  7 days / week, with little change save one or two welcome evenings out of the boatyard with friends!

Sunrise view looking over our stern as the boatyard comes to life.

Dockland 5 Boatyard has become a sort of mini maritime United Nations.  Owners of boats from New Zealand, Australia, Russia, France, Vanuatu, Switzerland, Germany, Holland, England, Hong Kong, Italy, Norway, and the U.S.  are hard at work, sanding, painting, rigging, and welding.  The pace has picked up dramatically, with winter approaching and many boats getting ready for the annual voyage north to the tropics or west to Asia and Australia.  Nights are increasingly chilly, and the days are getting much shorter.....

We're definitely in the homestretch of this refit.  A good thing, as we must leave New Zealand by early June due to our visa expiration.  Here's the status......

Fuel tanks:  DONE!  All of the cabinetry is rebuilt, so the tanks are hidden once again, and holding fuel without leaks.  This was a huge job, one that we never want to repeat.

Port side tank behind new bulkhead and shelves in the equipment pantry.  All have now been finished and painted, and the freezer and watermaker equipment are nearly installed on the shelves.

Starboard side.  Tanks are behind the teak panel. Compartment above awaits the re-installation of the generator.

Generator:  The crane delivered the rebuilt beast, and it's now back in it's compartment.  Mechanics Glen and Jeff did a fantastic job shoe horning the 375 lb rascal into place, without a scratch to the woodwork.  Kiwi ingenuity coupled with steel cajones, these guys!  We'll hook it all back up when we're back in the water.

What could possibly go wrong???!!!

Smile of success!

Genset finally rests in compartment awaiting hookup

Rigging:  DONE!  Just waiting on one broken part of the genoa furler, but otherwise all of the spar welding, and new standing rigging is completed.

Freezer:  DONE!  We finished the construction and painting of the new box and lid, and install of the new equipment.  (An Isotherm water cooled unit.  Compressor cooling is somewhat of an experiment, as we're running the cooling piping to and from one of our fresh water tanks instead of the more typical seawater outside the hull.  So far so good, with no appreciable warming of the water in the tank.  Nice not to need more seawater flowing into the boat, and a side benefit is that we can run the unit when the boat is out of the water)  It's running beautifully, and seems to use just around 35 amp hours / day, compared to 140 a.h. for the old, poorly insulated box.  This is a major success, and will hopefully allow us to rely solely on our solar panels for electricity, without running our generator daily.

The "Sugar Shack".  Our shipping container varnishing, fiberglassing, and painting room.  Nice!

Freezer lid and frame ready for fiberglass and paint

Freezer installed, now on "fridge" setting....and used for its highest and best purpose!!!

 Galley rebuild:  This is the biggie at the moment.  Since we needed to rip out the freezer box to redo it, the main galley counter had to come out as well.  We're getting a new one made of solid surface material like Corian, and decided to do all of the other counters at the same time.  Has become a fairly big project, and the counters will not be fabricated for about 2 more weeks.

Cindi works with shipwright Steve Erlich on plans for the new galley.  This pattern then went to the shop for fabrication.

Current use of the galley.....our workbench!

Wood refinishing:  Now completing coat 9, just one to go for all of the exterior varnishing.  Nearly there!  We'll then be able to reinstall the dodger and bimini frames, removed 3 months ago to allow the crane to hoist out the generator.

In the meantime, of course, there's been no shortage of smaller but time consuming little jobs.....servicing winches and anchor windlass, installing deck hardware, welding repairs to solar panel arch and genoa cheek blocks, installing new genoa tracks, headliner repairs, etc.  But it really does look like we're getting close as another project gets crossed off the list nearly every day.  As soon as the galley counters are installed, we should be back in the water, and BRAVO's 30 year birthday refit will be complete!  

Tahiti and Moorea.....time out for work and play...

Well, we've been in the Tahiti/Moorea groove for a few weeks now, enjoying the time out that this south pacific pit stop offers.  Many repairs were overdue, such as the rigging we noted in Nuku Hiva.  At that time, we reported that we had seen only a couple of strands broken out of a swaged connection at the top of one shroud, a lower on the starboard side.

2 broken shrouds

Well, when Adam went up the mast to take it down, and into the rigging shop for a new one, he found that the shroud in question had now broken all but about 3 strands (out of 20), and it's neighbor, also a starboard lower had just 4 remaining.....yikes, that was WAY closer than we had known to a major problem.  Happily we were able to order new shrouds (we replaced the broken two, and the matching pair on the port side as well) from New Zealand, and we cut them to size and just installed them yesterday.  We will replace the rest of the rigging when we reach New Zealand in November.

Another interesting problem was nipped in the bud....one morning while charging the batteries with the generator (running the genset far too much these days, as we watch our expensive P.O.S. Lifeline batteries give up the ghost after just 18 months....and Lifeline won't answer any emails.....grrrrrrrr.......  I digress......) we noticed the smell of burning electrical insulation....a very distinctive, very scary smell.  Fire aboard a boat is a really bad thing.  Really B-A-D!!!!  We finally found the culprit, a plug that had apparently gotten a bit of corrosion, raising the resistance to the burning point.  Easy to fix with a hardwire bypass of the plug, but could have been a real disaster.  Another bullet dodged, but a pretty close call on this one.

Okeee doke, 'nuff of the repairs.  Lots of smaller (but oh-so-expensive in Tahiti) bits have been repaired as well.  New main halyard, and all 3 reef lines, all now Dyneema, should last a while.  And as promised, on to the fun stuff...

Friends Rich and Laura came down to Moorea from Seattle for a visit.  We brought Bravo across the 10 mile channel from Tahiti, and anchored in beautiful Oponohu Bay, near to their hotel.  Had a lot of fun exploring the island together on our rented scooters.  Excellent hiking and decent snorkels on the reef.  Nice.

View from top of pass, looking down on Oponohu Bay on left and Cooks Bay on the right.

Adam starts up a Moorea chapter of the Hells Angels on his 50cc weedeater

Heading home

Picasso triggerfish

Cindi at a Polynesian dance lesson.....it's a fact, Polynesian hips ARE connected differently!!!

 

Went snorkeling with a gaggle (herd? school? mess?) of big stingrays in the Moorea lagoon.  Quite amazing, really, as these bad boys are used to being fed, and are all over us to get some goodies.  We had saved flying fish in our freezer to use for fishing bait, but we broke them out to feed the rays, they loved it, "climbing" nearly out of the water on our shoulders to grab the fish with mouths like Hoover vacuums.  A bit weird to be standing in 4' of water with monster stingrays acting like little puppies, while reef sharks swim all through the frenzy.  Very cool, all in all!!!

Nicole from Bella Star makes a new friend

Every year Latitude 38 magazine, based in S.F. sponsors a rendevous in Moorea of "puddle jump" boats.  Since we were already here, we decided to motor around the corner into Cooks Bay to join in the festivities.  A terrific opportunity to catch up with other boats we've met along the cruising highway, as well as a great slate of activities, including the all-Polynesia ukelele contest (winning band gets tickets to San Diego to compete in the international uke competion.....in SAN DIEGO?????......)

Winning team with their tickets to San Diego

Outrigger canoe races were the main event on the last day of the rendevous.  Adam and Cindi were both on 6 person teams made up of 4 gringos and 2 studly Polynesian rowers.  Adam's team, the Lei Men made it to the semi finals.....you know what they say about "old age and treachery.....!!!

Race starter took her job seriously!!!

Lei Men on the left, Adam in red shirt.

Grabbing victory on the outside!!!

This guy was no beginner!!!

This guy was!!!

The "Lei Men" in fine form after a stunning come from behind victory in the first heat

Off goes Cindi's team, the "Flying Huahine's"

A few last minute instructions from the head of the race committee.....

"And they're off....."

All in all, a great day, with the races, Tahitian dancing (w/ instructions), fire walking, I mean it had all the bases covered!!!

We're now back in Tahiti, many boat projects scratched of the list, and ready to head west to the Leeward Islands.....Bora Bora here we come!!!