Friday, May 11, 2007

Journal Entry - May 10 - 11: Off to Face the Tasmanian Devil

All I knew about Tasmania was that there was a plump psychotic cartoon character with bad breath, who must have drank way too much coffee, and talked like he had just eaten a bag of pinecones. What is a Tasmanian Devil anyway? When we visited Australia by air we supposedly saw this marsupial marvel in a dark cage, it wasn't moving, and I am suspicious they dressed up a tranquilized baby kangaroo, shoved it under bad lighting and charged $29.95 to see this rare Tasmanian wonder, anyway, I am digressing. We didn't know much about Tasmania other than there may be a devil, we knew it is the stomping ground for the famous Sydney to Hobart race, and it is home to one of the most infamous stretches of water known to sailors. So, here we are crossing the Tasman Sea. We know a lot more about it now! We have leaned that it is called the "weather kitchen", you usually get a gale either at the start or end of a voyage, and that you have to look out for Sea Mountains that can spring up out of the depths, hidden just under the surface and creating breaking waves in the middle of the open sea with no land in sight. Before I scare our readers senseless, please know that we have meticulously researched a good weather window and we have even used a weather routing service for the first time.

So far the trip has been good! We departed Opua, New Zealand at noon May 10. The morning was a controlled frenzied collage, racing for showers, to meet customs, pay the marina, getting fuel, finishing a few final projects, and a plethora of other departure tasks. When 12:00 rolled around, we were ready to go! Our friend Roger from Wings & Strings who had helped us all morning (despite his sprained back) was on the dock with our friends Karen and Barry from Sarabi and new friends from Nyriad. We pulled away from the fuel dock at 12:10, circled the boat for a few photos, and headed off to face the Tasman!

Our trip out of the Bay of Islands was refreshing. We shared the relief of finally leaving after so much preparation. The sea was gentle, under a murky gray sky, and the ocean lay before us with so many memories of past passages. Our first day at sea was spent mostly motor sailing in light winds. Food was quick and easy as Pam had prepared a number of scrumptious comfort meals in advance, and before you knew it the sun was down and our first night at sea in eighteen months was upon us. The night was black early in the evening and Pam was on watch first (as she always is). We were still motor sailing so keeping our course was no problem. The first night of any passage is always spooky, it's not like we see much more off the boat in the day, but light is comforting somehow, you never hear of kids being afraid of the light. By the time I came on deck and Pam hit berth, the stars were out in force. Mr. moon was still off doing his business elsewhere but the sky was beautiful. The remainder of our watch schedule went smoothly. We were trying a new 2.5 hour watch schedule that went as follows:

Pam on watch: 21:00 - 23:30
Scott on watch: 23:30 - 02:00
Pam on watch: 2:00 - 04:30
Scott on watch: 04:30 - 07:00

We then randomly take turns being on watch in the morning while the other person naps.

Now I don't know where I got the silly notion that going to sea would give me a chance to chill out and unwind from all the hectic preparations. Once we got through the morning radio nets and shrugged off the groggies from the first night at sea, we had to set to work on updating folks in Australia regarding our arrival. Then we got an email from a reporter from the Auckland Sunday Herald who was writing a story on our departure and she needed questions answered ASAP. Just as we were setting out to accomplish this task, I happened to look out the port side cockpit door and noticed that we were the recipients of a viscous and brutal bird bombing. New Zealand must have pterodactyls patrolling the skies because this dude strafed out boat with the gooeyist and squishiest weapon in his arsenal, and whatever he ate last must have contained Super Glue. It was disgusting! I think the bird population must have been spying on Pam and somehow overheard her opinion on the aviary species and decided to teach her a lesson. "See ya later sister, take this for the road - splat, splat, splat, splat, splat." And who do you think had to clean up the retribution for Pam's bird bashing, you guessed it, the guy who loves our fine-feathered friends! It took me nearly two hours with me in PFD and tethered to the boat.

When the day finally did settle down we had a chance to relax listen to music and reflect on our return to the sea. Late in the day we also got our first sailing wind and we were off to face the Tasman and any devils that might be lurking.

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