WIth the long busy days Training completed, spares on board and enough supplies to carry us for a few weeks, we are off to Great Barrier Island off the eastern coast of New Zealand – about a 7 hour run. Its good to see Whangarei behind in our wake.
We are running Iron Lady a bit hard to break in “Big John” – her 6 cylinder John Deere engine. With a bit of help from the tide, we are doing over 11 knots down the harbor.
Passing the Whangarei Heads, we are now at sea and the day is perfect and the seas are flat.
The time passes quickly as we continue to check out systems, work with all of the electronics, perform engine room checks and get comfortable with the boat. It isn’t long before Great Barrier appears in the distance.
We navigate in to a small cove which we have basically to ourselves and drop the hook. The first order of business is to get the dink in the water.
On the way out, we stopped to get a quick picture of Iron Lady at anchor.
A few of the locals were interested and stopped by as well. A little Blue Penquin was just a bit too shy to capture on camera, but the ducks were more friendly.
We dragged a line just for fun and caught our first fish – a Kawa (not spelled correctly but that’s how it sounds phonetically). He was the first to grace the back deck barbee for dinner.
A big day – a great day and we were all off to bed early. More shortly.
Cheers – Pete, Deb and Steve