Monday, February 22, 2010

Back South

Leaving Jim to sail Elenya with a friend up to Mahurangi to watch the classic boat regatta, I headed back down South for a second time on Evohe, an expedition ketch we had met in Campbell Island. This trip was to the Snares. We had amazing weather and the penguins were pretty cool!


Snares Crested penguins

Returning titi (sooty shearwaters)

Penguin slope

Evohe in the 'anchorage'

Canyoning in the Waitakeres


Christmas

Apologies that updates are now few and far between but work seems to get in the way of having fun! For Christmas we took Elenya out to Owhanake Bay, Waiheke. Some good sailing and Christmas day itself was scorching hot. In a failed search for ice cream we saw a friend's boat anchored in Oneroa and spent the afternoon catching up. The evening found us sitting in a spa pool overlooking the bay, drinking wine under the stars courtesy of some friends. I was working between Christmas and New Year so we sailed across to the East Coast bays and anchored off Rothesay Bay/Browns Bay and I went to work from there which was kind of like still being on holiday! For the NY break we sailed up to Kawau. Spent NY night with some of Jim's work mates and had a generally relaxing time for the rest. Lots of time spent lounging in my Christmas present of a waterproof bean bag in the cockpit! We also managed to fit in two scallop dives (and now I don't have to share them with CP who we visited while in Browns Bay!)

relaxing hard

Jim kayaking at Owanake