Explore Sailing Voyages in New Zealand 🇳🇿

the passage to Christchurch started in a mellow fashion, not much wind but in the rightish direction. we even played around with the cruising chute for a while but had to turn for our course and it didn't work anymore. as we worked our way towards cook strait the wind gradually picked up as was forecast. Tim helped us out there towards the "brothers" and was starting to get a constant 20kns. we were making good speed but heading towards the north island. we turned up and put a reef in the main and Mike helmed for a while and we gybed once safely clear of the lighthouse on the brothers. I took over on the downward leg and,has frequently been the case, the wind immediately picks up. this was no exception! soon I had 27 knots and on up to 32 knots. I was guilty of oversteering us with that wind and we got turned unwind twice and had to release the foresail and main to get us back on track. we took a reef in the main again and one in the foresail and had a more controllable time after that. then it was just the grind of 2hrs on 4 off watches. steady 25kn winds meant we were handsteering and having to work hard to keep our course. the sea state was around 1.5 m but bigger waves would come through from behind and knock your course around. I managed an 11.4 kn surf very briefly! nothing changed through the night and it was much the same all through the day. we were actually quite far offshore before we could lay our Gabe and head in towards Lyttleton Harbour. even as the sun shone and the visibility hot better in the late afternoon we still couldn't see land. I went off shift at 8pm and Tim took over, he saw land about 10miles off and soon after the wind fizzled out. we motor sailed into Lyttleton and after 30 hrs tied up in the marina just after midnight. A celebratory drink was had and the three tired boys hit the hay!

Not sure why the log didn't start recording until later, missing some of the start. anyway the passage took 30 hours & we are in Lyttelton. probably here for a couple of days as the weather forecast isn't great.