Report from New Zealand.

[rotrax]

I signed out from these pages a month ago just before First Mate and I left to visit our Son, his Partner and our Grandchildren in Wellington.

I must now admit to a serious Senior Moment! We have bought another Yacht!

We had been watching it on "Trade Me", NZ's answer to EBAY.

It is a steel Hartley 30, well equipped and in good but very dirty and totally neglected condition-not moved out of its berth for two years. Knackered batteries,clouded perspex windows but dry, sound and not rusty to any important extent. Not a pretty boat but suited to NZ sailing.

The asking price halved two weeks ago and it had had no bids. We took a look, made a silly offer expecting to be refused but it was accepted. It is berthed in a full service Marina at Seaview SE side of Wellington bay. £1500.00 per annum, £40.00 monthly supplement for liveaboard.

The Yacht came in at £4500.00-we expect to spend another £1000.00 to square her up.

We are begining to like it here.............................

 

[Seajet]

Good to hear, in every way; sounds like you have done rather well.

I have a cousin out there ( born there ) who sends local papers etc, seems a rather nice part of the world.

 

[macd]

£4500? You could get a nice, sensible J300 scooter for that!

 

[Concerto]

Stop teasing us, show some photos. Are you planning to stay out there or is it going to be your floating cottage for weekend getaways? LOL Sounds as though you might have made a real deal and could certainly use it to explore their islands or possibly a little further. It might take a while to sail it home though.

 

[rotrax]

Stop teasing us, show some photos. Are you planning to stay out there or is it going to be your floating cottage for weekend getaways? LOL Sounds as though you might have made a real deal and could certainly use it to explore their islands or possibly a little further. It might take a while to sail it home though.

I am techology challenged-never put a piccy up yet, but I'll see what First Mate can do.

The Visa rules only allow 9 months stay in every 18 months, so we will travel out bi-annually for at least 4 months at a time and live on the boat. Just registered her on the SSR and as she has no name on at the moment and we are not superstitious we have registered her after our new Grandaughter and called her Ella.

When she is in good shape and all is working as it should do we will sail her to the Malborough Sounds and cruise around there-its pretty spectacular in that area, even from the shore.

I had the donk going yesterday-a 20HP Bukh- started easily, no smoke, quietish, lots of water out of the exhaust and a strong thrust from the prop in ahead and astern, so that looks OK.

I am sorting the battery box and wireing tommorow-I started it with just one battery as a temporary measure-they have to be lifted over a metre high bulkhead and the are big heavy buggers-but have nice clamps and cables and new registers to stop them moving when fixed.

Next is the gas-over four metres of flexible pipe incorperating a feed for the gas barbie and a "T" piece under the sink where it feeds the cooker and the Califont instant hot water heater, no shut off tap at all apart from the cylinder valve-that is getting the fling test and will be replaced with copper pipe from the gas locker to a tap and then a "T" with new flexibles to the cooker and Califont. We will hook up the barbie direct to the cylinder when we use it. Gas is cheap here-a 9 kilo exchange is about 18 quid and a refill in a petrol station that does it about 15 quid.

The galley is ceramic tiled-you can perhaps imagine what the grout was like-a real health hazzard! Some barbie cleaner and hard scrubbing improved it no end and First Mate is to use a paste of baking soda and white vinigar to see if that will improve things.

So far so good-watch this space..............................

 

[rotrax]

4

£4500? You could get a nice, sensible J300 scooter for that!

Do they float?

 

[rotrax]

Good to hear, in every way; sounds like you have done rather well.

I have a cousin out there ( born there ) who sends local papers etc, seems a rather nice part of the world.

We like it, not only because of the family here.

We are looking forward to getting on the water here-but aprehensive of the rocks!

The local sailing club in Evans Bay has a report of a 1951 Wellington to somewhere or other race in its magazine-two boats lost with all hands-pretty serious stuff!

 

[Cspirit]

Yes, and be careful in the Sounds - deep water close to shore, so anchoring not always easy, plus topography encourages difficult/strong wind patterns. Beautiful area though....

Oh yes, and as you well know - Bliddy windy in Wellington.

 

[dylanwinter]

what a wonderful adventure

gotta get some snaps on here Rotrax

D

 

[Birdseye]

First Mate is to use a paste of baking soda and white vinigar to see if that will improve things.

So far so good-watch this space..............................

thats simply mixing sodium bicarbonate with acetic acid - which will fiz and give off carbon dioxide but I cant see why it would clean anything. try using them seperately instead. or better still going to aldi and getting one of their shower cleaners.

 

[AndrewB]

Windy Wellington eh? Loved it, but as the local saying has it; "if you don't sail in a gale, you won't sail at all".

A typical day in Wellington Harbour ...

 

[ffiill]

Visas and residency
If your centre of gravity is in nz,that is 50% or more of your children then you can apply for residency with family sponsorship.
Only problem is that in past 5 years processing time has gone up from about two years to seven!
If you can present 1 million $ nz up front you can circumnavigate.
Far better in oz where about £4000 gets you in in about 6 months!
When our daughter partner and grandson settled in the Hokianga in the far north we got all ready in the hope that another out of the four daughters with dual nationality would go.
Then in 2011 another went and the Residency forms got filled in.
Then she took off to Oz met someone and so ended our application.
East coast of North Island looks great sailing country particularly north of Auckland up to Whangerei ,past Cape Bret and into the Bay of Islands.Neither is it such a long hop from there up into Polynesia.
I would also love to do the Hokianga Bar on a calm high or low tide just to be one of the very few Yachts that has done it.
Problem is that you need to be exactly sure of the conditions before going in.
Local fishermen and marlin boats do it without thinking but a good swell and wind over tide and the crescent of standing waves and whirlpools will kill you!