Up early yesterday morning to catch the Naked Bus to Opua. You can see a photo below from the Harbour Bridge looking out towards Rangitoto. Enjoyed the night with Roger and Ryoko and catching up on their news. Roger has changed jobs and is much happier now to be working with Hot Cycles in St Heliers. Less stress and fewer long days. They head off to Japan for a holiday in later this year in July.
Arrived at the top of Opua hill in the 25 seater bus in torrential rain... no choice but to walk down the 1km hill dragging 25kg bag, backpack and camera trying to hold the folding umbrella against the strong Nor Westerly Then a short 800m along the foreshore to find Kalai handily located next to the ablution block with a rickety aluminium ladder lashed to the stern quarter. Dragging the aforementioned bag up a 4m ladder in the rain was interesting. Got to the top and pulled out the key to unlock the padlock - wrong key! Aaagghh!!! Back down the ladder thinking and praying about contingency plans - looked again at the key chain and the padlock key had magically appeared from behind the other one??? WHAT THE?
Got inside the boat and things were a bit of a mess from the engineers working on the drivetrain - cleaned up, hung up wet clothes and unpacked bags - a few wet clothes but no big deal.
Went and had a long chat to Lowes Marine people who have been working on the boat and it looks like the new prop should arrive next Tuesday and hopefully we'll be back in the water soon after. Wandered up the road to the General Store, which is actually quite reasonable and stocks a good range of stuff, then back to the Cafe for their world-famous seafood chowder about 4 pm for lunch! Needless to say the rain had stopped soon after I arrived... not coldW, but overcast and showery.
Woke early this morning and scooted down to the General Store for some of their fresh-baked sourdough bread which, as they say, was good on toast! The first shot below was soon after dawn looking North from the boatyards... weather has improved as the day went on to a brilliant warm (23 C) afternoon, though it started raining again around 9 pm as I was coming home from the OCC after watching the Crusaders belts the Blues in Christchurch.
I did manage to get a few of my jobs done today and after a constructive visit to Alan at Legge's Boatbuilders came away with a borrowed extension lead (to charge the batteries), some newfangled epoxy primer and 2 litres of free anti-foul to patch the hull.
Opua is a very interesting little corner of the world, with all kinds of people from all over the world. A young guy pitched his tent this morning alongside the boat to dry it out. He has come from the US and just cycled 4500kms around NZ and his goal is to cycle and sail around the world. So he is looking for work here and then has arranged to take his gear on a yacht heading to Tonga and then will head west to PNG and on to China... Some of the 'Cruisers' (Yachties who cruise around the world) have already left for Polynesia, others will leave in the next week or two, still others have returned home and left their boats with 4-sale signs on them - had enough, I guess?
Looks like a wet day again tomorrow, but clearing Mon/Tue so I should get the rest of the outside work done. PTL the washboards I made fit perfectly and this afternoon I successfully glued the brackets for the scuppers in place. If it clears I might walk into Paihia in the afternoon - a gentle 12km up and down journey!
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