Every fishing trip is a composite of all other trips, and it holds irresistible promise for the future. That cup cannot be drained. There are always greater fish than you have caught; always the lure of greater task and achievement; always the inspiration to seek, to endure, to find; always the beauty of the lonely stream and the open sea; always the glory and dream of nature.

Zane Gray, Angler’s Eldorado

Zane Gray wrote these words after spending a year fishing for marlin off the North Island of New Zealand over 90 years ago. Today the Sophie crew is located in the exact same spot in the world, and I am sitting here marveling at how the lure and excitement of fishing has became such a central, foundational experience for everyone we’ve had the pleasure of hosting on our boat over the last year. Not just for my long-time fishing buddies like Dan Rogers and Steven Fell (both pictured above) — they’ve known the secret their entire lives — but for everyone who has spent time with us over the last year.

I knew when we planned this trip that fishing would be an important and fun and protein-necessary part of our life offshore. But I never anticipated the shared sense of emotional power and emotional connection it would create across all of the different people who were able to join us on our adventure. And it had a cumulative effect, a variation on the cumulative effect that Gray writes about, because it was shared by different people, many who didn’t have a connection with each other except that they were our friends or our family. But as more and more people joined us and caught fish on this trip, more and more people who subsequently joined us really wanted to catch fish on this trip. There was a connection. People were getting hooked.

I guess it started with my brother Rich, whom I love but never really thought of as a guy who was into fishing, but man did he become so happy when he won the fight against a 20 pound yellowfin tuna at sunset 1,500 miles offshore on our passage to the Marquesas, doing so at the exact same time that Dan was pulling in that tuna’s 15 pound little brother. This resulted in Sophie’s first ever “double takedown”, and I now realize that Rich’s fish is the model for the tattoo that graces both my right arm and all Sophie fish photos that grace this blog. It was a physical manifestation of the shared sense of excitement that has become a part of the life we share with others.

And this shared sense of excitement spread. It spread to our friend Rebecca, who landed and dispatched a coral trout outside the reef at Moorea with a surprising and somewhat alarming sense of vigor and glee. It spread to our friend Karl, who could transform albacore on-the-line into sashimi-on-the-plate with world-class speed. And it spread to North Dakota Troy, whose grin at catching his first saltwater fish, in Fiji no less, was as big as his home state. And it spread the next week to our friend Randy, whom we normally think of as a funny, well-dressed triathlete-kind-of guy. But all he wanted to do when he joined us was fish, fish, fish. And he was so happy when he reeled in a couple of tuna as we traveled back and forth between Malolo and the Cloud 9 floating surf break lounge scene and nightclub.

So it shouldn’t have surprised us when it happened again last week with the arrival of our friends Ian and Becky. But it did.

We first met them through the Seattle Yacht Club, and they quickly became good friends because they shared our love of sailing, wine, food, and adventure. Becky even joined us on our passage from Seattle to San Francisco.

But we never really thought of them as a couple who were into fishing. We had never discussed the topic with them back in Seattle, and it didn’t come up in the planning emails and Facebook messages we exchanged in advance of their visit.

They had already spent a week in New Zealand by the time they had joined us in Opua and had done things like mountain luging, airplane fjord tours, vineyard visits, and fine dining in Auckland. So our plan for their visit to Sophie was to spend a couple of days doing more of the same followed by a couple of days anchoring out in the Bay of Islands to celebrate the American Thanksgiving holiday. Sophie is undergoing a bit of a refit right now and has no sails, and besides, the kids are in school. So unfortunately we couldn’t spend the entire time with them cruising.

As Jenna mentioned in her blog this week, on the first day of their visit she took Ian and Becky on tours of the big trees, and on the second day we all hiked a waterfall. On both nights we ate well and stayed up way too late. So I was a little surprised on the morning of the third day when I asked Ian and Becky what they wanted to do, and they both answered at the exact same time “I WANT TO GO FISHING!”

Hmmmm. That would require motoring 5 miles down the river and out into the actual Bay of Islands in a Sophie covered with spare lines and parts boxes, and then go drift fishing for snapper, something I had never done before. In the rain. But Ian and Becky were adamant that they wanted to go fishing, so I walked the kids up to school and then stopped at Cater’s Marine to buy a 2kg bag of frozen herring along with some ice and snapper hooks, and we took off.

I have to confess it felt good to be driving a boat again, and the Bay of Islands are beautiful. Once we got out to the fishing area we had 3 lines in the water, each baited with a frozen herring using 2 hooks in a rig similar to what we sometimes use to catch salmon (and always use to catch dogfish) back in Seattle. We drift fished for the next 3 hours, in what basically turned into a futile exercise of fish feeding. We kept losing bait and sometimes bait and hooks, oftentimes without even feeling a tug on the line. But Ian and Becky were having a fabulous time, and with each lost herring their level of excitement increased, even as the rain picked up.

Personally, as their host and guide I was starting to feel some pressure to actually deliver. I decided that the current rig simply wasn’t working, so I switched to a marlin hook (much bigger and sharper) attached to a steel leader (so fish can’t bight it off) and a heavier weight (so the bait can fall deeper into the current).

Within 2 minutes I got a hit, and although the fish didn’t fight like a tuna or mahi mahi, it was beautiful and soon in the boat. That’s what counts. Cue the obligatory fish shot:

I was happy, but Ian and Becky were ecstatic. I handed my pole to Becky, re-rigged Ian’s, and their lines soon went back into the water. Even as it rained Ian and Becky continued to work their poles from the shelter of the aft cockpit. When time ran out and we had to head back to the dock in order to collect the kids from school, Ian insisted on trolling on the way back just in case. They had that “glory and dream of nature” going, and they had it bad. But we landed no more fish that afternoon.

The next day was Thursday, and we headed out for an anchorage in the Bay with the kids on board this time. We didn’t fish for snapper on the way, but I did fry up the previous day’s catch in gluten-free bread crumbs and served it with a trio of dipping sauces. It was excellent. Once we had the anchor down in a nice cove we went out for a hike, played on the beach, paddle-boarded, and collected oysters. Ian and Leo had every pole on Sophie working along with a couple of hand lines in the water. We tried herring, artificial lures, different sized hooks, even casting with bobbers but had no luck other than a couple of very small fish that Leo caught. We were anchored in only 15 feet of water, and the fish in the bay were clearly too clever for us.

The next day was Friday in New Zealand, meaning Thanksgiving Day back in the US. Our plan was to motor 3 miles back out into the Bay, drift fish for snapper, then head over to another anchorage to cook some roast lamb for our Kiwi version of a Turkey Day celebration.

It was sunnier but much windier than our previous day on the Bay. I had marlin hooks rigged on all three poles this time, but we still had a problem with bait falling off. At one point I was reeling in my line to check the bait and saw a big fish following my hook. I stopped and jigged 5 feet below Sophie’s transom steps, and then wham Wham WHAM he finally took the bait. It turned out to be a four foot-long shark! I fought him back and forth on our trolling pole with the 80 pound braided test line, and he kept running and fighting for 10 minutes. It was a blast. I wasn’t quite sure what to do, but we took a couple of photos and then he eventually solved the problem by biting through the line and swimming away, quite angry with me.

At this point Ian and Becky were in a complete fish frenzy. We moved the boat a couple of times, tried different combinations of bait while watching the clock with the shared understanding that at some point we would have to stop fishing, drop an anchor, and start cooking.

We continued to lose bait and were down to our last 3 herring. Finally, I decided to use a short length of 10 pound test line to tie a herring up and down the shaft of Becky’s marlin hook. She dropped it 20 feet directly below the transom step and then stopped.

Tug. Tug Tug. Tug Tug Tug.

“I’ve got a fish … I’ve Got a Fish … I’VE GOT A FISH!!!!” Becky slowly reeled up her snapper while I worked the leader, and the result was this 10 pound beauty.

For the next 10 minutes Becky was kicking her feet on the deck like a 3 year-old girl eating her first lollipop. “I caught a fish! I caught a fish! I caught a fish! I want to go fishing again! I want to go fishing in Seattle! I want to go fishing with Dan! I caught a fish!”

It was pretty funny.

We loaded the fish in Sophie’s new fish box (under the grate in Sophie’s aft cockpit … thanks for the suggestion Jeff in Kirkland!) and doubled down on our efforts to help Ian land his fish.

No one likes getting skunked, especially when it’s the wife having all the fun. But we were out of herring, the wind and waves were building, and Jenna still needed to start work on our Thanksgiving stuffing, kumara pie and apple crisp. (I was going to do the lamb). So we reluctantly turned the corner and headed for the next cove.

Once the anchor was down, we had four lines back in the water. Ian really wanted his fish. Becky and I cleaned the snapper, which attracted a 10 foot shark who swim past Sophie a few times. There was also a big dolphin sleeping nearby. But no fish. We ate the snapper for lunch, went to shore, cooked, played games, ate our feast, talked, drank wine, and hung out. The whole time we left the four lines in the water, but still no fish.

The next day was our last with Ian and Becky. The plan was to go to shore for a hike, collect some oysters, then motor the 5 miles to Paihia and put them on their bus to Auckland. And hopefully help Ian catch his fish.

We all hiked and took photos on the shore, then Ian dropped me off to snorkel by the oyster beds while he rejoined the rest of the crew. As I swam back to Sophie with a couple of dozen oysters and a conch shell, I spotted a stingray laying on the ocean floor 15 feet down. I yell out if anyone wanted to come and see it, assuming Jenna and Becky would simply get in the dinghy carrying a couple of masks and come over. But apparently Becky still had the adrenalin surge from the previous day and asks Jenna if it was too far to swim there. “Of course not,” says my adventuress wife.

So Becky grabs the wetsuit, grabs fins, grabs a mask and jumps in. I’m 100 meters away. She starts swimming a very splashy stroke, and Jenna starts waving her arms yelling “NO! STOP!” From my perspective in the water, I assume Jenna is simply telling Becky to not attract the shark that was giving us indications of interest in that exact same spot 24 hours earlier. Eventually Jenna stops yelling, and Becky arrives. I assume everything is all right.

The splashing had apparently convinced the stingray that it was a good idea to fly away, which is always a very cool sight, but Becky didn’t get a chance to see it. We proceeded to swim around for a bit and soon spotted another one. In Becky’s haste to leave Sophie she forgot to bring a snorkel, so we swap masks and she gets to enjoy the experience of floating directly over a stingray, an experience that scientists now believe produces the exact same endorphins as those produced while landing a fish. Needless to say, Becky is in a good place. Or so we think.

We swim around for a bit more and then swim back to the boat. Becky gets out first. When I pull my head out of the water, I hear Jenna saying “Are you alright?” while I realize I am at eye level with Becky’s ankle pierced by a brand new 1 cm barbed bait hook attached to 5 cm of 20 pound test line. It turns out that in her rush to get into the water and over to the stingray, Becky snagged one of the hand lines and proceeded to stretch it tight and then snap it without ever feeling a thing. A horrified Jenna got to watch the whole experience and had been yelling to Becky “No! Stop! You’ve snagged a fish hook!” Becky never heard Jenna and never felt a thing the entire time she was chasing stingrays.

So I am still halfway in the water while Jenna and Becky discuss what we should do next. They decide we need to push the barb all the way through Becky’s skin, cut the hook in half (the eye of the hook was to large to push through the hole created by the pointy end) and then pull the remaining hook out.

But Becky, who is back in her endorphin-induced three-year-old-with-her-first-lollipop mode, screams “Get the camera! Jamie, roll up your sleeve! We need a shot of my foot with the fish tattoo!” Jenna gets the camera along with some wire cutters, and takes some photos.

I am a surgeon’s son and veteran pig stitcher, and I am also closest to Becky’s foot, so I do the procedure. I must confess that pushing the hook through her skin looked exactly like pushing a curved surgical needle through the skin of a pig when preparing it for a pig roast. Becky never stops smiling, but she does urge me to do it quickly.

I get the hook out without any tearing, and we all look at the wound wondering if we should irrigate it or apply medicine or some herbal therapy. It looked kind of like a snake bite, but none of us felt like sucking out the poison. We wiped it up instead.

The smiles never left, and the adrenalin along with Sophie’s magic healing power helped keep the situation pain-free. A big irony here is that when we first met Becky on her birthday at the SYC’s Port Madison outstation two years earlier, she was hobbling down the dock with a sprained ankle, looking for some Advil to help alleviate the pain. She is now the first person in the world who can tell a Sophie story about each one of her ankles.

Meanwhile, Ian was down below in his cabin taking a shower, oblivious to all of the activity taking place. Hazel was feeling mischievous and decided to pay him a visit, saying “So Ian, why are you down here taking a shower WHILE YOUR POOR WIFE IS UP ON DECK WITH A FISH HOOK STUCK IN HER FOOT!!!” I am certain Hazel had her hand on her hip while she asked the question.

(I have no idea what we are going to do with that girl in ten years, and welcome any and all advice from my mother or anyone else on how we can best prepare.)

We proceeded to shower off, drive Sophie through a 25 knot chop for 6 miles over too Paihia, drop a hook and then ate a nice, typical Sophie lunch (fresh oysters, marinated green lipped mussels, and organic pumpkin and leek (gluten free) risotto, all washed down with a chilled rioja.) Then I took Ian and Becky into town, put them on their bus to Auckland, from where they flew on to Seattle. It was a great visit, we have new stories to tell, and we miss them a lot.

For me, sharing the “irresistible promise for the future” is what drives us to do this journey, and doing it with friends makes it more meaningful for us. Fishing is now core to this shared experience, and we look forward to having more of our friends and family joining us and “getting hooked.” But if you are planning to do so, please don’t take this suggestion quite so literally. We promise to do our part and will try to no longer leave unattended fishing lines in the water while at anchor. Because we’re all for experiencing the glory and dream of nature, but we want to continue doing so without anyone getting hurt in the process.

Have we told you lately how lucky we are to be on this trip?

You may have noticed that we haven’t posted to the blog in the last 4 weeks while sightseeing, hiking, taking kids to school, fishing, boat projects and hosting friends. We’re having an incredible experience so far here in New Zealand.

For the first couple months here we are on a dock at the Opua Marina. While I love anchoring out, I have to say the convenience of jumping off the boat without having to dinghy in to shore has been a big luxury. Also, with all the boat projects we’re catching up on, you can’t beat our location at the end of the Ashby’s Boat Yard dock.

When we arrived, we cleared customs Tuesday morning just before Game 5 of the World Series. Needless to say, our first priority was to find a place to watch the game. Six of us squeezed into a tiny beater of a car we borrowed and drove to the Roadrunner Tavern where we enjoyed some of the best burgers we’ve ever had and watching the Sox win.

And of course we went back two days later for the epic Game 6.

How could it get any better than a Red Sox World Series championship? David Murray, what a brilliant idea you had to watch it again while cooking on Thanksgiving. Wish we could have too.

It may surprise you to learn that Jamie has always wanted a minivan. I on the other hand, although I fondly remember great times driving one with my friends and sisters during high school, have always loathed the idea of getting another, so it figures that the best cheap used car here was a 2004 Kia Carnival, and we are now the proud new owners of this sweet ride.

With new wheels and a sense of adventure, we headed off to explore the Northland with Fred and Frank, our wonderful crewmates who stayed for some vacation in New Zealand after our crossing from Fiji.

We hopped a ferry to the quaint town of Russell and visited the museum, Pompellier Mission and Duke of Marlborough Tavern that served up some amazing local fried oysters.

Russell is also home to Christ’s Church, the oldest church in New Zealand.

The Pompellier Mission is remarkable. They still operate the tannery, printing press and book bindery that has been in operation since the 1800s. We got a demonstration of the entire process and history from a Maori guide. Leo and Hazel tried out scraping leather and typesetting.

The kids also ran the printing press.

In Kerikeri we stopped by the Stone Store, the oldest building in NZ.

It’s spring here and flowers are in bloom. Everywhere in the Northland looks like a gigantic English garden.

We headed to the west coast to see the giant Kauri trees. En route, we stopped near Opononi at the lookout over Hokianga Harbour for our first glimpse of the Tasman Sea.

On our way to Waipoua Forest, our “two day old” car lost power and then overheated going up a steep hill. We discovered the radiator cap blew off and had to wait for the car to cool down. We managed to go another few kilometers before it overheated again. Almost every car that passed us stopped to check and see if we needed help. Kiwis are so friendly! Luckily we broke down within a few kilometers of the only garage in the area, so we enjoyed a great lunch at Morrell’s Café in Waimamaku while the mechanic checked out our car.

It turned out that there was no coolant in the system, only water (Jake our used car guy rectified this and more back in Opua and also paid for our garage stop). The Carnival ride has run perfectly since, for a minivan that is.

We wanted to get the car back to Opua, but we were so close to the Kauri forest that we made a quick stop to see Tane Mahuta, the biggest Kauri in New Zealand. It is huge! The forest reminded us of our road trips last year to the Olympic and Redwood National Forests, only more tropical.

We made a second trip to Russell to watch the annual Russell vs. Waitaingi rugby match. Our bartender at the Duke of Marlborough plays for Russell and told us about the game, and they won!

Leo and Hazel got into the action too.

We spent a low key Halloween at the Opua Cruising Club here in the marina. The kids made their own costumes including drawing their own face paint. Some local friends aka supermoms we met at the Cruising Club took them trick or treating around the neighborhood in between dumping rain showers and then gave out little handmade bags of candy to everyone.

We heard such great reviews of the local school that we decided to enroll Leo and Hazel for the last 6 weeks of the term. Opua School is quite used to cruisers joining classes this time each year and they welcomed us with open arms.

The kids love being with so many children and learning about New Zealand culture. We were a little overwhelmed with school activities and being back on a schedule the first week. On their first day we learned that they needed costumes for Show Day the following day. Luckily we found some supplies at the two dollar store in Whangarei while the kids were at school. That night they designed and made their own costumes for the second time in less than a week.

Hazel went as a strawberry and Leo was a bunch of carrots.

The theme for Show Day was “5+ Fruits and Veggies a Day” and included a school-wide costume parade and dance party. Some students also decorated their bikes and scooters.

Show Day coincided with Guy Fawkes Night and the Melbourne Cup, so the kids got to stay up late with us to celebrate with dinner, horse racing, and fireworks at the Cruising Club.

Later that week Jamie and I attended the Opua School Tea Party fundraiser. Jamie won best dressed man (of course!) and a raffle basket of Christmas goodies. Without gloves and a fur, I didn’t stand a chance, but thanks to Becky Hoppins who brought me some beautiful vintage white gloves I could be a contender next time. The food was fabulous and all handmade from scratch by moms in the PTA. The school performed a Maori Kapa Haka for us and Jamie and Frank danced with some of the girls during the ballroom dancing demonstration.

One weekend we walked on to the car ferry and hiked to the Omata Winery with Frank and our friends Jeff and Melody from Double Diamond, a Lagoon 440 from Kirkland, WA. The wine wasn’t our favorite, but the food and view were spectacular.

We are working our way through the AA list of 101 things all Kiwis must do. One must see is the Wairere Boulders, a valley of basalt rocks that claims to be the only place in the world where you can see basalt erosion. It was a beautiful hike and the kids loved searching for boulders that looked like animals.

See the dinosaur?

See the crocodile?

My favorite moment was when Leo stopped, looked down and said, “Mom, look! We’re where the red fern grows! Do you suppose they could belong to Old Dan and Little Ann?”

Jamie and I took the kids on another hike to Rainbow Falls in Kerikeri.

Hazel giggled nonstop while chasing chickens across the field.

One day I volunteered to help chaperone Leo’s class on a field trip to Adventure World, an amusement park in Pahia run by former circus performers. Leo and his friends absolutely loved it.

At first, Jamie and I weren’t sure what to do with all our “free time” while the kids are at school. We started with a deep clean and organization of everything inside Sophie and then some boat cleaning and maintenance projects. More on this in another upcoming blog post. We also started short day trips to hikes and restaurants. One day we ate lunch at the Duke of Marlborough Restaurant before streaming the Pats game.

Another day we walked from Opua to Pahia on the coast track (90 minutes one way) followed by lunch at 35 Degrees South, then walked back again following the beach almost the whole way since the tide had gone out.

Another day after morning boat chores we stopped at Marsden Winery for lunch. Feels like we’re dating again. We had just started tasting when Jeff and Melody walked in with a couple friends so we had lunch with them.

We also did the coastal drive to Whangaroa and hiked to the top of St. Paul’s Rock. Both have spectacular views in all directions.

We spent the week before Thanksgiving attending the All Points Rally in Opua, going to seminars, catching up with friends we’ve made across the South Pacific, and meeting a lot of other cruisers who came to NZ for the season.

We have been so fortunate this year to have so many friends and family join us for parts of our voyage. Becky Hoppins and Ian Campbell joined us for Thanksgiving (Becky also did our initial ocean crossing from Seattle to San Francisco last year). We hiked up Flagstaff Hill in Russell.

The next day while Jamie worked on the boat, I took Becky and Ian to Hokianga Harbour and the Waipoua Forest to see more of the Kauri trees.

On the way back, we stopped in Kawakawa to see the famous Friedensreich Hundertwasser toilets. Yes Frank, we finally made it there.

We hiked again to Rainbow Falls followed by oysters and white wine at lunch.

Hazel started an after school gymnastics class and just adores it.

The kids have also practiced the Kapa Haka and performed with their school at the annual welcome to cruisers at the Opua Cruising Club.

The weather has warmed up significantly since we arrived and it almost feels like summer again. After almost a month on the dock doing boat projects, we were so happy to take Sophie back out on the water for fishing one day while the kids were at school. Jamie caught our first red snapper and it was delicious.

Last year we spent Thanksgiving in Monterrey, CA on Sophie with just the four of us. We’re mostly observing local customs, but it didn’t feel right for the kids to just do a regular school day on American (or “amirican” as the Kiwis say) Thanksgiving, so we took them out for a couple days and anchored out in the Bay of Islands for a proper celebration. The dolphin seemed to like this. Becky and Ian did too.

We anchored at Urupukapuka Island, and the water was warm (enough). We have really missed the water!

We all hiked the loop track to the top of the island.

One other boat left shortly after we arrived, so we had the anchorage all to ourselves. This is apparently unheard of after school gets out for the summer.

There were oyster beds along the rocks so Jamie is now an expert oyster harvester and shucker. I think we’ve eaten at least 4 dozen in the past week.

In the morning we fished some more. Becky caught a spectacular red snapper and Jamie reeled in a four foot shark (let that one go).

We decided to have our Thanksgiving meal at the same time as everyone in the states (Friday here in NZ). We anchored at Roberton Island and ate fresh fried snapper for lunch and then paddle boarded and played on the beach while preparing Thanksgiving Dinner. Instead of turkey we had roasted lamb with baked kumara pie, stuffing and corn bread, and started with fresh oysters Jamie had just pulled out of the water plus some 1997 reds from the cellar.

On Saturday we hiked to the lookout on Roberton Island and then spent some more time in the water.

In her eagerness to see the stingrays, Becky inadvertently hooked her own foot while diving into the water. She didn’t notice until she got back to the boat. Luckily it was only skin deep and we were able to clip and remove the hook. In a surprising reversal of roles, Jamie played surgeon this time instead of me. Never a dull moment.

We watched some of the slideshows from our trip on Becky and Ian’s last night here. It struck us how much healthier we are now than when we left a year ago. “Who are those big people? Oh my, that was us.” Jamie is steady at 100 push-ups a day and I’m holding my own. After the slideshow, Becky told us the photos that we’ve posted to the blog aren’t nearly enough given all the amazing things we’ve seen so I promise more going forward.

It was sad to motor back to Pahia and say farewell to Becky and Ian. We had such an incredible time and miss you already! Thanks for a wonderful Thanksgiving.

We feel so fortunate to have so many great people in our lives and hope all the rest of you can join us soon. Everyone should try cruising. We’re back at the dock in Opua, relaxing and playing games with the kids who have two more weeks of school before summer.

We are the luckiest people on earth and still loving every minute of this incredible journey.

We have great boat kids. Hazel and Leo now think that doing a 1,000 mile passage is no big deal. They sleep all night. They hold their bowls patiently on their laps when they are feeling queasy. They focus on their work when Sophie school is in session. They can share a cabin and bed when we have guest crew without (much) fighting and yelling. They get incredibly creative and funny. Leo yesterday jumped 2,500 times on the trampoline, and Hazel thinks its a blast when the wind off the jib makes her hair go straight up. 500 miles from the nearest land.

Only Jenna and Hazel (and maybe the ice princess Caroline Sollenberg) would think that a good way to kill time on a passage would be to braid a bikini strap into your hair.

I love Leo’s sense of ridiculousness. (Look again at the photo).

We REALLY need to get our Webasto diesel cabin heater fixed. Immediately. A week ago it was too hot for a blanket at night, and this morning it’s 53 degrees in our cabin. For us right now that is REALLY COLD!!!!!

Throughout the last 3 months, I joked with people at the various cruising bars that our strategy for arriving in New Zealand was to hit the customs dock with one gallon of fuel left in Sophie. (The theory being you use all your fuel to outrun fronts and storms). I think we succeeded in our strategy. The left photo shows what’s remaining in our port fuel tank, and the right photo shows what’s left in the starboard tank (and the tank is empty when the needle hits the 1/8 mark). Have I mentioned lately that we averaged 8.33 knots over a 1,000 mile passage? Also, there is a fuel dock 30 meters from us.

For what it’s worth, this photo shows what’s left in our port water tank. The starboard tank is empty, and our watermaker has basically stopped working. The fuel dock apparently has water as well.

We had a wonderful time in Fiji over the last 2 months, but over the last week Jenna and I both remembered how much we love sailing offshore. We’ve now sailed around 7,000 miles over the last year. And the fact that we are doing it together makes it special.

I am a much, much better sailor now than I was a year ago.

The Bay of Islands is stunning. We are going to spend the next 6 months in New Zealand, and Sophie will spend most of that time here. I can’t wait to get started. We have already started spotting the boats of friends we’ve met over the summer. The people are all the same, they’re just now a lot colder.

The adventure continues. We are blessed to have the opportunity to do this with our lives.

We tied up at the Customs Dock in Opua, New Zealand at 8:42 PM local time, a little under an hour after sunset (above). I am not sure if the highlight of the day was motorsailing at 9+ knots in spectacular sunshine in a 5 knot southwesterly throughout the afternoon, or Jenna braiding a bikini string into Hazel’s hair (photo tomorrow.) All I do know is that Sophie covered 1,072 nautical miles in 5 days, 9 hours. Our average speed over this period was 8.33 knots. Fred and Frank were great crew. We are thankful for so much on this trip and appreciate all of your good wishes and prayers. We made it to New Zealand!

We are most definitely in the home stretch. It’s 10.30 AM local time, 28.10.13. Happy New Zealand Labor Day everyone! Current position is 34.01 S, 174.05 E. Winds are 13 knots from the south, and there is a 1-2 meter chop we are plowing through in the bright morning sunshine. Boat speed is 7.5 knots @ 155m with a reefed main and both engines running @ 2800 RPM. We covered 186 miles over our last 24 hours from yesterday’s waypoint. We actually sailed over 200 miles, including a 90 mile tack to the west yesterday afternoon to get a better wind angle after we ran into the southerlies. We have 79 miles between us and the dock, and the last 10 of that is in the shelter of the Bay of Islands. The wind is forecast to swing over to the southwest and drop to 3.5 knots before midnight. We are not quite sure how much fuel we have left on the boat. I am certain we have enough to get all the way to Opua at our current RPMs (and I’ve only been wrong once before in this situation!) On the other hand Jenna is not so sure, so we will spend the afternoon closely monitoring the fuel gauges while engaged in open and polite conversation on the topic. Another key issue we face is New Zealand Biosecurity Hazard compliance. We are not allowed to bring into the country any of our bacon, sausage, parma ham, eggs, fruit, vegetables, and other good stuff. We may have to eat four meals between now and bedtime, and at least some of them will be healthy. Last night we dined on spaghetti with imported Italian pesto and parmesan cheese accompanied by roasted Italian sausage. The movie was “The Pink Panther Strikes Again”, and Hazel almost hurt herself she was laughing so hard. Nothing has broken in the last 24 hours, although I lost the SYC hat the Wickmans gave me when I ran outside to see if the four frigate birds chasing us were going to strike at our lures. Overall the crew is happy, wearing another layer of fleece, and looking forward to sleeping on a dock tonight.

So when I was tucking the kids into bed last night (after they had finished watching Roger Moore ham is way through “The Man With the Golden Gun”), I turned to Hazel and said we needed to be thankful that Sophie was so fast throughout the entire day that we had successfully outrun the danger of all the storms chasing us from behind. She paused, smiled quietly, and said “Whoa!” That’s pretty much all we need to say. It’s 10.30 AM local time, 27.10.13. Current position is 30.58 S, 174.57 E. Winds are 6 knots from the east, and the seas are flat. Boat speed is 7.5 knots @ 174m with a full main and jib and one engine running @ 2800 RPM. We covered 210 miles in our last 24 hours, meaning that over our first 4 days we are now officially averaging over 200 miles per day. We could have covered more, but Jenna convinced me at 3:00 AM this morning to turn off a motor to conserve fuel. But overall we succeeded in our strategy of outrunning the front behind us, and that makes us all very, very happy. The GRIB (weather) charts we downloaded all day showed nasty weather (30-40+ knot winds) coming south just 50-100 miles behind us. We had some gusts touching 20 knots in the afternoon, but by last last night it was very calm with an easy sea motion and lots of phosphorescence in the water. We are now protected by the ridge of high pressure extending across New Zealand, the front (now a low) has slid off to the east, and we have just 250 miles left before we tie up to the customs dock at Opua. We still have over half of our fuel left and know we will need to motor into a 10+ knot headwind during our last day, but the big question on Sophie now is whose arrival estimate will be the most accurate. We’ll let you know tomorrow. 🙂 From a boat perspective, nothing broke except one of the main salon forward opening hatches which developed a 2 inch crack. We’re not sure if it was caused by a flying fish (we decked 5 plus one squid the other night) or by a sheet, but it’s an easy repair. The engines sound great. Fred is still raving about last night’s boef a la bourgognon. The temperature is expected to drop 20 degrees by the end of the day, and the fleeces and wool hats are coming out. But we are safe and heading for the barn.

We are well over halfway to New Zealand and covered our best 24 hours ever on Sophie! 10.30 AM local time, 26.10.13. Current position 27.31 S, 175.38 E. Winds are 10 knots from the east, and the seas are still comfortable at 1 meter. Boat speed is 9.5 knots @ 174m with a full main and jib and both engines running @ 2800 RPM. We covered 210 miles in our last 24 hours, meaning over our first 3 days we have covered 598 miles. (That is fast.) The really good news is that we covered most of this ground without using our engines, with the combination of a clean bottom, flat seas and a 15 knot easterly contributing to 9.5 knots of sustained boatspeed throughout the night. The less good news (and most of you know that I am too much of an optimist to say “bad news” in an offshore passage update) is that we are outrunning a line of squalls forecasted to develop behind us, but we are in a good position relative to the front and didn’t turn the engines on until 8:00 this morning so we have full tanks of gas and only 460 miles to go to Opua. The extended forecast for New Zealand is for a high to develop tomorrow with no fronts and a light southerly wind and 1 meter swells. If (meaning when 🙂 ) we outrun the squalls tonight, we will have a day and a half of motorsailing and should reach the dock sometime Monday evening. The kids are doing much better, and I knew Leo had recovered when he wolfed down 2 Italian sausages for lunch yesterday. Nothing has broken in the last 24 hours and everyone is well rested and happy. Dinner was an excellent salad and sauteed eggplant (Jenna) accompanied by a very tough corned beef (me). New life lesson: never assume the beef you are roasting is NOT a corned beef when it in fact it actually IS. We are bummed the Sox lost game 2, but it means that Jenna and I will be able to watch some of the Series on shore. Finally, another sailboat just showed up on the horizon ahead of us. Frank’s racing instincts are kicking in as he continues to reel in (sailboat racing term) our new neighbor. They don’t see or hear us yet, but I assume we’ll have a nice conversation when we pass them. All in all, we are having a great trip.

Our fast start continues, and it looks like we put the bouncy squally weather behind us last night. 10.30 AM local time, 25.10.13. Current position 24.02 S, 176.05 E. Winds 15 from the east. Seas a very comfortable 1+ meters. Boat speed is 9 knots @ 178m with a full main and jib. Covered 193 miles in our last 24 hours, meaning 2 straight days of 8 knot sailing! The kids, especially Leo, were pretty queasy yesterday but are much better (meaning eating) today. Had a bit of an incident when the beam pounding caused our spare anchors/anchor chain to knock out the bottom of a nonstructural locker bulkhead, routing drain water from the forward cockpit into the starboard bilge. The float switch had broken, but we caught it in time to plug the hole and reroute the drain. I will install a replacement switch today. Also, it seems the SIM card on our sat phone no longer works. From a sailing perspective, Sophie remains a tank. From a food perspective Jenna is cutting up coconuts and pineapple in the aft cockpit, and we’ll eat the corned beef roast with salad and eggplant for dinner. Caught one mahi mahi and “decked” (?) 4 flying fish. There are no strong winds or fronts forecasted between us and Opua, and we have 240 gallons of diesel in the tanks. That means that as soon as this easterly dies down, I’m turnin’ on our Yokahama Mamas, putting the peddle to the metal and playing truck driving music really loud as we motor through the calm and into Opua Harbor some time Monday night. Only 670 miles and 3 World Series wins to go!

Off to a fast start in a squally easterly. 10.30 AM local time, 24.10.13. Current position 20.51 S, 176.37 E. Winds 20-25 with gusts to 30 from east. Seas 2 meters. Boat speed 8.5 @ 180. Left Vuda Point 24 hours ago, made 195 miles with 2 reefs in main and 1 in jib over first 24 hours. Fast and (relatively) stable ride. Averaged over 9 knots last night. Self service coq au vin and crepes for dinner. Queasy kids, couple of squalls, and Fred Pot can’t wipe the smile off his face. Sophie is back in offshore mode. Nothing has broken. No fish. We are getting exactly the weather that was predicted, and we expect the wind to ease by nightfall. Overall we are off to a good start. Only 863 miles to go!

Our time in Fiji is coming to an end after two months. What an amazing country.

On October 10th we celebrated Fiji Day, commemorating the anniversary of Fiji’s independence from British colonial rule, with tug of war, beach volleyball, water bailing relays, kava drinking, singing and dancing.

Hazel and Leo had their faces painted and loved playing all the games.

To round out our Fiji experiences, I finally had the opportunity to try kava. We even let Leo drink a little.

Jamie describes the flavor as “tea made from cigarette butts” and we all think that’s spot on.

We really enjoyed singing with the daughter of the chief.

The past two weeks have been very low key. The kids focused on Sophie School, swimming and playing with friends. I lost count of how many hermit crabs they found. Jamie and I caught up on boat projects and of course we watched Red Sox and Patriots games. What an amazing time we’ve had in Fiji.

Many of our fellow cruisers have already departed and now it’s our turn. Fred and Frank are here to help us crew. We cooked homemade lasagne, beef bourgignon, coq au vin, corned beef, and crepes for the crossing. And the weather window looks good.

We just checked out of customs and as I type this we are heading south. Next stop New Zealand!