Lets name this post; Finally!!

We are leaving. The forecast has spoken and the low pressure that has kept us one week too long in Whangarei is now heading off. Same goes for us.
250 kg of food, 90 kg diesel, 1,5 kg worth of tools, 130 litres of water and 150 kg semi-intelligent man is all piled up, stacked away and more than ready to leave.

FIJI; HERE WE COME!
(We hope)

Leaving New Zealand

We are about to leave New Zealand pretty soon. The weather looks like it will clear up enough for us to leave on Sunday.

Finally I'm leaving this country where I've spent the last year of my life. If all goes according to plan I will not be returning for some time; who knows, maybe never. It is not without regret that I leave. I've made a lot of good friends here, and I've met a bunch of interesting people. I've come to enjoy the culture here; nowhere else in the world (except Finland) have I seen people too drunk to start their own vehicles, only to be helped in the procedure by their good friends. I've improved my English greatly while living here; I've learned to include "cool", "sweet" "cheers" and "aye" in even the shortest of sentences. I've enjoyed some great scenery and some not-so-great fish and chips.

All in all I'm glad for the time I've spent here, and it is a bit sad to leave. I'm grateful for all the experiences I've had here. All those drunk nights at the Jeff's Joy campground and the runs down the Rangitaiki River. I'd like to thank The Auckland Uni Canoe Club (AUCC) for that, and for all the other
places we paddled and drank together. I will not forget the close calls on the river or walking out from Jeff's Joy run in pitch black through logging fields for 6 hours because we didn't make it down the river because night fell.

Ed, Owen and Ash: thanks for the trip up Mt. Cook, it was awesome and probably the best view I've ever had. We should meet to climb some other mountains some day! Also thanks to the rest of the people at AURAC!

All the people I've spent time with at Uni; thanks for being entertaining, young and good looking!

ANSA Auckland: We will meet again "home" in Norway, thanks for all the great parties and trips together.

Thanks to Vanessa for being my flatmate my first half year here, and for cooking me great food all that time!

I'll miss all the nights spent in the back of my campervan, but alas; he's gone now, you can probably pay him last respects at Pick-A-Part. Oh, just got sidetracked, well, anyway, thanks to all the people mentioned, and to those I've met along the way, but forgotten to mention!

Cheers!

Skipet

SKIPET

Liberty heter båten vår. Hun er en gammel glassfiber-dame som fyller 50 år i år. Hun er tegnet av Wirth Munroe og bygd I USA I 1959 av Crystaliner. Modellnavnet er Arco 33. Hun er 33 fot, eller 10 meter, lang, største bredde er 3 meter og hun stikker 1,5 meter dypt med senkekjølen oppe, 2,5 meter med kjølen nede. Hun er langkjølt og kutter-rigget, dvs. at vi har mulighet til å ha to forseil oppe samtidig.

Skroget er lagd i massivt glassfiber (ikke noe moderne sandwich-konstruksjon her i gården!) og er 28 mm tykt. Vi har ikke rullefokke-system på forstaget, som er veldig vanlig på moderne båter. Dette betyr at vi må fram på fordekket for å bytte seil, uansett vær. MEN det betyr også at det er én teknisk ting mindre som kan bryte sammen og bli ødelagt på båten.

Seilgarderoben består av, i tillegg til et splitter nytt storseil; genoa (original fra 1959!), jib, yankee, stormfokke og kryssfokke. Vi har også en gennaker som vi forhåpentligvis lærer oss å bruke en dag.

Annet utstyr seile-nerdene kan ha interesse av er 2 CQR anker (25 og 35 pund), et stokkanker, 45 meter ankerkjetting, elektrisk ankerspill, SSB radio, VHF, Yanmar 2 sylindret 18 HK motor (ny i '96), to-blads propell, Monitor vindror, Avon 6manns livflåte, Avon gummijolle, nødpeilesender. Vi har med oss 40 liter ferskvann i en fast tank foran i båten, 115 liter til i 5 plastdunker i aktre lasterom. To av sistnevnte kan kobles på ferskvannssystemet slik at vi vi har på det meste tilgang til 90 liter ferskvann «i krana». Vi har også 40 liter diesel på tank pluss 70 liter til på kanner. Dette er nok diesel til at vi kan gå for motor i ca. 5 dager i strekk.

Liberty har to køyer i forpiggen som kan lages om til en stor V-køye om det er behov. I kabinen kan vi brette ut sofaen til en til stor dobbelseng. Når vi går vakter til havs bruker vi helst stikkøya i kabinene. Matlaginga foregår på en gretten gasskomfyr med to bluss på toppen.

Liberty er en førstegenerasjons glassfiberbåt, og er utrolig solid bygget. Mye av det originale dekksutstyret i bronse er fremdeles der det ble montert for 50 år siden. Senkekjølen er også lagd av bronse. 200 kg. Av det.

Vi har absolutt tiltro til båten vår, og skulle vi bli nødt til å avbryte turen vår på noe tidspunkt er det neppe sannsynlig at det er BÅTENS feil.

THE SHIP

Liberty is our boat. She is an old fibreglass lady who turns 50 this year. Built in the US of A in 1959 she is an Crystaliner production designed by Wirth Munroe, model name Arco 33. She is 33 feet (or 10 metres if you prefer) length over all, beam (width) 3 metres, she draws 1,5 metres with the centerboard up, 2,5 with it down. Furthermore she is long keeled and rigged as a cutter.

The hull is produced in solid fibreglass and is 28 mm thick (!), built as a tank! She is not equipped with a rolling furler, which means we will have to go up on the foredeck to change foresails. However it also means one less thing that can break down. Foresails include genoa (the original one from 1959!), jib, yankee, storm sail and staysail. We also have a gennaker that we hopefully will learn to use someday.

Other equipment the sailing geeks might be interested in includes 2 CQR anchors (25+35 lbs), a fisherman anchor, 45 metres all-chain rode and electric windlass, SSB radio, VHF, Yanmar 2 cylinder, 18 HP engine (new '96), two-blade propeller, Monitor windwane, Avon liferaft, Avon inflatable dinghy, EPIRB. We carry 40 litres of water in a forward tank, 115 more in 5 plastic containers in aft storage, these can be connected to the boat's watersystem so we have, at most, 90 litres of water accesisble «on tap». We also carry 40 litres of diesel plus an additional 70 litres on jerrycans.

Liberty has a big v-berth up front that can be made into two single berths, whatever suits. The cabin settee can be folded out as another big double bed. However at sea when doing watches we tend to use the quarterberth. We also have a grumpy two burner gas-stove with oven that works most of the time.

Being an old lady (Liberty is produced in the infancy of the fireglass boatbuilding techniques) she is incredibly sturdy; lots of the original hardware like cleats and winches are still on in it's all it's original bronze beauty. (The centerboard is made out of 200 kg solid bronze!). She has had an interesting life of which we only know bits; she has spent years cruising the great lakes in the states, the Bahamas, she has been through the Panama Canal and has spent around a dozen years cruising the Pacific Islands.

We have absolute trust in our ship, and should our little trip fail at any stage it is not likely to be caused by the ship letting US down.

COLD

I get out from under my duvet and spare blankets. I put on my T-shirt and shorts. I continue with my woollen beanie, my hoodie and woollen socks. Still cold I pull the hood up over my head. I then fire up the gas stove to make us some breakfast. Egil is still asleep. I stand for a second enjoying the heat from the little blue flame. Morning mist is floating on the river outside the porthole. Winter is coming to New Zealand. Time to leave now.

STOLEN GOODS

We've left West Park Marina four weeks ago. Since Egil's arrival we have filled our time with boat maintenance, boat modifying, general getting-to-know-the-boat and sailing the boat. Actually both of them; we have learned a lot from sailing our dinghy. Now we are anchored up in Hobson Bay right outside of Auckland. Since we have no clue as to what we're doing we're anchored with two CQR anchors and 40 metres of chain. In three metres of water. But its sweet to get out here to the free zone, that close to Auckland centrum. Just to be safe. We soon run out of gas. I take the gas bottle to a petrol station for a refill. Since I'm on foot I ask the attendants if I can leave the bottle and pick it up later as I'm going into town. Seven hours later I return to find the gas bottle gone. Apparantly some guy in a BMW pulled up and said I had sent him to pick up the bottle.

Buy a new gas bottle. We're finally taking some time off from the boat and we're going whitewater kayaking a weekend. Egil gets his chance to see some more of beautiful New Zealand. We're letting out another 10 metres of chain (just to be safe) and paddle our dinghy ashore and leave it under a small bridge. Same place we have left it every day last week. Upon our late return from a great weekend we find our precious dinghy gone!
It's a little past midnight and we are pretty tired. The weekend has been full of physical- and social activities. We have met a lot of interesting people, and especially this old salt that called himself “Captain Morgan” has left the two of us a little worse for wear. But alas, there is no way of returning to the boat, so we spend a miserable
night in the car James has generously lent us so we could get ourselves and the gear home. Off to Warehouse to buy a 99$ childrens play dinghy (Toyworld didn't have any). Our beautiful 10 years old yellow Metzeler dinghy later mysteriously reappears. Someone has tied the deflated version of it to a post on the other side of the bridge. We retrieve the sad remains of our object of great attention and countless hours of repairs for the last month. It
is now clearly FUBAR, or “possibly not repairable within the limitations of ordinary people”. Only one of the pontoons inflate somewhat, the other one has a 10 centimetre cut in it and the floor
leak fast.

WHANGAREI TUNING

Spendingspree and things for free
We came here to Whangarei because a) it's a bit further north in New Zealand and therefore «on the way» for us. b) Lots of people have told us to go here because it is apparently really easy to get «everything» done here, and it's supposed to be plenty of other cruisers you can gather information from.
As we had no dinghy we were forced to check into a marina. There we were quickly dubbed «The Orange Glow» due to our bright orange safety-netting that we've been (very gratefully) sponsored by the Auckland City Council. Thank you Council!

Our slightly more fancy neighbours took well to their new young Norwegian, scruffy and inexperienced cruising colleagues. We had heard lots about the generousity of the cruising community, but what we experienced in that marina was way beyond what we expected! We were showered with freebies from the other boats. As they passed us on their way to the trashbins they always stopped by to ask if we wanted their old boomcover, hatch funnell, solar panel mounts (aka random bits of aluminium tubing), WiFi antenna, their old cockpit cushions, new (!) sailbag etc etc. We got so many more or less useful bits and pieces we couldn't believe it! I guess their generousity might have something to do with our hopelessly inexperienced and dirt-poor appearance.


We arrived with a super-long To-Do list. Included on this list were new batteries (oh my God, the prices!), new solar panel mounts, fixing half a dozen electrical issues, sorting out how and where to stow stuff, fill our diesel-tanks, fill our water-tanks, get a proper solar panel mount and doing The Engine.

This last task ended up taking us almost a week and costing us about 550 $NZ (about et par tusen norske krones). It seemed that the deeper we dug into Good Old Yanmar 2GM20(F), the more stuff we needed to fix, sort out, repair, replace or buy. However now she's running like a dream, and has apparantly accepted all her new parts and fluids.
All the while we were doing boat maintenance we got heaps of information, tips, hints, radio frequencies, software and general help from the other cruisers. They even lent us plenty of tools to do the jobs so we didn't have to struggle with our own (which are limited to three adjustable spanners, 5 screwdrivers (4 philips and one gigantic flat), a multitool, a hacksaw, a hammer and the world's biggest axe (don't ask why, we can't give you an intelligent answer.))
We also took advantage of the vicinity of a supermarket to buy and stow away an amazing amount of supplies.

However yesterday, after 10 days in the marina, our «new» dinghy finally arrived in the mail, and there was no more (at least not a whole lot more) reason for us to stay at the marina. We had a last shower for a while, dropped our moorings and floated down the river to anchor up with the other slumdog cruisers, where we belong.
We are at present discussing whether to stay here until our necessary work is done and the weather breaks, or to carry on to Opua, even further norh, to do the same thing there. We are also disussing whether to abandon our original plan of going to New Caledonia first, or set sail for a a slightly longer first leg, and go to Fiji instead.
All for now, peace out.

SAILING OFF

We had stayed too long in Auckland. Losing our dinghy air pump was that drop. At least my gypsy-nomadic self started to vibrate with eager to leave for something new. A few days later we set sail for Whangarei, with a plan to stop over at Great Barrier Island. That means going north. Homewards. It sure felt good, and as we raised our foresail I even I felt confident about leaving and sailing and anchoring and all that. Luckily, after counting up our total of sailing days since I came down here, things got a little more real. 6 daytrips in and out of our Marina, two succsessfull atempts to anchor up, in well marked anchor/mooring areas and some bedtime sail litterature seemed to be all our experience. And yes, thinking of it, that boat still felt enourmus to handle, but yet so little when reaching the occean. In any case, with small, cozy butterflies stuck somewhere in our stomaches, we slowly headed upwind towards the open sea and Great Barrier Island.

It sure was a fine day, but slow winds turned into no wind. So when night fell, we could still see Auckland in the far horizon as we anchored up in a calm and beautiful bay at one of the many islands along the coast. A real slow-mo day, but that being our first night outside auckland, and with memorable pancakes for dinner things felt great.

We went of that morning with really nice winds, clear blue sky and perfect sailing conditions. Even though we were slowed down by a calm period, just as the winds turned around coming from east, we were now coming up past our destinations neighbouring island; Little Great Barrier. The sun was setting and a large pod of dolphins came up alongside our boat. It was our welcome surprise before letting of the anchor in one of many spectacular bays of this island.

That night the winds shifted again, and we got some waves in during night. This resulted in some paranoic dreaming and sleepwalking, but nothing more than usual.

So far everything had been going smooth. I was at a high and could not think of any better way to travel. At least it's getting close to driving a moped.

Earlybirds and breakfast at 6.30. Sails up at 7, heading for Whangarei. Our plan was simple; enjoy winds, basic sunbathing, testing of different sail combinations and reach Whangarei at sunset.

Again we got stuck in a no-wind period at mid day. This one lasted on for hours, and we drifted around trying out all we had of spinnakers and sail configurations, but there was no wind.

As it was getting darker we realized Whangarei was out of todays reach. We fired our good old Yanmar 18 HP and bubbled on for one of the nearby Islands. Night was coming fast and the steep sea bottom around the island made it impossible to anchor as the winds picked up again. We decided that faith had set us out facing our first night-sailing experience. The winds picked up even more and we were doing 6 knots and closing in rapidly. One surprise oiltanker, some extra large waves when entering more shallow waters, a little fumbling in the dark trying to see the red and green lights of the narrow approach to Whangarei, pluss one or two now forgotten issues more, and we were lowering anchor in a quiet little bay, just a couple of miles from our final destination, just as the clock struck midnight..

Had a peacfull night with no outbirsts of paranoia and motored in to Whangarei the next morning, all the way up this idiotically long and narrow river.

THE PRINCIPLES OF SURFACE-SUPPLIED DIVING / HULL INSPECTION

You need:

- A certified surface supplied diver, preferably with navy experience
- A snorkel
- A diving mask
- Some metres of garden hose
- An airpump (complete with musculous pump machine)
- Half a roll of insulation tape (preferably 3M super 88)



Use the tape to join all the pieces together, let simmer for about 45 minutes, find a hull to inspect, turn off speeding propellers and sonars, now dive!

LAST TRIP OF THE DINGHY

A week has gone by and we're about to leave Auckland when we decide to get rid of the Warehouse dinghy. We row it ashore along with the Old Yellow Wonder and a pump for the latter. We then dispose of the new one the only way we can think of: we take it back to The Warehouse and get our money back. After having said goodbye to some friends we make it back to our trusty bridge and dinghy hiding place.
Upon arriving back to our sad old Metzeler dinghy we are (not very) surprised to find that someone has bothered to steal the pump while leaving the dinghy (now chained to a post) and the drybags. Laughing in disbelief we start blowing up the one remaining pontoon using only our mouths. A little while later we have fashioned ourself a raft using our drybags, the dingy and some rope. It is leaking in half a dozen places, but it floats and should be able to take us the 6-700 metres out to our boat. We have stripped down to our shorts such as to keep the wet gear to a minimum should the thing sink.
At first things look good; the craft is manouverable and “fast”. It is even pretty dry. However soon after The Point of No Return I, being in the back realise that the freeboard is decreasing. We are soon down to about 10 cm which means that every stroke Egil does up front fills our construction up a little more. Which in turn means we are shipping a little more water with every stroke. Which in turn means we are riding a little lower in the water. Which in turn means we manouver a little worse. Which in turn means we are slower. I think to myself that there is no way we will reach “home” this way, and envision us drifting into the Hauraki Gulf. Not a very pleasant place to be drifting around at one in the morning in a leaking makeshift raft with no lights.
The raft soon becomes agonizingly slow and nigh on impossible to steer. For every three strokes we take I have to brace two strokes at the opposite side and we are moving at about 0,1 knot with the current sweeping us laterally away from our boat. We realise we need a change of tactics.
The current has swept us sideways leaving our own boat an impossible goal, especially as our muscles are on fire with the constant effort the last 30-40 minutes. We do however have a yacht on a neighbouring mooring. It is quite a flashy 50 foot racer, with heaps of electronics in the mast and a nice paintjob. Quite the opposite of our boat in other words. More important than the physical characteristics of our neighbour is his location: he is slightly closer to shore and to the side where the current has been taking us. Add to this that we know for a fact that no one is aboard, the decision to make an unscheduled visit is easy.
Some more minutes of constant effort later and we land at our neighbour's stern. Had we missed we would have drifted to sea. Good thing we didn't.
We take advantage of the roomy foredeck to rebuild our craft, and soon we're off again. The same scenario repeats itself, only this time we're so much closer to home. Ten minutes later we're slapping each other's backs in our own cockpit. We snap some pictures and go to bed. We're ready to leave Auckland.

Next morning as we raise the anchor to leave we see the owner of the neighbouring yacht board his boat. They walk around and get ready for a sail, obviously not suspecting their two scruffy nighbours of having helped themselves to a tour of their boat during the night. We wave to them and turn our backs both to unsuspecting neighbours and to Auckland.

RENDEZ VOUS

Egil:
I had just finished my little pre-adventure; my moped trip from LA to Buenos Aires (see mopeddagboken.blogspot.com), and was now more than ready for that big adventure. I left Buenos Aires with my packings, and with a money-sprinkling stopover in LA, I headed towards New Zealand where Øyvind, supposedly was waiting me with our boat. I had never seen the damn thing, except from Øyvinds facebook pictures, and felt like a christmas morning child as my plane set off for a Fiji stopover.

Oyvind:
Family finally sent home after a christmas/new years visit to New Zealand I started cleaning the boat before the Arrival of the Co-Owner. Priority one; stop that leak in the floor that lately had provided us with up-to-date test samples of the quality of the local sea-water.

I had reached both my goals for the previous year; I had passed all my papers at the university and had summited on Mt. Cook as a part of a greater plan of making my year more about fun and less about studies. I was more than ready for the boat, Egil and me to leave and let the adventure begin. I had lived here in the marina for more than half a year, reading all I could about sailing and wanted to get on with it.

Egil:
“You cant leave Fiji without a return ticket from New Zealand”. I tried to check in for my last destination after a little tasteof the humid and beautiful surroundings of the airport, but it seemed I had a problem. No return ticket, no papers of boat ownership, nothing really. Had to post a electronical telegram to Øyvind in search for help, and 10 hours, 10 swearwords and 10 white slices of bread with honey later I had proven my unlikely ownership of a yacht, located in Auckland city. Øyvind had managed to arrange some papers stating nothing really, but they were papers. In any case I had my last inflight meal as I spotted yet another sail boat from my window seat. I really didnt know what the hell I was getting myself into here. The only thing I did know as I stepped onto New Zealand soil was that I owned something floating worth 50 000 of my Norwegian krones.

Øyvind:
First time at the airport: No Egil. I have misread the arrival date. Second time at the airport: Still no Egil. I didn't check my email. If I did I would have found five different emails from Egil stating five possible arrival times. Hectic digitial communication to follow.

Third time: Finally the guy has been able to coax someone into letting him into the country. He's even quite quick through customs. Funny how efficiently you travel when your combined two year's worth of luggage can be carried in two tax-free shopping bags. One is even a Lacoste. Egil is showing some class.

Egil:
Åja, den karn! A classical Norwegian salute from somone who haven't seen eachother in a long time, and who will spend the next two years together on 20 square meters. We drove down to the privileged West Park Marina and I got to see that enormous pile of fiberglass. Damn that boat is big. My new home. I stuffed my plastic bags into a locker, and there it was. I had moved in, the adventure could begin.

PESSBLAUT FROM NEW ZEALAND TO NORWAY

This blog is all about Egil and Øyvind's sailing trip that will hopefully see them go from New Zealand to Kirkenes in northern Norway. The trip is planned to start sometime in April 2009 and finish around august 2010. Later rather than sooner.
The teams previous sailing experience is limited to a number of daytrips that can easily be counted on one hand. That is if the hand has seen a bit of rough use. For instance in combination with chainsaws or other finger decimating machinery.

If the crew is inexperienced The Ship is definitely not! «Liberty» is turning 50 this year and is one of the first fibreglass boats ever made. Hopefully she'll not retire herself for another couple of years.
The blog will mostly be posted in English so our non-scando friends can follow it. Yes, we are thinking of you guys. Both of you.
However there might be the odd post in Norwegian. These will most often have contents of special Norwegian interest that might be better addressed in Norwegian. Alternatively we just don't want you non-Norwegians to understand when we're gossiping about you. However, don't despair: We'll soon grow tired of it and start posting in English again, so stay with us!
Also we of course don't have internet while at sea (well, we could, but that cost money and anything that cannot be paid for in services, seashells or homemade alcohol is not included in our budget.) So posting may be irregular, though we might type stuff up while at sea to post it when we reach land and can access the World Wide Web yet again. In other words; things might be quiet for a while, only to explode in a sudden avalance of blogging.
The «Pessblaut» name is a north Norwegian term meaning being soaking wet, or, more literally; having pissed one's pants. Both not unlikely to happen to the guys during the trip. One of the things will quite likely be a problem of somewhat permanent character, rather than an accidental occurance. Which one it will be is anyone's guess. Depends on the weather I assume. Especially in light of the aforementioned sailing experience, or lack thereof.
So: Stay with us and cheer on us. Pray for us not to sink, run aground, run out of money, have a run-in with any authorities, get the runs, get sick, get tired of cruising, get saltwater allergy, get pirated, eaten by cannibals or navigate wrong and end up in Tahitit where we might take local brides and grow old, fat and sunburnt. Because all these things would stop us from entertaining you on the «Pessblaut» blog.
Peace out.