Wednesday, April 29, 2009a chaange of circumstance......
Apologies for the radio silence, We've had a bit on the last couple of days. I think thw last report said how things weren't looking too good to make a landing - and so they were not. Having been approx 12nm off Big Moggy island and things were looking good for an approach iinto doughboy bay with a good E drift. That would of course have been too easy. The weather did not favour us. The promised N wind arrived and coupled with a strong S flowing tide/current we started flying S at about 2kts (bloody quick). Unfortunately the current didn't slacken and the wind didn't drop and we kept moving quickly S. I had been met by the Fishing vessel Shangri La who were to standby and they had gone to shelter in the Islands. After another 24hrs drifting South and seen the land fall away again we were about 30nm due south of the S cape of Stewart Island. At this stage I made the decision to pull the plug and set up the tow with Shangri La. The weather looked bad for at least the next week, we would need about 3 days at least of steady S winds to reach back up to stewart I and then as we got closer in our ability to navigate into one of the few safe coves would be largely down to lady luck and the caprice of the wind and currents. Thus another dissapointing decision was made. Perhaps I could have stayed out there and waited for the winds to come good - maybe they would, maybe they wouldnt . Anyway the decision was made and I radioed Shangri La who steamed down about 25nm to my position. They found me rolling around in 40kts of wind and about a 4m swell so it was pretty sporting to transfer the tow line but some pretty driving and work with the lines by Rewi saw us hooked up and barreling through the swells up towards Stewart Island at an unprecedented 8kts! After about 8 hours and only one broken tow line later we came into Pegasus Harbour on the SE side of Stewart Island. We came in under darkness but the sheer rock islands could be made out in the Shangri La's powerful lights. The Carrot was brought alongside and beer was produced, I met George, Rewi, Salts and Ma, the crew on Sangri La as I stumbled onto her rather more solid deck. Rewi pulled out an incredible tea of Roast lamb and veggies - best ever... What an awesome arrival the shangri la more than lived up to her name. Supper came and went and a few beers and then about 3am crawled into the comfiest bunk ever which didn't try and throw you out . Then yestrday morning anchors up and we stamed all day to arrive at Bluff about 1600. I was relieved to see there were not too many people to greet us and we passed off a fairly low key arrival into Bluff fishing wharf. After the joys of form filling for customs and MAFF we were cleared in to NZ annd set off for a shower.... Anyway rough fill in of what's gone on. A little colour to add to this dry update to follow later........ Land's alright....posted by Olly Hicks @ 5:19 PM
