Whangaroa: Christmas
Whangaroa: Christmas
This beautiful dawn has been followed by a calm and sunny day.
Opua is quiet, but Whangaroa is quieter. We share this cove with a dozen other boats, none of them anchored near; but the only sounds are calling birds and the wind. As I was taking the above photo I heard the whisper of a tern’s wings as it flew by.
An easy day on the boat. Carol did winch me up the mast this morning to replace a bulb in the decklight just above the lower spreader. The rigger had brought the old one down to me when he went up the mast while I was in the boatyard to repair the steaming light, which is the upper part of the same fitting. For some reason I could not get the replacement bayonet bulb to stay in the socket. I don’t know why. Maybe I’ll try again sometime.
Yesterday I painted the area around the cleat the mooring was tied to and put some extra wraps of the furling line around the furling drum.
Tomorrow is predicted to be much like today, which means we may end powering most of the way back because of no wind, but a front is due on Wednesday.
Last Friday while on the mooring one of the boats maneuvering for the start of the Cruising Club race almost messed up my new paint job.
I was just getting ready to go on deck when I heard the unmistakable sound of something striking the bow.
On deck I found a boat about the same size as THE HAWKE OF TUONELA alongside, sails set, his bow toward our stern. Four people were aboard. One of them said to another, “We need to have someone watching up at the bow.” Indeed.
I called to Carol to bring up some fenders. I also uttered a few explicatives.
The other boat’s jib sheet and lifeline were caught on our anchor, which extends on a roller beyond the bow and was holding the two boats apart.
Fortunately the wind was light, but it was blowing directly into the other boat’s sails. I told him to lower them, and when someone let go the main halyard, I was able to push him by his shrouds far enough back so the lifeline and sheet came clear of our anchor.
I said that I had just painted the boat. The man at the wheel of the other boat said that there were no marks on my hull. I had already deflated the dinghy in preparation for our departure the next morning, but from deck I can’t see any.
As the other boat drifted away, I said that I thought that being on a mooring gave one right of way.
Mark Helprin wrote what I consider to be a much better novel than any of those on the New York Times list of the best of the last quarter century, A SOLDIER OF THE GREAT WAR. And I also admire his short stories. But after 150 pages I gave up on FREDDY AND FREDERICA. It is intended to be satirical, but isn’t amusing enough and I found myself starting to skim, which is fatal to my reading a book.
I’ve started OVER THE EDGE OF THE WORLD, an account of Magellan’s voyage by Laurence Bergreen. I’ve read several books on Magellan, including a fine novel, THE WIND AT MORNING by James Vance Marshall, but not recently
I just read of Magellan’s small fleet sailing into Rio de Janeiro in December 1519. Although the Portuguese had claimed what became known as Brazil for a dozen years, at that time they still did not have a permanent presence at Rio, and Magellan’s five ships had the harbor to themselves.
I have sailed to Rio de Janeiro twice and have been trying to imagine what it must have been like to sail there while it was pristine. The land around Rio de Janeiro does not look as though it belongs on this planet. The early explorers thought they had sailed into Paradise. Literately not figuratively. Paradise with a capital P. And so they had.
Tuesday, December 26, 2006