Day 410, Year 1: Anchor Chain Locker
Date: Saturday, December 2, 2006
Weather: Sunny and Windy
Location: Whangarei, New Zealand
Our day today revolved around the anchor chain locker. First we pulled the 300 feet of anchor chain and 50 feet of anchor line out of the locker and onto the dock. This is what we use with our main anchor, a 55-pound Spade. This left the anchor locker empty as we had already taken out the 75 feet of chain that goes with the back-up anchor, a 45-pound CQR, as well as the 225 feet of ¾ inch line that goes with that anchor. We had that line on the deck for our crossing to New Zealand. We were going to use this with our sea anchor if we had needed that to stop us in very heavy wind. Next we hauled out all of the extra line that we store in the anchor locker. The next step was to clean all of the anchor chain and line. It took us most of the morning, but finally everything was cleaned and drying. It was a perfect day for drying things as it was very sunny and very, very windy. I also hauled out all the dive and snorkel gear and gave it a good freshwater wash down. By late afternoon we had the anchor chain and line all tucked back into a clean anchor chain locker. The extra line is still drying and will be put away later.
We are supposed to move from the space we are currently in to the space we will be in for the season this weekend. The space opened up this morning but since this has to be done at high tide, we had to wait until 6:00 this evening. Unfortunately, it was just too windy so we will try again early in the morning. It will be nice to be in our permanent slip–one more thing we can check off the list of things that must be done before we head home on December 14.
We heard from Randy and Sheri of Procyon. They are staying in Gulf Harbor Marina near Auckland but are coming north for some sight seeing next week. They will stop by on Tuesday and probably spend the night here before heading up to the Opua area. It will be great to see them.
Last night we went from polar fleece blankets to down comforter. It was only 60 degrees inside the boat this morning, but the sun was shining and things warmed up quickly. Last night was probably as about as cool as it will get as summer is coming on quickly, but on the days when it is cloudy, it still feels like late fall to me.
