Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Manawanui Cruise--Day One

Early on Friday morning, March 26, we boarded a boat called the Manawanui for 3 days and 2 nights of sailing and exploring in the Bay of Islands. The Manawanui, which means big heart, is a 72 foot ocean going cruiser.  In the dingy on the way out to the boat from the dock, John, the owner and skipper, had us introduce ourselves and tell where we were from. This trip there were only 6 passengers--a young couple from Wellington, a young woman from Switzerland, a mid 50’s aged woman on a sabbatical from the University of Minnesota, and us. To that add John the skipper, Jessie the all-round-do-everything young mate, and Moby, the ship’s dog and mascot. Turned out to be a great group. Fun tidbit: when John heard that we were from Washington State, he told us that the Gregoire family had hired his entire boat some years back when one of the daughters was doing some studying in NZ! So, next time I see the gov, we’ll have something to chat about :-)
The first day we cruised about the bay and caught three kahawai (according to one writer, “a truly wonderful sportfish found only in New Zealand and Australia“), a skipjack tuna, and an albacore tuna--all for our upcoming dining pleasure!! Mark got to reel in the biggest kahawai. Mostly, we enjoyed the light sailing and the sunshine. John kept an eye out for wildlife but fish and birds were all we saw.

  The very day before we sailed there had been a once-in-a-lifetime (observed by humans) occurrence. A group of orca had attacked and killed several false killer whales or pseudorca (which are dolphins that look much like pilot whales) right in front of tourist boats in the bay. Turns out John the skipper studies pseudorca in his spare time. He was devastated because the pseudorca only come into the bay a couple of times in a year and he has been following this pod for years. He didn’t see the actual kill but arrived on the scene in his dingy shortly after (alerted by friends) and tried to follow the psuedorca pod out to sea. He showed us pictures that others had taken as well as his own (pretty gruesomely incredible). He was wanting to try to establish which whales/dolphins had been killed. Because of the event, however, he thought that most large sea life had fled the bay.
 
 
Later in the afternoon, we had to motor some to get north to the Cavalli Islands where we spent the night. After anchoring, John buzzed us humans to the sandy beach of one of the islands for a hike and Moby the dog for a pee break. We climbed to the top of the island while John went back to the boat to fix dinner.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
At sunset we headed back to the boat and an incredible dinner of fresh BBQ’ed rare tuna and tuna sushi. Oh my! The group talked and lingered over pavlova and hot drinks. After going topside to gaze at the star-filled skies (saw the southern cross), we turned in.
can you find Moby?

1 comment:

  1. W/ the exception of the killings, the cruise sounds heavenly.

    Barb

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