Lord Howe Island

Posted Wednesday 22 February 2012
  31 31.43S by 159 03.06E

After an uneventful passage, which means a good one, I arrived in lord Howe, Tuesday 21 Feb. at about 0300 am local time and heave to 12 nm off the island waiting for day light to go through the pass.

When I woke up, I was greeted with strong NE winds, clocking 26 kn, so I had no choice but to beat to windward on a short but steep seas all the way to the pass, where a park ranger's boat was waiting to guide me to the mooring buoy as no anchoring is allowed; after securing Vida Nova with double warps, on a very shallow depth and I completed the arrival formalities, I sat down in the cockpit and admired the most beautiful island in the South Pacific. A World Heritage area and I could not help but to think, that like Chersterfield reefs in New Caledonia, Lord Howe is another wellcome oasis in a watery desert and with a low ceiling overcast sky and rising winds, I was certainly happy to be snugged in, instead of being bounce around outside.

Well, next morning I woke up being bounced around on the inside, as the wind backed to South west creating a very annoying vicious rolling, where everything has to be hold down or falls down, as it did my fresh brewed pot of coffee, making a big mess on the stove and floor. I am not exaggerating when I said, that I cleaned the stove more in two months, than Veronica in two years, not because she was dirtier but the opposite, confirming that a clean person is the one that doesn't mess.

I try my best to keep the boat acceptable, but it looks like that when I wake up, I have nothing to do, but I go to bed with half of the things done. Enough of domestics, now what I really need is for the weather to calm down, so I can launch the dinghy and go ashore to explore a bit.