East Coast Australia to New Caledonia

[DtM]

Inspired by a post by Cat Man Do in the Coastal v Ocean criusing thread.

When the FP36 arrives it is our plan to cruise the east coast of Australia for a while. The next adventure is probably to sail to Noumea.

I can see that Cat Man DO has done this trip. Has anyone else?

Can you please post any information, when , winds , experiences etc etc.

I am a sponge on this one, all info will be sucked up.

daniel

[cat man do]

Australian B.O.M in our instance much more accurate than French B.O.M.

The new owner of our beloved craft worked for the French version, and kept in contact via Sat phone.

I wanted to beat out of Brisbane into a S/E and free off after 24 hrs onto a reach to New Cal as it seems the closer to New Cal you get, the more East the wind goes and this is what the rest of the world seems to do.

About 200 N/M out we get the call to go North as fast as we can to avoid a low forming.
Brisbane BOM had told me that this showed up on the French weather model before we left, but they did'nt use it as they felt it was not going to happen.

So of we toddle, into the land of fickkle wind and eventual wind on the nose from the N/E. After 3 days of this I could'nt take his call's anymore and left that to someone else.

Apparently the low did'nt form,[ no s..t] , and now we were about 60 miles of the bottom of Bellona Banks and Chesterfield reef, with no charts for the area as we were supposed to be a couple of hundred miles further south in clear water.

Would have loved to go over for a look as now there was glassy calm and I gathered there were plenty of cray's being so far offshore, but wiggle ,wiggle now heading south again towards Noumea at an incredibly slow speed ETA six mths time. Motor for a while, only carry 60L so don't get to carried away. Stop and have a swim in 4000meters of water.

Day 7, we would have been in Noumea 2+ days ago on my route , and now it's time for a bit of northerly yeehah, zipping along in fairly flat water doing low teens for abot 5 hrs and then fun over and start bashing into increasing E S/E wind for another few hours. When it got to about 30 kn, and we down to double reefed main and an absolute blade, not quite storm jib, we thought about the tripple reef but I thought it was only going to get worse , so put out the parachte anchor.

Oh baby, these things are great, we rented[new owner paid] a demo model from Para anchors Australia. Best thing ever, it was like being in a not so comfortable anchorage for the night. We Got the call to expect a 50 knot front to come through. Well they got 1 right.

Mid way through next day we headed off again feeling well rested, even jammed a couple of pre dinner rumbo's down while on deck surveying the scene the night before. Wind about 12 knots from exactly where we were going. We could pick up New Caledonian Radio Stations and the next dawn we sailed in towards land, but of course did'nt have chart's to get into the lagoon 100 N/M north of Dunbier Passage, so were taunted by the view for the rest of the day with ever decreasing wind and eventually none, so stay 10N/M off reef edge and motor at 1/3 revs and arrived at entrance in morning and cleared in in time for lunch at the CLub Nautique at Port Mosselle.

We had agreed with the owner that we had our girl for another month while there, so loaded up and headed out again, but that's another story.

Dave

pic from top of Amadee light house

[smm]

We sailed Endless Summer from Newcastle to Noumea via Lord Howe Island. A bit dicey in winter but it worked well as the stopover in LHI allowed us to pick a different weather window half way through the trip. Description of the trip is at:

http://www.summ.org/travels/017_lord-howe/index.htm
http://www.summ.org/travels/018_noumea/index.htm

New Cal is absolutely fabulous. You could spend years exploring it.

-Scott

[Weyalan]

Seaquesta is a semi regualr poster here - he bought a boat in Queensland last year and delivered it back to his home in New Zealand... you could send him a private message asking for comments / advice?

[cat man do]

SMM, thanks for that link, can't wait to get back there myself, part of the reasoning behind the bigger boat was to carry a fair bit of gear next time.

As we were selling the last boat she went fairly empty, which meant we had to buy nearly everything there, which was a bit harsh on the cruising kitty.

Seems we could have taken heaps, didn't even get anyone look below when checking in.

Dave

[Galaxie]

Any recommendations for cruising guides to New Cal.. Going next year from Auckland thru Vanuatu for 2 months or so then Loyalties and 2 months approx in New Cal. Have an aging guide on CD for new cal but wondered about anything of worth published en anglais.