[p]beale12.4
[s]
pos: 18 57.589s 176 31.595e
Date: 04/10/2017 00:30 gmt+12:00
Midnight Tuesday, and we are underway from Fiji to Auckland, properly at sea again. 100 miles done, around 1050 or so still to go.

My new crew Bas and David joined me Monday night at Denarau Disneyland. No rest for them: we were up At first light (5:45), breakfasted and off to Vuda point to clear customs and immigration. That took a while, but we managed to get underway by 11:40am, heading across the lagoon to the Malolo passage through the reef.
The winds are strange inside the lagoon, but as we approached the reef, the famous Filji "accelerated zone" kicked in. 30 knots gusting 35 as we went through the reef passage around 2pm. And building. We got 35 gusting 40 over the next hour and building, choppy seas. Heavily reefed main and half a genoa, and we sat on 8 knots or so.
Luckily the accelerated zone isn't to wide, so winds started easing towards dark.
Now, midnight, we are in 25 knots gusting 30 sailing on the wind in messy 2m seas under a beautiful moon.
A little wet, but a lovely motion and trucking along well.
That's all for now. We hope to be back in a little under a week, with luck.

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