[password] pilot25041
[position] 20 16.63s 174 48.24w
[status] Tuesday 9th October morning and we're anchored just off the island of Nomuka Iki, we arrived here late yesterday afternoon, having sailed from Ha'afeva Island.

On Sunday morning we awoke at Ofolanga reef and the other two boats had already departed, the sun was hot, we had 1kt of wind and, as there was nothing to disturb it, the sea had an oily appearance. We had no choice but to motor to our next destination and with no wind forecast we even left the sunshade up, as we meandered through the various island paradises, it became apparent that the stbd main water pump wasn't working, time for Barry to depart under the stairs ...... an hour or so later the pump was running and we also found out why the stbd heads blow bubbles between them ....... the black tank vent filter is completely blocked (foul water has contaminated the charcoal filter) ....... nothing we can really do about that until back in NZ and source a new filter! As the day progressed we again had our fill of whales and saw dozens of flying fish ....... its so much easier to see them when there's not a ripple on the sea surface! As we approached our destination we cou
ld see big rain clouds forming ahead of us and as we got nearer we closed all the hatches, the rain then started, wind increasing to 14kts, visibility dropping significantly, so we slowed to let this pass over. Once it had cleared the wind also stayed in, so we decided to change our anchoring plan and go to the other side of the island ........ again more whales appeared beside us. Once inside the reef and anchored, it was time for a swim before our dinner, which was absolutely delicious ..... sirloin steak, chips, peas, grilled beef steak tomatoes and onions, all washed down with a nice glass of the red stuff ....... we even had a turtle swim by about 20m from the boat as our entertainment and all this with the most spectacular sunset going ........ an amazing red coloured sky reflected on the sea and probably the best one of this trip (hopefully we can upload a picture once we get decent internet) ........ all in all a great evening!

Monday morning, we're fairly sure there was a pod of dolphins inside the reef, and as the wind was still blowing a little, we took the sunshade down so we could actually attempt to sail to our next destination, off we went ...... full main & genoa, wind variable 8-11kts, sailing at 40degrees AWA, making 3-5kts SOG, as we didn't have a huge distance to go it would be a nice leisurely sail for the day ........ well leisurely until the port black tank wouldn't empty, the pump was running but the gauge still shows full ..... time to lift the carpet and investigate.

The port pump is a macerator type, to cope with the manual toilet, once removed and stripped down, we found the macerator blade was loose as the end of the centre spindle had corroded away and the rubber impeller had probably less than 10% of the blade area left on it, so hardly surprising it wouldn't empty the tank ...... after a good clean, fitting an electric toilet impeller (seemed like the same size), some judicious use of 5min Araldite on the macerator blade, the pump was refitted and hey presto the tank again empties and the temporary repair will last for another 3 weeks to get us to NZ!

After a spot of lunch, Barry took over the 'driving' and as the afternoon wore on and the wind had eased we decided to use the diesel spinnaker, so we tried to start the port engine ........ turned the key and absolutely nothing happened ..... so stbd engine was started and Barry complete with multi-meter went below to investigate, particularly as we'd used the port engine earlier in the day to leave the overnight anchorage without any issues! At first it looked like the engine start battery main terminal post was a bit loose, the starter solenoid was clicking but no engine turning' generally an indication of low power getting to the starter, we then found out that the starter was fed from the secondary battery terminal, this is hidden under the main terminal and had obviously come loose at some stage, as there were signs of burning and a hole had appeared/been melted into the top of the battery ........ once this lead had been cleaned and connected to the main battery termi
nal post, we had the second hey presto moment of the day when the engine could be started. As this battery is no longer sealed, we will need to source a new one in Tongatapu later this week!

We then motored up to where we are now, between two islands (Nomuka & Nomuka Iki) and pretty much surrounded by reefs, it was a fabulous sail getting here, passing many beautiful small islands, reefs and atolls along the way, unfortunately interspersed with some engineering issues ...... but hey after all 'Cruising' is defined as 'fixing a boat in exotic locations' ...... & I think we can all agree on that definition so far!

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