Kiapa

Kiapa is a 52ft Morelli Melvin gunboat catamaran, built in Oregon, USA. We bought her in San Francisco in 2011. Her owners are Lionel and Irene Bass, who hail from Perth, Australia.

Recent Updates

Posted: Mon, 9 Jan 2017 - 10:04

Anchored in Kaiarara Bay the last couple of nights - another beautiful spot here at The Barrier. Hiked up to Mt Hobson, the highest peak on the island yesterday. Wow, what awesome views from the top

Posted: Sat, 7 Jan 2017 - 09:33

What wonderful Kiwi hospitality we enjoyed last night. Went ashore here at Smokehouse Bay, Great Barrier Island to go for a short hike and do some hand washing (there are specially set up laundry

Posted: Wed, 4 Jan 2017 - 13:51

Although it's a super windy day today we are snugly anchored on the eastern side of Great barrier Island, just off the miles long white sandy Whangapoua Beach. Not really the weather for playing

Posted: Tue, 3 Jan 2017 - 08:14

Anchored in pretty Nagle Bay at Great Barrier Island. Close by is little Oyster Island, so of course we had a little 'hunting and gathering' session for hors d oeuvres last night. Yum YUM!! No luck

Posted: Thu, 29 Dec 2016 - 17:36

Oops, suddenly 2 weeks in NZ have flown by and Christmas has come and gone! Hope Santa's sack was full of all sorts of lovely goodies for you! We sailed from Marsden Cove to one of the stunning bays

Posted: Tue, 13 Dec 2016 - 14:42

Just had a glorious 5 hour sail from Moturua Island in the Bay of Islands to Mimiwhagata Beach. And we can see crazeeee Kiwis swimming in the 18 degree water. Brrrrrr, a bit too chilly for us wimps

Posted: Mon, 12 Dec 2016 - 19:45

We sailed out of Opua Marina this morning and are now anchored off a small island in the Bay of Islands. Once settled Lionel casually cast a soft bait off the back step and I kid you not, within 3

Posted: Fri, 9 Dec 2016 - 16:41

Here we are, back in the land of beautifully flowering pohutukawa trees.. All in all our passage from Vanuatu went very well - ending by being spoilt with a pod of dolphins surfing our bow waves in

Posted: Thu, 8 Dec 2016 - 05:51

It's 3am and we have just pulled up on the Customs dock in Opua. Enjoying a lurvely cuppa tea before we head to bed. Had a great few hours of sailing earlier - even had the spinny up for about 4

Posted: Wed, 7 Dec 2016 - 08:06

Hooray, throwing 'skippy' back yesterday worked! At lunchtime the forecast light ENE wind filled in beautifully, which saw us fanging along too fast to put the lures in the water. This morning the

Posted: Tue, 6 Dec 2016 - 08:00

Aaaaaah the old "catch a fish at sunrise" yarn...... well it's true! We've just landed a nice size skipjack tuna but decided to try and bribe the wind gods by releasing it - I say that 'cause we are

Posted: Mon, 5 Dec 2016 - 07:57

What a fabulous day of sailing we had yesterday. Kiapa was in her element, gunning along at 8-9k in 11-14k of breeze and so munching up the miles - pity it was still in the wrong direction! We

Posted: Sun, 4 Dec 2016 - 08:00

Glorious sailing right now - the wind has backed off a tad and the sea state is a bit more settled, and we have a gannet catching the thermals off our heady looking for breakfast. The wind is

Posted: Sat, 3 Dec 2016 - 07:57

The trades have set in, as forecast, which means Kiapa is slowly zig-zag tacking south. While we are covering good ground we feel like we've got the handbrake on 'cause our DTW (710nm) doesn't

Posted: Fri, 2 Dec 2016 - 08:06

Yeehah, we are underway to Opua. Waved goodbye to Vanuatu with our beautiful turquoise spinnaker which we doused at sunset. The wind dropped during the night so we are currently motor sailing. Sel

Posted: Thu, 1 Dec 2016 - 15:57

WE'RE OFF. NZ, here we come. Looking forward to it!

Posted: Wed, 30 Nov 2016 - 10:24

The forecast tropical depression has arrived here at Aneityum - it's a calm, grey drizzly day. Our water tanks are overflowing with collected rainwater - yah. So we are relaxing some more, doing a

Posted: Sun, 27 Nov 2016 - 09:28

Mmmmmm, a few sore heads this morning, I'm thinking. We had a mixologists' "cocktail competition" last night between Sel Citron and Kiapa. SC created the 'Salty Lemon', fancily decorated with bright

Posted: Fri, 25 Nov 2016 - 14:48

After conferring with The Lemons over a coffee this morning we have decided to stay put here at Aneityum for a few more days. The forecast is for light winds for the next 2-3 days and then big swell

Posted: Thu, 24 Nov 2016 - 17:46

Arrived in Aneityum in time for lunch. Had a fast and bumpy sail yesterday arvo, then a slow motor sail through the night (the winds were fluky between Erromongo and Tanna Islands and we had a strong

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Kiapa

Kiapa

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