Huse Bay

Well here we are in Huse Bay at the far eastern end of Waiheke after a four hour sail this afternoon. We took our time getting going today, going ashore in the morning to use the facilities and then walked to Surfdale for an icecream and drink. The little outboard died half way to the beach (lack of fuel apparently), so it was as well that we had oars. We got back to the boat and had a swim over the side before getting the boat ready to leave. We sailed off the mooring, running downwind out of the bay and then took an easterly course along the southern coast of Waiheke. It was a beautiful day. We started in about 5 knots of breeze from the NE, but the wind died for a while before filling in to a reliable 10 knots that built to be close to 15 for part of the afternoon. The boat went really well and we made about 4 knots boatspeed for most of the afternoon. I enjoyed continuing to get to know the way the boat behaves. We tried to sail inside Passage Rock south of Te Matuku Bay but the wind headed us and forced us to go around to the south taking us as far as Kauri Point on the western side of Ponui Island. We tacked up the Waiheke Channel, passing Ponui, Rotoroa and Pakatoa Islands and made Huse Bay at the northern end of the Channel about 5pm. It’s quite isolated here. We saw a few beach homes coming up the eastern coast of Waiheke, but where we are now there is just bush with farmland beyond. We are in quite deep water though not far from the shore and have a couple of other yachts and a launch in the bay with us. We are well sheltered from the NE wind, but there is a little bit of a swell coming around the northern end of the bay and rocking the boat.