Chilling in Picton

Welcome to the new look blog. We have been aware for a while that the tracker wasn’t very obvious on the blog and Pat finally worked out how to rectify it! Hopefully it is now easier for people to follow us.

We headed into Waikawa marina, which is just north of Picton, on Sunday. This is a wonderfully friendly place with lots of local sailors happy to help out with whatever you need. Debi contacted a few people through her “Women who Sail” facebook group and Juliet came down to the boat on Monday to say hello and give us a few tips. She and her husband run Oddies chandlery (oddiesmarine.co.nz) at the marina and kindly leant us their vehicle so that we could go and do our provisioning. That was very useful for topping up the onboard cellar as there is no public transport and car hire is very expensive.

Enjoying the sunshine at Waikawa Marina

Picton Harbour

On Tuesday we headed out to the Marlborough wine region on board a “hop-on hop-off” bus. Unfortunately our trip coincided with a cruise ship coming in which meant that things were busy and also that the bus service was truncated mid afternoon in order to get the cruise people back to Picton for 3pm. This meant things were a little rushed, but we still managed to visit three wineries, have lunch and visit a chocolate factory. Again, this was a useful trip for replenishing the onboard cellar.

Lunch at Framingham Winery

On our return from the vineyards we visited the Edwin Fox Museum. The Edwin Fox is the ninth oldest wooden troop ship in the world and was built in India in 1853. She is built from teak and saul with a copper bottom. Originally built as a cargo ship she was used to carry troops during the Crimean war and also transported prisoners to Australia and brought early settlers to New Zealand. After being used as a stationary freezer ship and then coal storage vessel in Picton, she was removed from the harbour and beached in Shakespeare Bay, Picton in 1967. She lay there for 20 years before locals managed to raise enough money to re-float her in 1986 and start the long preservation process. She now lies in a dry dock in Picton and it is amazing to go and stand in the hold and see how the hull has survived all those years of neglect and abuse. Her full history can be found here: www.edwinfoxsociety.com/history/

The Edwin Fox

The Edwin Fox

Tuesday evening was spent at the Waikawa sailing club where we met Nicky, Paul and the crew of local boat “On Appro”. This was a very enjoyable evening exchanging stories and getting a few tips on sailing in the area and the meals served were delicious and good value for money.

During our remaining time in the marina we managed to get X-Pat thoroughly cleaned, topped up our water and diesel and did a few running repairs. Yesterday (Thursday) we left the marina and are now anchored back in Carey Bay, just across from Picton. We are having a lazy day onboard as it is raining today, only our second day of rain on the whole trip. We had hoped to depart the Sounds tomorrow and head north to Great Barrier Island. However, the various weather forecasts, which we normally use are not in very good agreement which always makes us nervous. We will review again tonight but don’t want to take any chances crossing the Cook Strait so it may be a while before we feel comfortable to go.