Tranquility at Te Rua Bay

Today was a much nicer day. Vela was hard at work getting everything in line as she's unlikely to be available tomorrow while we cross the Cook Strait. So to get out of her hair, Nathan launched the dinghy to try and find some fish for dinner.

After floating around for a couple of hours, he only hooked three blue cod, and they were of questionable size so they went back into the water. Unfortunately two of these fish were poached by a squadron of shags that we're following Nathan around. To be honest it was quite impressive watching the birds eat a fish that was twice the size of their heads...

Back onboard Starling and it was time to jail up the anchor and make a little hop further down Tory Channel to shorten our travel time tomorrow. On the way down the channel we sailed past a group of NZ fur seals which seemed to be hunting a school of fish.

We decided Te Rua Bay looked a likely spot to spend the night, so we parked up and settled in. Vela cooked up her Pad Kra Prao (locally called pow pow) for dinner which was delicious!

Within a couple hours of arriving, the wind dropped away to nothing, providing us with amazing glassy conditions. Vela went for a bit of an explore on the paddleboard while Nathan enjoyed a funky cookies & cream beer as a sundowner (not very cookies and not very cream...)

We watched one last ferry gliding down Tory Channel while star gazing before turning in for the evening.Read more