Friday 5 July – Off to the Lau Group of islands

The weather window has held true for us to go to the Lau Group. The plan was to leave around 4pm so that we could cross overnight to get in during daylight, as you have to navigate some passages through the reef. We are heading to an area called Bay of Islands as we need somewhere very protected for the big winds arriving tomorrow night, which get stronger during the week, lasting 10 days.

We got ourselves ready in the morning and then headed to the resort to go for a walk and stretch our legs. We settled up at the resort and when we said we were going for a walk, the owner asked us to take the fat dog with us as she loves a walk and certainly needs the exercise. The staff all call her Fatty, she readily joined us, I was a bit concerned about village dogs and her getting lost if she went off, but the owner reassured us she would stick with us and she knew exactly how to handle local dogs. We walked along the coast past the school which was very impressive, beautifully maintained, very friendly kids and teachers. Typically we had left it late and it was steamy hot walking in the midday heat without any shade!

Rowan and the resort dog trundling along in the heat!

Butterflies everywhere

Time for a cool off

Very smart school

Lava beaches at low tide

We returned to join some Yachties for the resort BBQ lunch and a game of Farkle. We learnt yet another set of rules, which was fun. Rowan won on a very lucky shake of the dice.

Alia Vita left for the Lau group this morning but are heading way down south of the chain of islands, while we aim for the top, and will work our way slowly down. We met a couple from California on their boat Hijacker (strange name!), they are also heading to the Bay of islands and left the same time as us. We left on the dot of 4pm and had an easy motor sail around the headland. To our surprise we had a nice gentle little wind the other side which meant we could sail the whole way, we did not want to go fast as we need to enter the passage in daylight.

I did the early shift which was calm and easy enough for me to make some crunchies (flapjacks) for the trip. We sailed parallel with Hijacker the whole way, with a boat called One Life about 10 miles behind us.

Farewell to Paradise resort, a great stop off

Sunset on the move