Blinkin' Nora it's a miracle

Well by some small miracle I seem to be on a stable and completely free internet connection, plugged into the mains, with unlimited time and power available to me, even Kieran is nowhere to be seen asking me if I've finished yet or not. This is a VERY unusual state of affairs and has renedered me virtually speechless. Luckily for you this means that I am unable to compose any witty commentary to go with all these photo's, but as you can see we had a pretty amazing passage from Opua, Bay of Islands, to Golden Bay, where everyone walks around barefoot with dreadlocks trying to outdo each other for how cosmic and alternative they can be. Six days of beautiful weather, whales, dolphins and albatross, with a 30knot blow on the last night that got us thoroughy wet and broke the jib was an amazing way to arrive at our new home.

First stop was Sprits Bay at the northern tip of the North Island by Cape Reinga, a truly piratical anchorage where the souls depart this land, and from then on we left the land behind.....

We love you too

When your ex crew email telling you that they had such an amazing time on Lilly they want to do something nice for you, it's easy to feel a little bit nervous, what could it possibly be......?? Will they attempt to single handedly dinghy sail around South America? Will they set up a business manufacturing canvas buckets? Have they invented a way to cook for 9 people on passage without throwing most of it on the floor?

Well no, none of these, but they have, nonetheless, achieved great feats of engineering and really got a taste for extreme weather conditions.....

(and just in case the blizzard is onstructing your view, the flag reads 'Happy 2009 Lilly Bolero'

We love you too Chris and Gilles....

A very serious business

Well the new year brought forth the Bay of Islands Tall Ships race. This is a very serious and prestigious event where lots and lots of boats gather together to compete once a year, they tweak their sails, polish their hulls, streamline the rigging, varnish the woodwork. keep a keen ear to the wind, agonise over the best course and race unto the bitter end with victory the only goal in sight. As usual we approached the event with the seriousness and commitment it deserved.To be honest I'm not entirely sure that everyone else appreciated the endless supply of water balloons and huge wads of soggy toilet paper being thrown at them, and the tumbleweed silence at the prize giving when I asked if there was a prize for fancy dress seemed to imply that maybe we hadn't taken it quite seriously enough.... by midnight when I found myself head banging to metallica even I realised it was time for us to go home

More pictures coming soon....