Its cold and raining here (middle of winter) and I am missing sun, really – really badly. That said, I am having a great day. Howick rescue one (our unit’s boat) has been a duty boat this week. Went out with HR1 today and the weather predictions were pretty grim. Wind 25 – 35 knots average and raising to 35-45 knots with up to 55 knots gusts of wind.
We positioned ourself in Islington Bay (the bay between Rangitoto island and Mototapu Island) and practice maneuvering around buoys, contact and slow speed approach, etc. Then we met up with Alpha – an Auckland Coastguard vessel and chatted for a while. Right when we were heading out a call came in from operations to assist Ingrid Visser the “Orca Rescue Lady” with her team and her visitors infamous explorer’s son and grand son Jean-Michel Cousteau, son Fabien Cousteau in while releasing a 3.4 meter, juvenile female orca whale of about three years old who was reported at 3pm (1300 AEST) on Friday to have been beached at Huia. The orca has been released in Takapuna because of the waters being calmer than waters in Huia. Jean-Michel Cousteau, son Fabien Cousteauare in New Zealand filming a documentary that is tentatively titled Jean-Michel’s Ocean Adventures: Mirror in the Water. It will screen on the National Geographic channel after its release next April.
So we headed out to keep boats away and to assist with the release. I wanted to take some pictures but was at the helm and I think it was more fun to be part of it than to take pictures. There were no private boats since the weather was bad only about 4 coastguard boats and couple of Orca rescue boats. It took a while to get the orca going because she was disoriented and couple of people swam with it for a while. There was quite a crowd gathered on the shore and after about half an hour or so the orca headed out. We were in close contact with Ingrid’s boat and had a chance to talk to her over the radio to liaise. She seemed very nice and was very happy that we were helping them out. She was is great mood since the orca was doing well and everything was going according to plan.
After hour or so we headed back for a crew change. I am happy that I had a chance to get out on the water again – after last week’s rum race. I don’t know what it is but I always like the bad weather, hurricanes and such. It pretty exciting playing with the spinnaker sheet when you know there might be a gust of strong wind and you will have to act really fast to prevent the yacht from heeling too much. Fun, fun, fun… Also it looks like our trip to Thailand will happened after all. I am looking forward seeing Monika, Chris and couple of other people from Bay Area and have (let my hair down – ha…since I have shaved my head last week) for couple of weeks of well – we’ll see of what.
I found some random video of Howick Rescue one on youtube so that you can see my boat in action.
Ok I am heading out to watch a rugby game in Remurera bar (nice part of town) with few friends.
Oh yeah – one more thing. It has been a while since I discovered a song that I can keep playing over and over again. Flobots – handlebars.
