SthnJeff 18 Posted March 12, 2014 Author Share Posted March 12, 2014 What's the next leg? Nelson to Queen Charlotte? Make sure you get the correct tide times for French Pass. Go thru with the tide (you won't make it against it anyway) just as it starts to run is the easiest. You can do it at full flow as well, watch out for the strong eddies - they are not dangerous it you are in the middle, but can cause a rapid change in heading!! Matt Tides or Flows? I know Matt knows a lot more than me about the area but I found it quite confusing. Don't make the mistake that I did when initially planning my trip that the flows through French Pass related to the Tides in the area, they don't. The flows through French Pass change during the tide, varying quite a bit. Luckily I found the correct answer before I went i.e. High Tide in Nelson this evening is at 8pm but French Pass changes direction at 7:18pm. But that can move around a lot. Also in Auckland each tide changes pretty regularly half an hour per cycle, in Nelson two high tides can be within minutes of each other (12 hours apart) with the low an hour apart, then cycling the other way. Very confusing to us Gulfers. http://www.linz.govt.nz/hydro/tidal-info/tidal-streams/french-pass Cheers Have read about the many vagaries of French Pass...... enough to make one consider going West around D'Urville! Luckily the tide table for the sounds actually give best times for going through French pass. I will also only be doing it with a person with experience in going through the pass on board. Link to post Share on other sites
Absolution 7 Posted March 12, 2014 Share Posted March 12, 2014 Have read about the many vagaries of French Pass...... enough to make one consider going West around D'Urville! Luckily the tide table for the sounds actually give best times for going through French pass. I will also only be doing it with a person with experience in going through the pass on board. I've seen a few crazy pictures of the tidal flows at french pass. Wouldn't want to get that wrong! Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted March 12, 2014 Share Posted March 12, 2014 My trip through a year and a bit ago. Couldn't have been much nicer. Probably 2/3rds flow Link to post Share on other sites
wheels 543 Posted March 12, 2014 Share Posted March 12, 2014 Have read about the many vagaries of French Pass...... enough to make one consider going West around D'Urville! Luckily the tide table for the sounds actually give best times for going through French pass. I will also only be doing it with a person with experience in going through the pass on board. It really isn't that bad. It is a spectacular place, but really is quite easy. As long as you make sure you go through the proper channel. If you are new to the place, then slack tides are best to start with. Once you have done it a few times, going with the flow is no problem and actually quite fun. You have no show of going against the Tidal flow and the only time I would suggest not going with the Flow would be at the time of Kind Tides. Going the outside of Stevens Island (which is outside, or the Northern End of D'Urville) is actually worse. The tidal rip out there is horrendous and you want to transit that area at slack water as well or make sure you have wind with tide. Wind against Tide, especially a fresh Norwester, can be really ugly. The same if you take on Stevens Passage. Really spectacular to go through at Slack water, but you really want to get confident with the area to try it when the tide is running. I highly recommend giving both passages a go. The area is spectacular and well worth a look. All that area is my favorite place to explore. Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,232 Posted March 12, 2014 Share Posted March 12, 2014 Yeah, what wheels said! Don't worry about high/low tide, listed in the tables is the time of direction changes - as a primary port. The channel is by the lighthouse, and you are fine close to shore - like 20 m! It's deep. If going thru while flowing, just head down the middle of the tounge of clear water in the main channel. You'll be fine. Not worth going around durville island... You want the tide slack or going NE. Check here http://www.linz.govt.nz/hydro/tidal-info/tidal-streams/french-pass Link to post Share on other sites
wheels 543 Posted March 12, 2014 Share Posted March 12, 2014 The first picture is off a small whirlpool in the turbulent water at French pass. The second and third is the area off the end of Stevens Island about a mile or more out from the Island and the rip carried on out to the Horizon. The Pic doesn't do justice to the Wave height, but they were 2.5 to 3m and the inflatable was surfing down the faces and passing us till it's painter stopped it. The day was calm and hardly any wind, but if you look at the background, you will notice the rip is quite a big area. Link to post Share on other sites
grantmc 59 Posted March 20, 2014 Share Posted March 20, 2014 Well, I have gone and done it..... I am now the proud owner of Tandara Awsome news. Welcome to the Raven Club: it is very exclusive! That will make 6 of us with Raven 26s at Seaview. There is also Tracer at Clyde Quay and 2 more at Evans Bay. Happy to help you sail Tandara home. You can catch me on 021 157 3594. Oh and mooring at Seaview should be a tad under $300 not $400. There are cheaper options too. Link to post Share on other sites
SthnJeff 18 Posted March 20, 2014 Author Share Posted March 20, 2014 Well, I have gone and done it..... I am now the proud owner of Tandara Awsome news. Welcome to the Raven Club: it is very exclusive! That will make 6 of us with Raven 26s at Seaview. There is also Tracer at Clyde Quay and 2 more at Evans Bay. Happy to help you sail Tandara home. You can catch me on 021 157 3594. Oh and mooring at Seaview should be a tad under $300 not $400. There are cheaper options too. Cheers Grant I am tentatively set to bring Tandara back to Wellington on the weekend of 4 April and have a Crew organised for that but if the Weather gods are not smiling that weekend I will probably need some replacements as that is the weekend that suits everyone. I will get in touch if that is the case. I am flying to Nelson tomorrow for the weekend to go for another sail and attend to a couple of bits of maintainance in preperation for the trip. Seaview don't have any 10 metre berths available at present with a long waiting list for when the eventually construct some more and have offered a 12 metre berth. The bigger berth is $355 pm against $287 for the 10m. No pole moorings are available but given they do not seem full it is possible they may be a casualty of the expansion of the Berths? I will start at Seaview initially at least then look at some other options as the summer approaches. Cheers Jeff Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted March 25, 2014 Share Posted March 25, 2014 My trip through a year and a bit ago. Couldn't have been much nicer. Probably 2/3rds flow When I play that video it says "This video is private" and does not display... Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted March 25, 2014 Share Posted March 25, 2014 Fixed I think Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted March 25, 2014 Share Posted March 25, 2014 Fixed I think Yep, works now... cheers. Link to post Share on other sites
SthnJeff 18 Posted April 8, 2014 Author Share Posted April 8, 2014 Tandara now home in Wellington. Set off at 4.45am from Nelson on Saturday Morning with out a breath of Wind and struck out for French Pass under the Power of the mighty Bukh 10hp! Managed to get the sails up for about 10 minutes just North of Peppin Island before the breeze again disappeared. Hit French pass bang on schedule at around 1.00pm , with Dolphins about 100m away from us slipped through French Pass on slack water, barely an eddy in sight. With the forecast not quite ideal for the Sunday, we decided to push on and make up as much distance as possible. so we had a brief stop in Elmslie Bay, sorted some lunch and watched a school of Stingray cruising by within 2m of the waters edge. Round past the Chetwode Islands with still no wind and flat calm seas, continuing round past Cape Jackson we turned into Queen Charlotte sound at about 5pm and continued motoring right up towards Tory Channel where we moored for the night in Ngamahau bay at around 10.30 on Saturday night. Up again at 5.30 on Sunday and away at 6.00 to quite a different day. Squally showers, limited visibility with a wind in the region of 10-15knts from the SE forecast to build to 20-30 later in the day with 1 - 2m swells in the strait. Motored out of Tory Channel at around 7.15 and finally got the sails hoisted, being cautious with two reefs in the main and Genoa about 2/3rds unfurled and struck out for Wellington, knowing the tides were not ideal, with a current from the SE. combination of Wind and tide pushed us closer to Caper Terawhiti than we had planned and we had some trouble clearing Tongue Point and had a few tacks largely killing time for around 3 hours, until the Tide finally released us and pushed us on towards Wellington. We cleared Moaning Minnie around 4.30 then motored up the Harbour as the forecast wind had dropped to nothing, having to wait for a Car Carrier to leave and two ferries to enter the Harbour we tied up in Seaview just before 6. A long weekend with three tired bodies on board. Tandara performed brilliantly with the motor not missing a beat (Once I had figured to turn on the return / breather valve on) using a miserly 18 litres of diesel for the 18 hours motoring we did on the Saturday. She sailed beautifully handling the swells very well which occassionally nudged 2m and 20 knot winds (Not high numbers I know but perfect enough for first big trip!). We were getting close to 7 knots at times in these conditions with little effort so for a 40 year old cruiser gets along just fine. Thanks to Tom and Dave for a great trip in helping me get her to Wellington. Link to post Share on other sites
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