Wannabe

Got any heavy cruising boats coming along to race their homes? I'm cruising down the coast with the dolphins after returning from New Caledonia. My only handicap is my sailing ability.... oh and the rather full stocks of food, whiskey, water, beer, fuel, wine, books, toys... Good luck finding that on your racetrack! Maybe Wifey would like to go and visit her parents early for Christmas... and the lads could come over for a 'meeting' and we could inadvertently find ourselves at the start line... ...or maybe I'll just cruise out with my drone and click click... Cape Rodney says

Gps Puk for sale on TradeMe. Perfectly good, Just haven't used this since installing our fancy pants AIS system last year. Global Sat BU353 USB gps receiver Just thought I would tell you lot in case someone had been meaning get one... https://touch.trademe.co.nz/listing/view/1110169348

Don't let the facts get in the way of a good story!

Well done Mike and thanks for all your efforts. I suspect you may have done some work on the 'manual' also - I must go and download that again and work through the instructions to get the most I can out of your services! Please persevere with Iridium Go! Unfortunately, most of the YIT services are no use to me because you can only use the Iridium Go! to access content from their own walled garden. This frustrates me no end, and makes a lot of bad words stream through my usually calm mind. Also, FYI: It took me a LOT of effort and technical wizardry to find the Chrome App. I'm

Thanks. From memory, the Rocketguides for both is something like $500, and what I really want is something with pages that I can relaxedly browse through. I get sick of staring at a computer screen - especially in the tropics. I have OpenCPN with SOME GE 'charts'. I haven't gone through the complex / laborious process of creating my own, but have sourced some from other people. I'll have another looksee while I still have Internet available. The legitimate source for OpenCPN charts is LINZ and has charts for FIji and New Cal. Most of my GE 'charts' come from here: http://www.svsoggypaws.

Yep, I've got all the Noonsite pages and a bunch of other stuff saved... but nothing beats actually browsing through a book... I've just noticed that the 2016 "Fiji Shores & Marinas" book is available for free from a few places in NZ. I'll pop in there and pick one up.

Heading off to the islands soon and haven't had the time to read up on where we are going... I'm keen to obtain some reasonably current cruising guide/s for Fiji, Vanuatu, and New Caledonia. I have Jimmy Cornells cruising destinations and some online stuff, but nothing I can sprawl out on the deck and read on passage. If you have something lying around that you would be willing to part with let me know what you want for it. Thanks!

OK, long story short, you can sell your boat in New Caledonia tax free... MOST countries stipulate that you can not sell your boat without first importing it. New Caledonia doesn't. ie. You can enter the country on a short term stay visa, sell your boat to any non-New Cal resident, and there are no special hoops you need to jump because of your geography. Thats basically what I've been informed by a local yacht services agent in New Caledonia. Now you know what I think I know.

Thx for the info! I will read the guide and chat to Pete

OK, if you have a smartphone and are happy with the tiny screen, then you're sorted. You're not going to (economically) get Navionics charts on to your PC to use offline. You can use the web app that I linked to earlier for planning (https://webapp.navionics.com/#@6&key=vx~_F_ppi%60%40) Presumably you now have the LINZ charts on OpenCPN and the Pacific Islands charts on your phone. See you in Fiji

Option 1: Buy an iPad, a waterproof case, and the $15 Navionics charts. (My recommendation for you, because its the best for a technophobe) Option 2: Buy an android tablet, a waterproof case, and the $15 Navionics charts (I have this x 3, but only pay once for the charts) Option 3: Laptop with OpenCPN 3a: LINZ charts (that you probably already have) 3b: CM93 charts that fell off the back of a truck and can be 'borrowed' from most cruisers (but not me 'cause I'm standing on the moral high ground) However, if you're a little bit technophobic, you'll probably need said cruiser to in

Rumour and speculation has led me to believe that completing a boat sale in New Caledonia (privately) can be done with zero tax or duty implications. I've spent some time trying to verify this today and yielded nada. I'll be cruising the South Pacific again this year and intend to put the boat on the market after we leave NZ (where we are bona fide visitors). I thought that New Caledonia could be a good option (0% tax/duty), and Australia second best (15%)... and NZ a poor third (21%). (Incidentally, I'm talking about a 40' cruising cat) Anyhoo... can anyone shed light on t

I'm not sure I entirely understand the question... Navionics charts are freely available online via the web, but I doubt thats what you mean. If you have an Android device, you can download the free version of Navionics https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=it.navionics.singleAppMarineLakes&hl=en You then need to buy charts and from memory, you get a 30 day trial before you have to commit to buying. You can buy the charts from within the app, or from the app store. I've hit them up before about the fact that you can't see the South Pacific charts in the Android on

I used to say that people cruising without paper charts are reckless and irresponsible, but I've changed my tune. I still carry some, but honestly haven't looked at them. You can get the entire south pacific for Navionics for about $20. I have 3 tablets on board with these Navionics charts and they are updated regularly. Download large areas for offline use is a bit laborious, but still perfectly do-able.. edit: The Navionics app is called "Boating" I also run OpenCPN and have some other program that uses the same charts. People rave about Google Earth integration with Open CPN to

I'm not a marina lover, and only stayed in a couple in Tahiti where they asked for insurance, but not specifically public liability. When looking at NZ Marinas, however, I needed to have $1M coverage, and my insurer sold me this as a seperate addon. I can't remember the cost, but it was affordable and I just considered it part of the cost of being in an NZ marina. Please publish your findings because I will also be heading to Fiji / Vanuatu / New Caledonia this year.

Yup, Gulf Harbour and Bayswater have ferries. The Bayswater ferry would have to be a lot cheaper and the general environment is a bit more homely than the others - it is where I'm leaning. According to this article, the others that allow liveaboards are: Bucks, Hobson West (presumably Hobsonville), Viaduct Harbour & Viaduct Harbour Marine Village, Westhaven and West Park. Orakei state that they don't allow for liveaboards and Westhaven charges 25% extra, and from what I heard in the past are quite restrictive on the numbers... actually, I vaguely recall reading somewhere that Westhaven

I'm sitting on our 12m cruising catamaran in a lagoon in French Polynesia watching the rain clouds part and pondering our plan to sail to Australia for the cyclone season. I've decided to revisit the idea of coming to NZ I had decided to go to Aus in order to avoid the cost and hassle of tax and CAT1. Both of which are manageable, albeit somewhat painful issues. I'm a Kiwi with a NZ registered boat that we recently purchased offshore. Anyhoo... We are coming to the civilized world to earn some money over the cyclone season, and hopefully pay for our cruise next year in the pacific.

I missed this thread the first time round... I've just spent the last hour reading through every post with Wifey... feeling inspired, and getting closer to living the dream! I love threads like this!

Wait what... W.T is Wild Thing...? My boat is called Wild Thing II... i wonder if they are related. Wild Thing II = German made TopCat (18' boomless cat)