day 176- still no carbonara
Miriam: Today was an early start, springing into action at first light to rally down to Great Mercury Island. It was a crashing bashing soaking wet sort of upwind slog in brisk 18 to 22 knot winds but luckily Wendy the windvane loves these conditions so we let her drive and kept an eye on things from the companionway where we could duck and cover when the waves came pummelling in. We made excellent time, getting there by early afternoon. Unusual erosion pocked white cliffs rose from the sandy beaches with a mix of plantation pines, native forest and meadow covering the island’s low hills. Jamie, highly motivated by fishing, had the dinghy together and loaded to go in record time and I rallied to join him despite being a little sluggish. I’m so glad that I did. There were loud squawks in the forest that Jamie identified as Kaka and one of the native parrots flew close enough we could see the flash of orange beneath their wings.
We headed out to the point where a weathered pinnacle of rock rose out of the sea with a gnarled Pohutukawa as crown reaching exposed roots down the textured wall. Ocean and time created a fantastical sculpture garden of sea caves and arches and little alcoves of rough grey igneous rock and while Jamie went straight in for spear fishing in 3 layers of heavy wetsuits I chose to do some climbing. I wore my wetsuit with the thought that should I fall into the sea it would be the most appropriate choice and the neoprene was more resilient to the rocks anyways. I made it quite a ways up the pinnacle, loving the easy holds and sticky quality of the rock, until I looked down and scared myself and carefully headed back down. I did some snorkelling in the kelp beds, again delighting in the hypnotic dance of the fronds. My tolerance for cold water and total mm of neoprene being lower than that of our intrepid fisherman I soon climbed back out to entertain myself crawling along rock walls and nestling into sun baked nooks to gather the last warmth of the day. The sun neared setting and Jamie finally emerged, one butterfish and a delicious crayfish (a NZ lobster for our American readers) the richer, and, having just broken the pull cord for the motor again, we rowed home into the sunset.
Naomi here, More bashing upwind, sad to leave great barrier after such a short time. Big shout out to Pete and karon who hosted us so well at one tree point, karon did all our laundry effortlessly (?? Seemingly??) and I was so glad to have clean and dry fuzzy pants to wear. It didn’t take long tho before seeing our first pod of dolphins on the way to mercury island before I was up on the bow getting soaked in the salty water watching the mama and baby and aunties and uncles play in our bow wake. No luck trawling on the way to the island except one petrel which I noticed flying in a loud and distressed manner before realising we had caught it. Guess what petrels have an EXTREMELY strong jaw, got me and also Matt through his gloves. Luckily the lure had already lost its hook so I was able to unwrap the line from its wing. Great relief to get into the protected waters of mercury island, another very cool island we could of spent a long time exploring, especially after Jamie came back with tales of holes full of crays off the point. Very happy to have extra blankies from the op shop !! It’s cold down here !!