This is the first log book of the new section (VII) which is a really long one. Booth in time and distance, but we are coming back to that.
We start this log when leaving New Zealand heading for Australia. We thought we could meet up with our friends Rex and Louise at their home island Lord Howe, but that didn't work out so we directed towards the coast from Coffs Harbour in the north to Sydney in the south.
We have heard about the extra charging for overtime and weekend fee when checking in for the Quarantine check, so we planed to arrive on Monday morning 9th of November, and so we did.
The weather forecast had two small low for the first three days and after that a quit big high right where we wanted it to be. And it developed almost exact as it was predicted.
In fact we thought we had to slow down not to arrive to early but the strong easterly current help us whit that. Sometimes we had more than 3 knots against us...
After the first days of turning around a bit, the high gave us a good run directly to Sydney an as you have to report your arrival at least 96 hours before we gave up the idea to go to Coffs as a starting point on our route to the south.
The moon gave us some wonderful nights and we saw some of the sea living birds and other animals on the way. Some of them only visible during night time and when the sea is calm.

The theoretical distance from Opua NZ to Sydney is 1100nm and we sailed about 1400. A short detour when the low's passed of course but most of the extra miles was because of the counter current.
Finally after 10 days at sea we entered Sydney harbour in the morning of November 9, as planed...
A warm and sunny day and we docked at the customs wharf at 10 in the morning.
The Customs met up, and three alert gays climbed down from the rather high dock. They did the checking in for both the customs and the immigration without any problems and at no cost. Next step was to meet up with the Quarantine Service, but to our and the Customs surprise they didn't want to see us that day...!
And they claim the importance of not bringing forbidden items and then charge 330AUD for their "service"!
Well the next day we had to go back to a jetty in the other end of the harbour to meet them and so we did.
After all formalities was done we had some very nice days in the central down town of Sydney, within walking distance from the free anchorage in Blackwattle Bay. The only problem is that there are no garbage bins, no toilets, no showers but a very new public dinghy dock. The Fishmarket is close by and there we could fill up water and buy fresh fish and vegetables.
On Wednesday we had Rex and Louise visiting for lunch before they flew home to Lord Howe and later same week we met John and Janet and there boat Iris in Middle harbour some miles north of the city centre.
We visited the Visitor centre to find out what to see and do as this is our first visit to Australia.
After some thinking and planning we decided to leave any inland travelling to later and we both had a flue for same days when resting in a nice anchorage in Middle harbour. At the anchorage we had a neighbour yacht coming over telling us about a Swede at a mooring in his home harbour. So  we went  to Birkenhead Point, after some days, meeting Hans, who left Sweden in the 70:th.
Hans had all understanding of what a couple of Swedes have a need for - visiting IKEA, buying herring and hard bread!
From a mooring lent to us from another sailor we have sent our new wind generator to Melbourne for repair, and have also taken up an old problem with one insulator for the backstay. While we are waiting for these two to come back we have had some nice days and evenings together with Hans and his Cheryl, and Gino - who was the first we met in Middle harbour.
As soon as the insulator and wind generator is back we start the south bound sailing to Tasmania and we hope to make a lots of stops along the coast.

Finally - the long Section VII. Starting in NZ to Aus/Tasmania back to NZ Stewart island. Along South Island up to North Island in April - restocking and leaving for the Pacific Islands in June/July 2010.
Staying in Micronesia waiting for the northern hemisphere spring to go to Japan and later in summer time 2011 arriving in Alaska. Ending section VII in October/November 2011 wintering in Canada.

25 November 2009
Annika & Björn
Lindisfarne

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