A Little Side trip for Ants

We became friends with Dick and Gail off a motor yacht Ice Dancer II. Yes friends with people off a power boat!

Ice Dancer II in Majuro

Gail had to fly home to Alaska with some health issues and Dick needed a hand to get Ice Dancer back to Hawaii. So Ants jumped on board to motor 2000 nms upwind.

The immaculate LARGE engine room

A bit about the boat. She is a Nordhavn 56' of about 60 tonnes and a million dollar plus luxury long distance boat with 80000 miles under her keel. She has a John Deere 350 HP main engine with a 36 inch 4 blade prop and a 90 HP wing engine with folding prop which also has hydraulics for bow and stern thrusters and winches. A couple of big generator sets fit easily in the cavernous engine room. 8000 litres of fuel capacity gives a range of 2500nms at 8 knots.

 

Dick looking after the John Deere

 Dick and Gail have been all over the Pacific and Cape Horn and Australia (Port Davey in Tasmania was a favourite).

In better weather enjoying a fish dinner

The trip from Majuro was upwind in 18 to 20 knots for the first 2 days and I struggled a bit with the motion (most unusual for me). I still managed my watches plus a couple of small repairs deep in a bilge and up the radar mast. Then the wind went light and we had 9 days of easy motoring to Hawaii.

The Blue Marlin we released unharmed

A Brown Boobie

We had a good catch of a 100 something pound Short Bill Spear Fish (great eating) and a catch and release 40  something pound Blue Marlin.

Sunrise in North Pacific

A very easy trip saw us arrive pre dawn at the Ko Olina marina and after a little hassle with immigration (my electronic visa waiver didn't work on a private yacht ;they did waive eventually the $585 penalty) I enjoyed 3 days in Hawaii before flying home to the Marshalls.

An interesting side trip but I am a yachtie at heart. I think it will take the European canals to convince me to be a power boat man!