Whangoroa Harbour and 35 knot winds

Next morning we do a quick pack up and head up to Whangoroa Harbour. When we get to the launch site we find a small clean changing room that we use to cook up breakfast. The weather looks rough and there is a light rain. We set up and paddle north to a cove in the north eastern end. It is quite beautiful. The weather is off and on. We come to a really cool rock formation called the Duke’s nose. Once you look at it it’s obviously a well named feature. The tide is low and we are able to harvest a few oysters. We stop for lunch at a DOC Hut called Lane cottage and get attacked by sand flies. If there are any carnivores in New Zealand then it’s the Sand Fly.

The wind is starting to pick up. We take a downwind tact and head toward the Harbour mouth. The closer we get the bigger the wind swell and the stronger the wind. We shoot out the harbor and try to check out the sea caves that are in the area. The water is just too big to allow us to go inside. By now the wind has really kicked up and we are faced with 35knt head winds with gusts of 45 knt. There is nothing for it but to just put our heads down and do the hard work. We make headway except in the really big gusts. There is no lee to hide and it just a hard couple of kilometers back to our launch site.