After buying our car in Auckland and spending five days touring the city, we packed up into Fornaxia and took off for our first three sights in our road trip: Owharoa Falls, the Dickey Flats Campground, and Karangahake Gorge. Owharoa Falls Our first stop was Owharoa Falls in Waikino. The falls are just a 2-minute walk from…
David and I flew into Auckland to begin our 5-week road trip around the country. Day 1 – The Waterfront and New Zealand Maritime Museum Our AirBnB was just a block off Queens St, the main area of Auckland. We took a right turn and walked all the way down to the waterfront. The Waterfront…
We’ve just flown into Auckland to start our 35-day New Zealand road trip around the North and South Islands! Our tour started with five days in Auckland, and one of the popular things to do in the Auckland area is taking a ferry out to Waiheke Island. About Waiheke Located just 20 km off of…
We recently purged our boat after reading the Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. I got rid of so many clothes, but it got me thinking, what DO I wear while cruising? A Word on Materials As a general rule, we stick to quick-dry synthetic materials on the boat. These clothes use less water to wash…
We (and every other blogger/vlogger/participant in online forums) see a ton of questions about cruising costs. Answers can vary so widely, but we thought we would at least share some basics of what our first years of cruising looked like financially. Note: all amounts are in USD! Tracking I’ve been a big fan of Mint…
2016 was our first full calendar year of cruising, and It was a fabulous one (I think our best!). We started the new year in Guadeloupe in the Caribbean with family onboard. We cruised the rest of the chain to Grenada, hopped over to Panama, and then transited the Panama Canal before crossing the Pacific…
We’ve already covered communications at sea, where we are out of cell phone service. But what about being near shore? How do we use our cell phones to communicate with family, friends, and make arrangements on land? Google Voice Transfer Step one for us was to transfer our number to Google Voice. This allowed us…
Most boats cruising the South Pacific Islands come down to New Zealand to hide out from cyclone season. With easy access to the international airport in Auckland and plenty of marine services, it’s no wonder most cruisers haul out in Whangarei. Why We Chose Norsand Boatyard There are several boatyard choices in Whangarei. We did…