Lord Howe Landfall

0630 position 31-33S 159-05E. On a mooring off of Lord Howe Island, Coral Sea

At 8AM yesterday the cry of "fish on!" brought me scrambling up on deck from the chart table. Both hand lines had hooked up and the fish were diving. Perhaps ahi? Rob throttled back and we landed them both, a couple of large aku, and threw the larger one back. We left one line out hoping to catch something different as we closed in on Lord Howe.

At 930AM the rain stopped and the breeze started filling in from the southeast. It wasn't quite strong enough to sail at the 8 knot minimum speed required to make it to our destination before sunset, so we continued motor sailing. The confused seas gradually got organized with the new wind and the ship's jerky motion disappeared.

The "When will we sight Lord Howe?" competition was won by Marie when the island was twenty eight miles away with her absolutely spot on guess of 12PM. There was a bit of controversy though. I had guessed 1PM, and because of my cataracts I didn't sight the island until 1PM... Hmm... As we got closer to the island more and more sea birds wheeled around us. Van Diemen rounded the nearly 2,000 foot high sea cliffs on Lord Howe's southern coast and headed up the island's western shore for the southern mooring field.

We had been in VHF radio contact with a friendly competent fellow at "Lord Howe Maritime" since we got within five miles of the island. He drove his truck up onto the hill above the mooring field and guided us in using a hand held VHF. We picked up one of the five empty mooring balls, got the boat put to bed, and settled down in the cockpit to enjoy a celebratory Van Diemen cocktail.

I decided to serve the fresh aku three ways. The first appetizer was a Tahitian style poisson cru to go with our cocktail. Then, as the sun was setting and the crew was debating about the possibility of a green flash, we enjoyed sashimi with shoyu and wasabi. For dinner I prepared blackened aku medallions, roasted garlic and pine nut seasoned green beans, and rice. I am hoping that the three tuna preparations combined with the beef sausage fried rice I made for breakfast yesterday will earn me an honorable mention in the Van Diemen cooking competition.

After dinner we watched some videos from earlier in the trip. The crew was particularly impressed with the one of Rob diving into Mariner's Cave in Tonga.

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