Subtropical Island Sunset

After motorsailing for two hours yesterday, we dropped anchor in a large cove on the leeward edge of Roberton Island. Roberton is the closest island to the coast of the mainland in the Bay of Islands, and spending the afternoon in the cockpit offered excellent views of the nautical traffic (ketches, schooners, and fishing boats, oh my!) and the mercurial weather: abundant sunshine, rain, multiple fog banks blowing passed, a fantastic sunset, and many layers of jackets and fleece going on and off continuously. 

Today we're inflating our temperamental dinghy (for the last time! a new dinghy has been purchased and we're waiting for it to be shipped into Opua) and going ashore for a hike and a picnic. It's already Thursday here, and Thanksgiving, so I'm sure we'll spend much time discussing our feelings, and how grateful we are for some of the finer things the subtropics have to offer: a sun that sets at 8:30 pm, a hike without extreme humidity, a grocery store with fresh strawberries, and a cell phone plan with Facetime-fast data streaming.