We launched Rireana at the end of the cyclone season on 30 April 2013. We had spent the previous 6 weeks preparing her for another season of work in the tropics.
After launching we proceeded to a mooring in Port Vila Harbour and lived and worked there before heading north to Malekula at the beginning of June. We stopped at Havannah Harbour and then, because there was an onshore wind causing a rough sea at Revolieu Bay on Epi, we proceeded directly to the Maskelyne Islands and entered Sangalai Harbour in the dark. Modern chartplotters are wonderful things. We then spent a couple of months sailing between the Maskelyne Islands and Port Sandwich while attending to Trust work. There were the usual issues with strong winds in Sangalai Harbour but our anchor held. We also experienced a rough couple of nights in Avock but again, the anchor held well. Each passage into Port Sandwich also seemed to be accompanied by strong winds, rain, and falling darkness.
We left Port Sandwich and returned to Port Vila in August, battling a 20 to 30 knot south easterly at first, which slowly, and luckily, went more easterly as we sailed south. We took as much water over the deck as we have ever done, but made a relatively fast passage, reaching Havannah Harbour in about 15 hours.
We worked in Port Vila until the beginning of September when we again sailed north to Malekula. Our passages were again, relatively uneventful. On the return voyage to Port Vila in early October we made an overnight stop at Lamen Bay on Epi, and another at Revolieu Bay.
We again made the decision to leave Rireana in Vanuatu for the cyclone season. However, this year, instead of hauling her out of the water, she is on a cyclone mooring.
