The 2006-2007 New Zealand summer was late arriving but quickly made up for it's tardy appearance with a wealth of beautiful sun filled days. We have taken advantage of this with extended trips to Whangarei, Great Barrier Island, West Coromandel Coast, Waiheke Island, Kawau Island, and Mahurangi Harbour. We have had cousins Roger and Kamala Jonkers and Niven Smyth onboard on different occasions and enjoyed the excitement of snapper fishing which has been very rewarding. Between these trips and Daniel's pre-schooling requirements, little time has been available for filling in the gaps in logs etc on the website, so with the approach of winter hopefully this can be remedied. Well winter has well and truely past and only a small advance was made on web tasks. A holiday in Asia during June-July a cold late winter with a myriad of repair and maintenance tasks on "Star of the West" occupied most of the time. New upholstery throughout and new dodger and bimini necessitated a painting and varnishing exercise to match the new fabrics. Sterling assistance from friends Pete White & Christine Bourke made light work of the exterior varnishing. A refurbished heads with a water heater (engine heat-exchanger) is a new luxury as previous recent cruising was always close to the equator. Due to a wet and windy Spring and completion of the R&M tasks the 2007-2008 Summer cruising didn't start until after Christmas on December 29th where we headed to Kawau Island with friends Pete & Christine onboard to see in the New Year.