Yesterday, the calm of our peaceful flotilla was broken. In 24 hours we’ve gone from a collection of yachts enjoying the company of whales, sharks, dolphins along with a lot of other spectacular Tasman wildlife, to living in the shadow of Anadarko’s monstrous drill ship the Noble Bob Douglas.

As the sun rose this morning over this beautiful section of the Pacific, the scene was dominated by the ugly sight of ‘Bob’. Just to give the size of this behemoth some context, Ros on the Baltazar described it’s approach yesterday like this: "Even while it was several miles away we could hear the roaring of Bob's engine room fans & see black smoke pluming" - you can imagine what it’s like floating here less than 500m from it!

We’re not only out here to protect this unique environment, we’re also h...

Out on the Tasman it is still, sunny and calm. The water has been so flat lately that, ironically, it’s technically known as "oily seas" because there’s a sheen over the water. Take note of this though because it’s the only time you’ll ever see me happy with oily seas!

The SV Tiama awaits the Noble Bob Douglas at the deep sea drill-site about 110NM West of Raglan

This morning as we all sat on Vega having cups of tea and eating chocolate biscuits a very large right whale breached and wandered through the middle of the boats. It stopped the conversation in its tracks as we all stood open-mouthed, pointing.

This is also a very popular area for sharks (with their fins on) which has put a few people off swimming but did not dampen Barclay Armstrong’s standup paddling spirit as he took...

Our Pacific oceans campaign is focused on ensuring sustainable and equitable fishing in the Pacific.