Knox-Johnston was having problems, as "Suhaili" was showing the strains of the long and hard voyage. On 3 November, his self-steering gear had failed for the last time, as he had used up all his spares. He was also still having leak problems, and his rudder was loose. Still, he felt that the boat was fundamentally sound, so he braced the rudder as well as he could, and started learning to balance the boat in order to sail a constant course on her own. On 7 November, he dropped mail off in Melbourne, and on 19 November he made an arranged meeting off the Southern Coast of New Zealand with a "Sunday Mirror" journalist from Otago, New Zealand.