The Whitsundays - We made it!

We try to keep the blog as interesting as possible so hope you enjoy the latest news post.

The journey so far has made us appreciate how much the weather affects every decision we make and where and when to next set sail. On checking the weather as usual with all intentions of heading home we found perfect conditions to push north for the coming week mmmmm................. so that's what we did, we'll save Lady Musgrave for the homeward leg.

The first thing we started to notice was the landscape changing and the feeling of being very remote; no phone, VHF radio or Internet. The temperature started to become quite clammy and tropical and the water had turned an intense colour of turquoise in the sandy bays; very inviting for a swim. We took our time cruising through the Northunberland Isles just below the Whitsundays which are made up of small deserted islands overnighting at Pearl Bay and a group of islands called the Percy Isles.

It was on to Mackay to restock supplies where we had to navigate through 100+ tankers; whoops a bit close. Then onwards and upwards to the Whitsundays yippee! We plan to cruise around this area for at least a couple of weeks and when we've had enough start the return journey. The homeward leg should be quite exciting as whales are migrating north at this time of year heading to the warmer waters so we'll have to keep a close lookout as they pass us by.

This is probably going to be the last post for a while unless we have something news-worthy to report.
We hope you have enjoyed our journey so far and look forward to catching up with you soon.

Dave, Caroline & Archie :)

Rosslyn Bay Marina - Great Barrier Reef

After a rocky night at Great Keppel Island we headed to Rosslyn Bay to re-fuel, the south easterly was forecast to get stronger so we decided to stay a night at the marina: special treat. We took this opportunity to organised a mechanic to check over our engine as it hadn't been starting first time. Lucky for us when the mechanic came to look at it he couldn't get it started and found the starter motor had broken - now replaced phew!

Archie couldn't believe his eyes when he spotted a turtle feeding at the side of the pontoon. We had to carry him back to the boat or he would of been in the marina beside the turtle.

This is the point we decided its time to head home. We've had a great experience and now feel ready to resume life on land. Our adventure started 6 months ago and to us it feels like we've been away for ages. Its not over by any means it will take us 6 weeks plus to sail back to Sydney and hope to stop off at Lady Musgrave Island where the snorkeling is meant to be amazing. Looks like we may be at the marina for several more days though as the southerlies have set in for the moment :(

Great Keppel Island

We're currently trying to tuck into a bay at Great Keppel Island with 6 other cruising yachts eager to keep out of a southerly swell. Despite being on the north side of the island the swell is working its way around the corners. A couple of the yachts are using different techniques to stop them rolling around; one has his sail up, another has his boom out at 45 degrees with a weight holding it in place and we are attempting something else, running a second line from the back of the boat to the anchor chain to hold us into the swell. None of these methods seem to be working too well and we are all still rolling all over the place. No sundowners tonight as we are feeling too queasy.

Today we took the opportunity of getting onto terra firma and exploring the island which has a resort, a couple of restaurants and some nice walking tracks. We walked through clouds of blue and black butterflies which seem to have all hatched at the same time - impossible to photograph. The tides here have a bigger range than in NSW with close to 4m between high and low and when we returned from our walk the dingy was 100 meters up the beach. Poor Dave had to drag it down to the water himself as my knee is still recovering.

Up to Mooloolaba

Sunrise the morning we left Ballina, the sea was calm and the bar was totally flat. We had decided to continue heading north if the weather improved which it had.

When we returned to the boat we found we had a lot of cleaning up to do. The boat had been anchored in a bird sanctuary for the last three weeks and an osprey family nesting nearby had moved in. Samurai had become a handy perch to look for fish. Archie loves feathers and was very pleased with himself when he found one of the large osprey feathers.

We covered 200 nm in three days stopping briefly at Southport and Morton Bay arriving at Mooloolaba for Easter. The town was a buzz with people holidaying over Easter with great cafes, restaurants and a beautiful beach.

Having spent 3 days here we're now preparing for the next few legs up the coast to Bundaberg. In order to arrive at Wide Bay Bar close to high tide, we'll be getting up at 3:30am in the morning...uggh! About 450nm to go to the Whitsundays.

Our Outback Experience

We really felt we were getting into the outback when we arrived at the small town called Miles 340km west of Brisbane. The earth had become an intense red colour and we were stopped in our tracks when we spotted emus in a field. The roads seemed to never end with very little traffic passing us and no mobile coverage this was when we started monitoring our fuel gauge very closely.

Arriving in Mitchell (population 1000) we came across trees we have never seen before called Queensland Bottle Trees their name deriving from their shape. The swelling is due to water held in the trunk making them ideally suited to the outback climate. This town is famous for its artesian spa pools which are pumped up hot from the Great Artesian Basin - David gave them a try. The same source provides the water supply for the town and consequently the cold taps in our motel produced hotter water than the hot.

Our furtherest inland destination was an outback town called Charleville, 638km from Brisbane, we were interested in visiting their state of the art observatory which proved to be an amazing experience.

Its not until you get into the outback that you realise how tough the farmers must have had it in recent years battling the drought. This year they had a different problem to deal with as they have just had major floods throughout the area. The water has subsided in the towns and a huge recovery program is underway as they try and get back to business as usual.

Charlesville is the biggest town in this area and home to a flying doctor base. This base services approximately 622000 sq km of southwest Qld - an area almost the size of the UK (unreal!) and we took a tour around the centre.

There is also a weather station where the lone resident meteorologist gives free 'tours' as he goes through the morning routine of taking and reporting various measurements. The measurements are used by the pilots coming and going from Charlesville and are also fed into the models used for the national forecasts. The finale of the tour was to watch the weather balloon being launched into the atmosphere as shown in the picture: this happens automatically each day at exactly 9:15am. The balloon takes measurements every two seconds until it reaches high in the upper atmosphere and bursts - the balloon plus instruments including GPS is lost each time.

Currently heading back to the coast and stopped in Toowoomba which is a very pleasant town and seems very civilised after the outback. Picture shows Table-top mountain at Toowoomba.

Tomorrow night we will be back on the boat. Will we head north to the Whitsundays or will we head south to Sydney???


Find out next blog :)

Cyclone chasers - Balina to Bungerberg

First stop Rainbow Beach where we were picked up in a 4WD truck ready for a day tour of Fraser Island. This island is World Heritage listed as being the largest sand island on the planet where dozens of lakes, rainforests and sand blows cover vast parts of the island. It is home to 230 species of birds, Australia's purest dingo and many other species. We found ourselves having a very close encounter with large goanna lizards (1 meter in length) and had to chase them as they tried to ambush camp lunch. Pictured are a couple of the stops we had on the tour: the rainforest on the way up to Lake Mackenzie and the wreck of the Maheno to which we raced along the beach at high speed to reach.

Next day a short stop at Tin Can Bay, one of the few places you can feed wild dolphins : it all started in 2006 when a local found a dolphin in the bay unable to feed itself due to a shark attack. The locals started feeding the dolphin fish and it's been coming back ever since.

We headed on to Hervey Bay staying a few nights intending to do some diving only to be informed Cyclone Ului was due to hit Queensland in the coming days and waves between 4-7 meters and strong winds were predicted.......that was the diving out.

We continued on to Bundaberg visiting the rum distillery where we were forced to sample several different products. We stayed near Mon Repos beach which is the largest turtle nesting area in Australia. In March the last nests are hatching and we headed down hopeful to see the baby turtles heading to the sea. The night before we arrived five nests had hatched, but of course we weren't so lucky and despite waiting several hours no nests opened when we were there. Still the rangers did dig into one of the previously departed nests to count and classify the broken eggs which they do for research and in doing this we did come across one lonely hatchling who hadn't made it passed a grass root and had been struggling to escape all day. This one was released and we watched him struggle a further 20 metres down the beach to be swept away by the growing waves.

The lucky turtle :)
We were in Bundaberg when the cyclone hit Makay and The Whitsundays causing a lot of property and boat damage. In the end we were lucky not to be able to leave Ballina in the boat as we would of been very close to the cyclone action.

Due to the sea condition water activities are out so we have decided to venture inland heading to the Queensland outback and more adventure.

Heading north to Queensland

Well, we've finally left Ballina - but not by boat. Having spent 3 weeks on shore for Caroline's knee operation and partial recovery, we returned to the boat, keen to head on about a week ago. Unfortunately the weather was not great for several days and when it looked good for us to go last weekend, there was still a 1.5 - 2 metre swell hitting the bar (the sand bank at the entrance to Ballina). While not huge, this was still enough to generate significant breaking waves at the bar - see the pictures below for an idea - and prevent us from getting out to sea. After spending several days checking the bar, the swell and weather were building again and it was clear we'd be waiting another week at least for another chance....all very frustrating.
So....we changed our plans and have rented a car, planning to head north to Queensland and do a bit of touring, staying in cabins along the way. We are aiming to get to Hervey Bay visit Fraser Island and do some diving returning to the boat in three weeks time. When we return we will start to head back to Pittwater (Sydney) which should take us around four weeks weather permitting.




It's a bit disappointing not to get further, but on the plus side we have been to the Whitsundays, which was our ultimate goal, several times before with friends. We've also had a great adventure already and now are starting to look ahead to return to Sydney, keen to start new projects.

Finishing with a picture of one of the stunning sunset's on our trip.

Cheerio for now Dave, Caroline & Archie xxx