Whales and Work Mates

27th Sep 2010

After a great nights sleep I woke just before the 05:00 alarm and the anchor was up by 05:20. The trip out of Wide Bay was slow as it was against the incoming tide but we were soon underway south with a light SW and good speed in calm blue water. The trip was almost of the ilk I choose to call “coffee sailing” but for the too light winds but it was still an easy and pleasant way to spend the day.

The highlights of the trip were again sealife sightings which included; an ‘old man’ dolphin with numerous battle scares including a large bite out of his dorsal fin, a huge and similarly old and barnacle encrusted sea turtle and finally two very good whale sightings. The first of these was a big fella just lazing in the water very near the boat as the photo left shows. The second, although more distant, had a number of whales happily engaged in fin slapping that seemed to be all about fun from where we were watching.

To finish the day off, as we were manoeuvring to the assigned berth in Mooloolaba, I spoke to a passing kayaker with whom we may have conflicted as we turned. The exchange was friendly and effective but was immediately followed by Paul identifying this chap as a work mate from the area - small world indeed! A serendipitous occurrence to be sure but in the immediate; this meant that quite apart from the always tricky job of getting the boat neatly in the pen, I had the additional task of keeping Paul from starting up one of his many and almost always protracted conversation until after we had the mooring lines on. I happy to say I achieved this with only the slightest hint of Captain Bligh so the day ended as favourably as it had begun.

PS: As Pilgrim will be alongside for almost the next 2 weeks, there will likley be a 'blog hiatus' for a time

Catch the tide and meet the Boeing

25th Sep 2010

We left Urangan at 05:45 so as to catch the tide down the great Sandy Straight. You may recall from the trip up, that the tides can run at 2.5 kts in the straight and as such, can have a huge impact on passage times. As it turned out, we picked it perfectly. In fact, it was one of the reasons we had sat in Urangan for 4 days and in this case, our good timing meant getting a 2 kt ride down on the incoming tide to Broonlye Pt and then continued our ride on the outgoing tide from that point south. You see Broonlye is the centre of the tide flow with the water coming into this point from both side on the flood and out of this point on both sides on the ebb. We must have hit he mid point right on tide change!

For the trip; the weather was overcast and drizzly and but for a few turtles and more impotantly, an attempted rendezvous with a south bound ‘red tailed’ 737 crewed by a mate, the trip was without much to report. (The rendezvous by the way, didn’t come off because of cloud and I suspect somewhere between 25 and 35 thousand feet, but it was fun trying)

Here Wide bay, just inside the bar we will sit tomorrow and wait for some NE winds for the trip to Moolooaba.

Small winds and Big Bubbles

21st Sep 2010


We left Bunndy at 07:45 and once off the channel markers, we picked up a nice SW wind. Knowing it would not last long we soon found ourselves in a very light southerly. With this and the calm waters of Harvey Bay we should have made a good pace but this were stolen by a tidal flow of over 1 kt flowing out of the Bay which hung on until the tide change at 13:30. In any event, this all made for an easy trip with reading dominating the day but for a turtle sighting and a number of interesting whale encounters.

With the camera ready, we did expect to see whales but surprisingly they were few and far between. The first was on the surface not far from a nearby power cat that had stopped to observe. The whale seemed perfectly content to be the show and gently slid below the surface after quite enough time for photos.

The next was in the form of a massive bubble trail right beside the boat. We didn’t see the critter that was making these bubbles of about a metre or so across at the surface, but the guess was it had to be a whale immediately below the boat. The final sighting was from Paul who with a yelp, pulled the throttle back to idle. Looking forward I saw only where the whale had been – just 5 metres ahead of us on the surface. Pual reported it as being a 'mid sized'  and following on from the story of the whale strike last blog, this was a close call (for the whale at least).

Now in Urgangan, we will sit for a couple of days while a 30 kts change passes by and then move down the Great Sandy Straight, wait for some Northerlies and then on to Mooloolaba

Forecast, Optimist and Big Bangs.

18th Sep 2010


After a very close look at all available weather information and long think, I hesitantly decided to go! In a nutshell the facts appeared to be that we might have it a little tough with a light (10kts) headwind right on track for the bulk of the daylight but by mid afternoon things should improve with a swing to the NE. Alas – such was not the outcome but merely the interpretation of a meteorological optimist.

Early enroute we were pushing about 12 kts true wind (right on track naturally) and just barely making about 5 kts with a resultant apparent wind of around 17 kts across the deck. This of course meant motor sailing (again) and while the seas were not large, we did get stopped by about one in every dozen waves – the bigger cousins of the group. All of this found us working hard for every mile and at times, needing to brace against the motion of the boat. Not so bad really but as implied in the opening paragraph, this didn’t let up but went on all night and all morning without relent almost until we were in the river entrance at Bunndy.

Now don’t get me wrong, all in all the trip wasn’t bad, but having had some good ones to compare against, its true that this trip simply was not to be on that list! In fact, the trip was almost entirely without note but for a fabulous whale sighting just after sunrise, with spectacular leaps and bounds some 150 m off our port beam and this leads me to another story:

Given the number of sighting we have had, I have said several times of late that whales will soon become small ship navigation hazards if their numbers keep increasing. This view was upheld by a couple from Cronulla on a 38’ ‘Plastic’ when they told their story of hitting a whale just off Rosslyn Bay. Apparently, they just happened to be in the same bit of water as the inattentive whale and simply rammed it with their bow. The whale then rolled under the boat, scratched along underneath ( barnacles and all) and appeared on their port side with tail raised but then slipped away without incident. Lucky for the whale and even luckier for them as it could have done some real damage either on impact or after if it had gotten upset!

Anyway, once in Bunndy a shower and a sleep were the order of the day and the plan looks like a departure on Tuesday, whence we shall keep a good lookout for whales as harvey Bay abounds with them!

A Long Goodnight

14th Sep 2010

As planned, we left the Mackay berth at 08:00, refuelled and were underway at 08:45. The sail was good all around! Even thought we had virtually no wind for a good deal of the daylight portion of the trip, the seas were flat and we were making good time under ‘Cast Iron Main’ and tidal assist. The night saw us finding some great 10 kts Northerlies which saw us breifly touch 7.8 kts with an overall avergare of well over 6 kts.

Back to he start; as I said last blog, we were required to thread our way through the anchored vessels and while I spoke of this earlier, the photos left may give a better impression than word.

Once clear of these we had a very relaxed trip with time for, reading on the aft deck, scones (among my best to date) and photos of such sights as the magic sunset as shown.

With that said, the trip was not without its highlights with no less than 5 whale sightings, one of which was a big fella just drifting on the surface only 50 m from the boat. The others were more distant but much more active with leaps and splashes and all the spectacle that whales can provide. On the opposite end of the size spectrum, we were joined by tiny flying fish for some time. These guys would leap out of the water and ‘fly’ with just the tips of their tail in the sea and sort of ‘skip’ at tremendous speed for up to 100 m – presumably getting away from some predator. An amazing sight! Last but not least was a welcome return of the dolphins. These had been scare in the northern waters so the group of 10 or so that played on our bow this morning were yet another spectacle to be enjoyed.

Arriving in Rosslyn just before 10:00 we refuelled and tied up after a good 23 hr run with speed averages over 6 kts – a long good night.

Bring on the Northerlies

13th Sep 2010


My apologies for being ‘off the air’ for so long but we have both been away attending to matters domestic. Anyway, we are now back on the boat after our respective trips home and we are ready to go. All we need is for the southerlies to stop.

The weather today is not bad but the weather tomorrow will be better so that’s the plan is to leave Mackay and push all the way to Rosslyn bay some 167 nm away. This will be somewhere between a 24 to 36 hrs trip dependent on the speed we achieve.

The not so good news is that as things look, we may get stuck in Rosslyn Bay for a time as the next round of Southerlies play their part. Still, I do like Rosslyn Bay as a location and we may be able to park the boat behind a headland somewhere just to avoid becoming ‘marina bound’.

Now its true that the time in the marinas has is down sides such as cost and lack of excitement but the relaxed lifestyle and the opportunity for domestics and little jobs such as fitting an isolation switch to the auto sump drain pump are on the plus side.

Departure out of here tomorrow will see us threading our way through the 50 or so anchored bulks carriers off Hay Point ( the pic at left only shows a small section of the area) and also doing battle with the tidal currents of Shoalwater Bay, which can be considerable. But, such is the nature of the beast and after all, none of this is any where near as electrifying as the first time encounter North bound.

The Barometer is falling!

2nd Sep 2010

The night and the morning did not augur well for the day ahead as the wind was still blowing and the skies were grey. With a mind to better understand why I looked to the Barometer, a parting gift from colleagues at CAE, only to find it had fallen badly. In fact it had fallen so badly that the aneroid capsule had dropped to the bottom of its housing - a matter of some double sided tape letting go.

With that sorted we set off at 07:15 hoping for an improving day and while the day was not bad, it was frustratingly disappointing as we were yet again, faced with a beat directly into wind, albeit a tolerable 10-15 kts. Some 9 hrs later we arrived at Mackay and settled into to the ‘post flight’ duties and a shower.

The plan is for us to be here for a week or so as I am returning to Sydney on both domestic and ‘official’ matters and Paul is off to visit some inlaws.

Next stop Rosslyn bay!

Shaw Island

1st Sep 2010


With the wind still on the nose at 15-20 kts we again beat across to Shaw island only this time I went for engine assist as the wind against tide made for a nasty chop which slowed the boat unmercifully.

Today was therefore very similar to yesterday as we grabbed another couple of miles towards Mackay in these adverse winds and enjoyed a lazy afternoon.

The forecast for tomorrow is for the winds to drop so here’s Hoping!!

Cid harbour

31st Aug 2010

The next few days we plan to slowly move to Mackay via some of the Whitsunday spots. So today we beat across to Cid harbour in a stiff 15-20 kts headwind. It seems the wind in the Whitsundays never gives in!

Cid was protected and quiet so a after a little clean up we settled into a lazy afternoon and evening