Lower Whitsundays

Leaving Mackay means we're in the lower Whitsundays and there's not many boats around (except for dozens of bulk carriers waiting to load coal at Hay Point - we sailed straight through em)  so when we got to St Bees and Keswick Islands we were the only ones looking for a spot. There's a small resort on Keswick with an airstrip and a general store and nothing else except enormous holiday "shacks" on top of the hills looking north to Brampton, Lindeman and perhaps, Whitsunday.
Overnighted there in a fairly open but secure anchorage in Egremont Pass. I'm probably telling you what you already know but the ground makes for great holding under anchor and, touch wood, we've had no problems dragging anchor (more on that later). We've been hoping that the water clears up but "Debbie" has stirred things up so badly that even where we are now at "Hammo" it's still dirty. Hopefully it will get better as we head out to the outer reef.

Splitting the Pack at Hay Point

From St Bees we sailed to Brampton and we anchored off the Resort with one other boat except for a bloody prawn trawler who pulled up right between us in the middle of the night and left his Genset running all bloody night!

Brampton copped it from Debbie and was closed and fenced off (it might have been that way even before the cyclone). We took the dinghy and went ashore to take a look and we met Davie and his wife. They are the caretakers and we got Davie's life story. I think he was going stir crazy. Anyway, he resort's knackered and the owners (United Energy) are debating what to do. We took a walk along the airstrip and up a small hill to try and get phone signal but no go so we chased butterflies - aw shucks.

Chasing Butterflies on Brampton

Couple of nights in the anchorage on Brampton and we upped anchor to head for Thomas Island via Goldsmith, Ladysmith, Tinsmith, Coppersmith, Blacksmith, Silversmith and Anvil - we were in the Smith Group. Beautiful sail through this area and because its a fair way from Hamilton Island there's very little traffic.  Overnighted at Thomas before taking off on the slack tide to Lindeman and Shaw islands. Good opportunity to test the prop repitch so I prised Supa Glue from the wheel and opened up the diesel. WOT pulled 3300 revs (down from our previous 3600) and she was doing 8.6 kts. Much more satisfactory but still not as good as Ingenue! More pitching to be done.

We circled Shaw Island and anchored in Neck Bay, Kennedy Sound between Shaw and Lindeman in the East. Lindeman is another closed Resort but looked in pretty good shape, Again, a nice sail but the water is very dirty. So, from there north to the top end of Lindeman via Pentesost Island (apparently the only one Cook Named in the whole Cumberland/Whitsundays group - little piece of trivia for youse all). Anchored at the northern end of Lindeman and were joined by a bunch of hoons in a charter cat. They had a great time and passed out pretty early in the night. Remember what I said about good holding ground? Well. the wind freshened and I got up about 1.00am  and saw their lights disappearing in a northerly direction just missing Pentecost to the east. Nothing we could do so went back to bed. Next day when we got into "Hammo" the cat was tied up with the divers below. They'd run aground at some speed and had one keel hanging off - major damage apparently and deep shit for the crew. Our bit of excitement for the day.

 Hard work this skippering

Anyway, now we're in Hammo preparing to head off and explore the area - South on the flood, North on the ebb!

Nothing's broken for a couple of weeks so I'm eagerly anticipating what gonna go wrong this week!

That's all for now so stand by for the next gripping encounter.

 In my element

 With the beautiful people at"Hammo"

Our Outboard's a Seagull.

That might be Australia

Buckets of Serenity

We pulled out of Gladstone April 12th and passed through the North Channel rather than via the Narrows for reasons explained earlier. On the charts it looked more challenging than it actually was and apart from being (politely) challenged by a ferry, the passage was uneventful. We even had a naval escort part of the way, 

   

                                                                                                        With our Anchor ears on so we                                                                                                               can yell quietly. (thanks Mavis)

From there we headed direct to Great Keppel and enjoyed good sailing conditions. I "complained" about the northerlies when we on our way to Bundaberg late last year; well, the South Easterlies have well and truly kicked in and we have had 15 - 20 kts up the ginger for the last month. Great for sailing but sometimes a little relief would be nice - becoming a sailor, never bloody satisfied!

Gladstone Marina

Great Keppel is pretty rugged but a nice enough anchorage, if a little swelly, We took the dinghy (Penelope) ashore and went for walk along the beach - you know, sand between the toes and all that stuff. Ya gotta do it.

Forgot to mention - we crossed the tropic of Capricorn and had a drink to celebrate.

From GK (that's we sailors call it) we headed for Port Clinton. Easy entrance and talk about serenity, this is where it all started , buckets of it. It's a big area and there were just two other boats both anchored miles away from us. We anchored just under Mt Flinders opposite a beautiful little beach. Shy turtles poked there heads up every now and then and fish moved all around us including a few stingarees, which jumped out of the water - being chased by something, they don't do that for fun! We spent two nights secure at anchor and it was fantastic. Unfortunately it's part of theShoalwater Military area and from time to time they bomb the shit out of the palce.

Mount Flinders and beach Port Clinton

The plan was to go from Port Clinton to Pearl Bay, apparently the prettiest anchorage on the coast but the swell was developing and the anchorage there was untenable so we cruised through the bay and entered Island Head Creek. Spent the night at anchor in another good anchorage before leaving next morning for the Percy Islands.

Another rollicking sail up to Middle Percy (getting a bit sick of "rollicking") and dropped the pick off the A Frame amongst 4 other boats (one an ex Sandringham boat - "Lumiere").I can understand why "real" yachties rave about Middle Percy, it does look like something out of the Swiss Family Robinson. Beautiful beach, fringed with coconut palms (non native, but look good) and the A Frame building that is full of "memorabilia" from past visitors. It's actually at risk of becoming a bit of a junk heap but interesting nevertheless. We got adventurous and hiked up the hill to the old homestead. A hell of a climb but well worth it just to see the "homestead" and the "interesting" characters who live there. Came back down via a shorter track and the lagoon where one of the local characters has his boat in dry dock.

Dry Dock Percy Islands

Weather was beginning to build so we decided to head for Mackay for reprovisioning and relief for a couple of days.

15 - 20 kts up the ginger

Not sure if the video works

A little front approacheth

I CAN steer (note the style)

As I write this we are in Mackay, fully provisioned and preparing to head off again tomorrow am. From here to Scawfell Island - Brampton and then to Lindeman and into the Whitsundays proper for two or three weeks. So our hero, Odysseus, will once more plow the watery plain and we will see what adventure await.

Leaving Rum City

Finally got out of Bundaberg on a weather window Thursday 6th after 3 frustrating weeks of very brisk south easterlies. Having said that, we were able to take the boat out of the water and have it's bum scrubbed, antifouled and prop speeded, not to mention a prop repitch. Alternator issues appear largely resolved although we still await delivery of the high output replacement. Hoping that catches up with us in Mackay later this month. In line with our ambition to visit as many wineries as possible we hired a car and drove to Childers (hippie central) where  a winery called Hill of Promise showed us a passable Shiraz. I don't believe QLD is well known for wineries - with good reason. The only other"winery" tried to trick us into tasting their "Prize Winning" fruit wines.We backed out slowly.

Had a nice sail out of the Burnett tp Pancake Creek with the wind up our ginger. We "poled out" the headsail (Col) and tooled along at 7-8 kts. Picked up a little tuna along the way (too small to photograph) and rounded Bustard head mid arvo. Entered Pancake Creek "by the leads" (Col) and anchored uneventfully. It was still blowing hard but holding was good so no dragging problems.

Launched the dinghy next day and headed across to the beach area from where we hiked up the hill to the Bustard Head lighthouse via Aircraft Beach lookout.  Nice spot Pancake Creek and a few of the locals turned up in their tinnies for a spot of camping and fishing. It's just north of Agnes Water and the Town of 1770 so a popular spot for the locals.

Wind showed signs of abating so we "weighed anchor" (Col) at 0730 on the 9th and made for Gladstone Marina. About 30 miles so we motored all the way and performed a battery monitoring exercise. All worked as it should so should

be OK from here on (touch wood). So now we're in Gladstone where we reprovisioned and fueled up ready to depart for the first of our islands - Great Keppel tomorrow. We chickened out on navigating the narrows between Curtis Island and the mainland because of the floods in the Fitzroy which has likely filled the Narrows and Keppel Bay with all manner of rubbish. We'll tackle that on the way home.

So, from here to Great Keppel, then onto Port Clinton, Pearl Bay, Island Head Creek and the Percys. From there we will head to the Whitsundays (possibly via Mackay) so if any of you ever wanted to sail that area give us a hoy and we'll see what can be arranged.

Keeping an eye on TC Cook all the while!

Sally continues to attract the midgies - almost like she's an anode for me. I get the odd bite but she takes  to excess! Stocking up on the DEET.