Once again we were behind the main bunch of Rallyists who had mostly left Mackay before the end of August leisurely to cruise (I try not to split infinitives….) the beautiful Whitsundays and on northwestwards towards Cairns and Cape York before the hop across the Gulf of Carpentaria to Darwin. Who cares about punctuation as long as it makes sense?
There was still work to do with the installation of a new refrigeration set up as the old one (13+years) had finally died and we were using an old domestic fridge/freezer kindly lent to us by one of the yard workers. This was positioned under the boat in the yard and meant clambering up and down that horrible ladder several times a day just to get the milk for tea etc. The fridge man who came and sorted us out was great fun and we chatted away for hours about all sorts while he worked at fitting the new unit which works really well. Thanks Warren, the Rhodesian refugee….he certainly had some tales to tell………….
We left after that and headed across the water about 25 miles to Brampton Island anchoring for the night in a sheltered bay. Next morning the air was alive with birdsong and butterflies. This is how it was meant to be I began to think!
We motorsailed for most of that day to some anchorage or other and on again the next day and the next until we found Magnetic Island…it somehow drew us in……….I now know that it was the pink rocks and it felt like coming home, well, sort of anyway. The rocks are granite like Albecq (or Ploumanach if you know Brittany). Quite beautiful!!
So we stayed for a day or two comfortably alongside in the ultra clean marina, long enough anyway for a stowaway or three to scamper aboard up the bow rope. Yes! I felt “something alive” on my feet that night, jumped up and knocked it off then looked up and saw a small furry creature scuttling around. We had mice, aboard!!!! Actually, I now believe they were an Australian rodent called a melymus. Anyway, we just couldn’t have them aboard soooooooooooo poison was laid down. I think one of them ate some that night, poor thing. The other one however carried on scuttling around at night until Dick spotted it and I managed to catch it in a plastic box……So sweet! I treated it very well and put it in a plastic basket/cage sort of thing…gave it lots of lovely fruity things to eat and some soft kitchen roll to curl up in. How did the little devil thank me? By eating through the bars and escaping! Of course, it couldn’t get far as we hadn’t touched land for over a week but it is still around somewhere unless it has eaten some of the poison in which case, it’ll have a very short future……….
Whilst in Magnetic Island, we took the ferry across to Townsville for the day. Nice old town. Dick went to the dentist. I went to the aquarium and did some shopping. I found a CD of Gurrumul, the blind Aborigine, which I had been searching for, for some time and can’t stop playing it now on my mp3 player.
Next stop on our hop up the Queensland coast was Cairns where we reprovisioned the boat (bought more kangaroo steaks…cheap and quite tasty….a bit like venison?) as this is the last decent stocking up place until Darwin which is over 1000 miles away. Australia is such a big place!! Cairns is quite nice as cities go. The Aussies certainly try very hard to look after their country in all sorts of ways.
The general idea was to day hop up the Queensland coast but it is just too far so we did a few overnighters anchoring in suitable bays with just one quick run ashore in Cooktown which is a rather historic place full of monuments to explorers and goldminers but now just a one horse town with a small shrimp and prawn fishing fleet and a centre of social activity at the local bowls club!
We eventually caught up with 7 or 8 Rally boats in a windswept anchorage somewhere within the Barrier Reef all making their way up the coast like us but they all left far too early in the morning….I mean, before breakfast? Well, really!!
So, after breakfast and with a quick DIY job on the anchor windlass, we set off again for yet another overnighter through the reef strewn waters off Queensland….this means “watch on, stop on” as we were sailing up through a busy two lane shipping channel ( the only way through the Barrier Reef). Many large vessels heading for Aussie ports come through and no one knows which side of the channel to use although the convention is “portside to portside”. Some ships choose the other side and this means possibly encountering a large vessel head on at night with unlit and uncharted reefs all round and a closing speed of over 20knots. As I am writing this, you will know that we survived but I had only 2 hours of sleep in 36….just up to the point where we safely anchored in Adolphus Island. Nice here!! More later……….
And so now it's obviously later because I am able to post this blog! We left Adolphus island and struck out across the Gulf of Carpentaria for Darwin...the jumping off point for Indonesia. The trip was around 750 miles, not far by Pacific crossing standards but trickier because there was a lot more shipping to watch out for so no nodding off for a few minutes while on watch. A brief highlight of the crossing was seeing a dugong (manatee) lolling around alongside the boat. Ugly creatures but compelling too! The temperature steadily increased as we travelled west and now in Darwin and in a marina, it has become almost unbearable, especially at night (30degrees plus at the coldest!). It reaches 36deg by noon every day. Oh boy! In one way, I can't wait to leave except that it's supposed to be even worse in Indonesia and then Singapore with the added excitement of ultra high humidity.....They say that one acclimatises ( I didn't even after 6 months in Trinidad last year).......
We leave in about a week for Kupang and Bali etc. I'm looking forward to a complete change in culture and to things being incredibly cheap for a change. The Oz dollar is very strong at the moment.... Buying local wine is more expensive therefore than back in Guernsey. Mad!!
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