Cairns - 16 55.217S 145 46.891E (It's that whale again!)
Aurora_b
Mike and Liz Downing
Tue 23 Jul 2013 12:53
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Arrived at Cairns this morning, having made the 83.9 mile
passage overnight. After the passage to Dunk ended up as a motor boat ride as
the forecast winds didn't turn up, we decided not to leave the next morning
unless the winds were actually blowing. So set the alarm, woke up when it went
off, checked the wind and went back of to sleep! Nothing again. The forecast for
the day was southeast 15-20kts, occasionally 25kts in the afternoon.
As still no wind by lunch time we decided an overnight passage would
be the best option, especially as it's full moon time again - so much more
pleasant and hopefully if whales were about there might be a chance of
seeing and avoiding them. (A view that shows we are still novices when it comes
to whales!) With that forecast there must be wind by the afternoon so
planned to leave around 16.00. The anchor came up on time as the wind was
up to about 12kts - not the forecast strength but on it's way up. By
the time we had cleared the influence of the island and had the sails set,
it dropped down, but we were still able to make 4kts and that's all we
needed to get in by midday the next day. With the flat see we ghosted along in
the moonlight and it was an enchanting sail. At least it was for a few hours
until the wind started to drop further. Normally on a coastal run
where we can get fuel the other end we'll put the motor on if the speed drops
below 3kts, but after the last 2 passages of motoring I was determined
that the motor would not go on unless the speed dropped below
2kts. An hour later, at 1.9kts, very reluctantly the motor went
on. The forecast was 15-20kts, occasionally 25, the reality was 3-4kts,
occasionally 5! The forecasts are not normally that far out.
While motoring at 4kts (saw no reason to rush) in the
moonlight (not quite so enchanting as sailing!), there was an almighty
whoosh of air next to the boat. Turning round the body of a whale no more
than 20ft from the cockpit was slowly slipping back under the water.
Keeping my eyes on the spot, it or another came up along
side about 40ft away and blew. It looked huge as it broke the
surface, arched and slowly slid back under. It did it one more time and was
gone. Unlike the frenetic breaching of the other day, this was all very
leisurely, as if it had come to say hello and having done so it went on it's
way. So both encounters we've had have been very surprise affairs - we didn't
see them until right beside the boat, possibly as each time they've
approached from the stern and we tend to always be looking forward. We were
once told that if whales get too close, start the motor and the noise will keep
them away. In this encounter the motor was already running and it didn't
seem bothered. And, as it was already running there didn't seem to be
anything else to do other than just marvel in the encounter and
hope it didn't get any closer.
In the early hours of the morning the forecast winds finally
turned up (a day late) and sail was reduced to keep up about 5 knots, not
wanting to arrive too early. All went smoothly until the rounding Fitzroy
Island, just off the mainland before turning into Cairns. I had planned the
route in the same way as I plan every route, taking a moderately conservative
approach on how close to get to potential dangers along the coast, like
islands, headland, reefs etc. Once underway, I couldn't believe that
commercial shipping was following my exact route - not close to it, but exactly
coming down my line. (Using AIS we could see ships up to 27 miles away last
night.) Having exclaimed to Liz that they can't do that, that's my
course, the reality of course is that at 800 or 900ft long they can do
whatever they want! So I adjusted our course to keep much closer to headlands
etc, except rounding Fitzroy, which I left as originally planned. With 10 miles
or so to go to Fitzroy, no commercial shipping was on the screen. with 9
miles to go and zooming out, 2 ships were coming, one from the north and one
from the south. And on checking routes and timings guess where would they
meet - rounding Fitzroy, and at exactly the time we would be there, With
20-25kts of wind and the seas coming up, being squeezed by two big ships didn't
seem such a good idea, especially as the course of the one from the south was
going inside our course, so being squeezed between the two was looking
quite likely! The decision was made to turn west and go inside Fitzroy. Not so
easy when you have two poles up holding the headsails out and no main up, but
after an agonizing period that seemed to go on for ever we cut across the
course of the ship behind us and got clear in time and then had a another
agonizing period getting passed the southern end of Fitzroy, which was now
a lee shore. But we made that too and were able to turn north between Fitzroy
and the mainland and rounded the headland towards Cairns as the sun came
up. When planning the next course a 'commercial shipping' factor will
be added to the
calculations!
Cairns is a major milestone along our route. It's one of
those places where we've been saying, "something else to do, we'll do it when we
get to Cairns", so the list has been growing and it's going to be a very busy
week here if we're going to make a significant dent in that list. One of
the reasons is that we decided quite a long time ago that we would stay in the
marina here rather than anchor and that does make some things easier, e.g
laundry and provisioning - the marina is only a few minutes walk from the
centre of town. We left the last marina, at Gladstone, on 6th July and have been
at anchor or on passage for the last 17 days and have covered another 641.8
miles and a total of 1384 miles since leaving Pittwater on 17th
June.
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