23 29.074S 151 13.515E
Aurora_b
Mike and Liz Downing
Sat 6 Jul 2013 09:35
The anchorage here is very open and the swell comes in, but so far the light wind is keeping our bows into the swell and we're not rolling. Hope that's going to last the night. (Shouldn't have written that - the wind has dropped and the rolling started! It's a bit late to put out the stern anchor, which is the proper solution. If we were staying longer we would, but tomorrow, all being well, we hope to head further into the tropics!)
Have just found out from the local volunteer coastguard that the Australian army is playing war games along the coast a bit further up and a number of key anchorages (Port Clinton, Pearl Bay and Island Head Creek) are all out of bounds. Not wanting to be used for target practice, we'll now have to do an overnight trip the day after tomorrow to get past it all. The military exercises are continuing until the middle of August. Surprised they can afford to keep going that long! Interesting comment from one of the locals in the marina at Gladstone regarding sailing at night. He was saying he rarely sails at night as there are so many whales about at this time of year. That's the second time we've been told that, so we're reluctant to do it, especially with no moon. We haven't seen any whales since Coffs Harbour and we would like to see them again, but hopefully during the day and not too close!
As we're outside internet range, going to try and send this via the SSB, if I can remember how to - it's been 7 months since we last used it.
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