Bamboozle - Back into the Tropics

Back into the Tropics

Bamboozle

Jamie and Lucy Telfer

Wed 8 Jun 2016 07:30

20:20.844S 148:57.023E

At the risk of stating the obvious Australia really is a very big place. We have logged over 600nm since we left Brisbane, one overnight passage and eleven long day sails north, but we have still got more than 700nm to go to Cape York……that’s nearly 1300nm (2300km) and we haven’t even left the State of Queensland. If you look at the map of Australia we started about half way up the right hand side and we won’t get to the top until around the 14th July although having made such a good start does give us some time to stop and enjoy some of the more relaxing bits. The Whitsunday Islands, where we currently find ourselves definitely falls into that category, "One Hundred Magic Miles” as our cruising guide puts it. It is of course winter down here but we have just sailed across the Tropic of Capricorn so are genuinely back in the tropics. So far we have been incredibly lucky with the weather even though the locals keep banging on about how cold it is, we have had a succession of warm sunny days and pleasantly cool nights and the wind has generally been blowing in the right direction too.

We have now arrived at Hamilton Island, a well known “Resort Island” with a good marina and home to a big annual race week which we will be sorry to miss. With 4 months of proper cruising coming up we have been enjoying a few days tied up with bars, restaurants, swimming pools and even a decent coffee shop at the end of the dock. It is a great place to tackle some of the jobs we want to get done before we head off into the bundu, servicing all the winches, diving the hull to check and inspect everything and the many other little maintenance tasks to prepare Bamboozle for heading a bit further off the beaten track.

A beautiful morning in The Great Sandy Strait. We haven’t sailed in such shallow waters since our time back in the Chesapeake and I don’t remember the last time we had to pay such close attention to the tides. Even with our not particularly deep draft (2.05m although I’m using 2.2m at the moment because of all the provisions and other assorted stuff we have loaded on board) the middle section of the straight is too shallow for us without a metre or two of tidal assistance.

Morning coffee waiting for our tide to get over Sheridan Flats

Lucy with the “Weather and Tide Book”…..planning the next few days passages.

Streaming tell-tales in the early morning sun. We have really noticed the difference in the performance of our sails since we replaced the genoa and main in NZ in 2014.

The screen of our chart-plotter as we passed Hay Point which is one of the largest coal export ports in the world. Each one of the "Dad’s Army" like arrows is a huge bulk carrier ship detected by our AIS system. The ones with a red surround are considered “dangerous targets” by the system, ones that we might be about to run into or may be about to run into us. Most of them are in fact anchored so the trick is to make sure you know which ones are actually on the move (or even more trickily, just about to start moving!!!)

Just before we left Brisbane I invested in a decent new fishing rod at the Sanctuary Cove boat show and I am pleased to be able to report it really works. This yellowfin tuna was as delicious as it looks. The problem with catching a fish this size is that I am not allowed to fish again until we have eaten it all!