To Magnetic Island

Beez Neez now Chy Whella
Big Bear and Pepe Millard
Sun 12 Jun 2016 22:57
To Magnetic Island
 
 
 
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This morning after a nice lie-in and breakfast in bed, the anchor came up at eleven twenty and we left our spot near the beach.
 
 
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Farewell to our bed-mate and good morning to a working girl.
 
 
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Bear’s final look back at Gloucester Island. Are you sad not to have had a bimble ashore..... Arrrrrrgggh, didn’t miss a thing, the thought of all those deathlies makes me shudder. I’ll take that as a no then and death adders are not to be put on the Christmas card list......... Out went the genoa and off went the engine, purring along in the sunshine, marvellous.
 
 
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Lovely flat sea, clear view of the mainland and a few weekend cruisers out and about.
 
 
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King of all he surveys.
 
 
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At a quarter past four we could see the most extraordinary structure.
 
 
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Rounding the end of the jetty we could just make out a chum, totally dwarfed.
 

Later, we looked up:-  

The Port of Abbot Point is of significant strategic value to North Queensland Bulk Ports Corporation, as there are very few locations along Queensland's eastern seaboard where deep water (>15m) is so close in-shore and is so close to a UNESCO world heritage site. Abbot Point is the most northerly deepwater coal port of Australia, situated 25 kilometres north of Bowen, Queensland. Established in 1984, it consists of a rail in-loading facility, coal handling and stockpile areas, and a single trestle jetty and conveyor connected to a berth and shiploader, located 2.75 km off-shore.

India's Mundra Port signed a 99-year lease on Abbot Point Terminal 0 in 2011. The deal cost Adani Group $1.83 billion. Adani is seeking to expand the terminal to allow another 35 million tonnes of thermal coal exports per year, on top of the current 50 million tonnes of capacity.

In 2010-2011 190 vessels arrived and carried off a cargo tonnage of 15,063,943.

 

 

  the-abbot-point-expansion  Abbot-Point-Expansion Dredging Today

 

Thank you to Green Journal and Dredging Today for the pictures of this extraordinary facility.

 

 

abbot_history NDBP  Planned look - Townsville Bulletin

 

NDBP explanatory picture and the Townsville Bulletin picture of the planned expansion. Wow.

 

 

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Out on the twenty metre mark Gleamstar was patiently waiting for her turn. All 225 metres long, 32 metres wide and a draught of 7.5 metres, she was in France in March, China and May and here she is today. She carries the Marshall Islands flag and was built in 2011. Her gross tonnage is a whooping 41,342.

 

 

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Bear happily looking up chum data for me.

 

 

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.As dusk approached we could make out to our left another chum waiting quietly at anchor.

 

 

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Just as I was settling to enjoy the sunset there was an almighty kerfuffle. A brown booby had circled Beez three times to find a nice roost for the night. I was telling him to land on the solar panel or the mid rail, no, he decided on the his fourth fly-by to try the wind generator. Landing well he hadn’t taken into account the steel slide back toward the blades. Oh my, he was hit and landed splat next to Bear’s vacant chair. The skippers head appeared in the doorway and I asked him to stand fast until my new friend had shaken the now circling stars from around his head. He attempted a take off but hit his beak on the dodger plastic thinking it was sky, now he was in the small gap, wings outstretched not knowing what to do next. Bear quietly covered our stuck visitor with his sweatshirt..........

 

 

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..........and held him steady on the side rail. He flew off, landed for a second on the water and took off giving himself a good shake as he went. All was well.

 

 

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Back to enjoying my sunset.

 

 

GRAND_VENUS by Michel Dauchy  Plan

 

Bear snuggled in bed I had my busiest two till six yet, a very dark night with a few stars. I had to sneak left to pass a concrete carrier at anchor called Glory Pacific (when I looked up her picture she looked a bit of a one careful owner). On the horizon ahead a couple of bright lights, at three miles off Grand Venus appeared on the AIS, hugging the inner bit of the shipping lane. I went out to the right to do a port to port pass as I didn’t want to go in too far because of............

 

 

Capture

 

..............the sticky-out, sharp, pointy-bit of Cape Cleveland.

 

 

GRAND_VENUS by Michel Dauchy  Car-carrier-Picture-courtesy-Bertel-Schmitt

 

There was just enough light to show the outline of Grand Venus, a behemoth of a car carrier that went roaring by at twelve knots. This busy chum was in Port Kembla on the first of May and Yokohama at the end of the month. Today she had a pit stop in Townsville and now en route to Brisbane. With berthing fees at US$3,000 per day, she needs to by nippy. Carrying up to 8,500 cars on 13 decks, each car is held in place by four nylon ties just a few inches from its neighbour – four inches of headroom and an impressive damage record of around 0.4%. This ten year old giant weighs in at a gross tonnage 59,217, length 199 metres, width 32 metres and a draught of 9.3 metres. No sooner than my busy chum had passed than two ladies appeared on the AIS in a direct behind me. Buses and policemen came to mind. Time to turn left back to my original track to get out of their way, they were two Australian Navy warships each 231 metres in length and the same beam as my chum friend – big ladies. After all that I settled to listen to some music and six o’clock came at me like a speeding train.

 

 

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Pepe went to bed, a short sleep as we would be in to Horseshoe Bay on Magnetic Island in a couple of hours. I too had fun with a warship.

 

 

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I think this lady called 304 was using me as imaginary target practice – I hope.

 

 

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Around the last corner and sadly time to wake the soundo first mate.

 

 

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I poked my head out to a lovely, sunny morning and saw the corner which soon became the anchorage.
 
 
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Bear said he wanted to tuck over toward the left as we were due some rough weather with thirty knot winds over the next few days. No sooner than I took the wheel the wind blew strongly through the saddle in the hills.
 
 
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No sooner than Bear had stuck his thumb up on a successful anchor set at nine o’clock than I looked left and saw Wishful Thinking.
 
 
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Bear launched Baby Beez whilst I did my log, sat phone off and on for the ping position on the blog, wiped this journey off the chartplotter and then settled to breakfast together. Minutes later it seemed, it was late morning.
Plan: pop over and say ‘hi’ to Michael and Gin, then a bimble to the forts up the hill from the beach. We got no further than WT as we were invited aboard for coffee. Lots to chat about and a new plan. There was a live band in the pub ashore so we went back to Beez to change and Michael and Gin came to pick us up and we arrived in time for happy hour. A very loud singer, good and raunchy but after a couple of sets we had all had enough. A couple of pizzas underarm, we went went back to Beez for supper and a trial game of tri-ominoes. A few sherbets and a good laugh later, it was time for our new rally friends to go and we soon turned in.
 
 
 
 
ALL IN ALL A JOURNEY THAT FLEW BY FOLLOWED BY A SMASHING DAY
                    A CRACKING GOOD SAIL AND A FUN EVENING