May 2022: Australia calls, but the Tasman Sea - Again?
Blue Hound
Phil Marks & Rosy Jensen
Sun 15 May 2022 21:05
We planned our route north of Norfolk island in the hopes of avoiding the worst of the Tasman Sea (locally known as the Ditch) which had punished us in 2019 by routing north into the Coral Sea.
This plan worked well and progress was good at first, even glimpsing Norfold Island just after dawn one morning.
But the Coral Sea had other plans for us.
There were problems with our satellite phone weather downloads although we eventually managed to get Australian high seas voice forecasts. Too late.
On Friday 13th we were forced to lie ahull for 24 hours in a storm F10 as a trough bulged south from New Caledonia. We had confused seas and whiteouts in the hot rain.
We were still 130 miles off the Queensland coast as we drifted 27 nm south overnight not wishing to close the coast until the easterly weather abated. We lost the mainsail and the genoa (both old, both shredded), a generator didn't recover from a dowsing and King Neptune's garbage men lifted our gash bag off the aft deck overnight. Apart from being very wet Blue Hound had looked after us well.
We picked up a passenger after the bad weather. We all needed rest.
On the evening of the 15th May we motored serenely into the Burnett River, relieved to drop anchor off Bundaberg Port Marina where we'd first visited almost 3 years before. 1642 miles sailed in 12 days - not a fast passage!
This time the bio-security timber inspection of the boat was less rigorous and less expensive as New Zealand was considered much less of a wood pest bio-hazard than Tonga (whence we'd previously arrived).
Now it was time to fix things and sort out local phones (a nightmare).
Here's our passenger, a Noddy.
