Sunshine at last
Simanderal
Michael Hughes and Ger White
Fri 22 Apr 2011 02:02
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We spent nearly a week in Mooloolaba--always
intended to spend time there, but our departure was delayed by a day or two by
continuous heavy rain!! But we enjoyed ourselves--Andrew & Emma came up from
Brisbane for the weekend--made use of his car for some provisioning--and Ger
enjoyed the shops!!
And the last few days have been a series of day
passages heading further north--with at last some glorious sunshine!!
On the 20th we sailed from Mooloolaba to the south
end of Fraser Island--a passage of over 60 miles, so an early start--after the
first couple of hours of rubbish wind, the wind kicked in at 0800 at 15
knots on a very fast broad reach which took us up to the Wide Bay Bar earlier
than expected--crossing the bar was interesting on an early rising tide, but the
lowest we recorded was 4.8m depth, so ok. And we were anchored in peaceful
Pelican Bay by 1630.
Then on 21st it was another early morning--anchor
up before 0700--to sail up the Sandy Straight with the rising tide. These are
very shallow waters and the middle section has to be crossed near high water
(about 1130 that day) or else you'll go aground. The forecast was for very
little wind and I expected to have to motor most of it--but unexpectedly there
was enough wind from a good direction (this never normally happens!!) to sail
almost all the way--lovely calm sea behind Fraser Island, a lovely sunny
day--doesn't come much better! And we were anchored in Kingfisher Bay, towards
the north end of Fraser Island, in time
for lunch--wonderful!!
We're paying for it today (22nd),
however--currently on passage to Bundaberg--somewhat over 53 miles--and although
we sailed for over a couple of hours at the start, there just isn't
enough wind to get us there before dark--probably not enough to get us there at
all!--so the engine is on and we'll be in around 1630--it gets dark here at
1730. At least the sun is still shining!!
Plan is to keep heading north quickly towards
Mackay where we'll be provisioning etc for a couple of weeks in the
Whitsundays.
All is well.
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