Leaving the Tropics

We wanted to stop at Great Keppel because of its fame, being heavily promoted in the 70’s. “Get Wrecked on Great Keppel” I think was the promo.

Well, the place is near dead, the big resort is closed, from lack of water, or a cyclone a decade ago..  depends who tells you..

In its place there’s very little left. There’s a water shortage so no use resupplying and no shop to provision. But at least the beach is nice, it’s white, like a WA beach…  The only tourism left are the Rockhampton locals arriving on the daily ferry, which rafts up on the beach and drops a ramp. The anchorage is not the best either, on the first night we dragged 80m. But we were a fair distance from the other boats, anchoring closer in found better holding. But it was a rolly anchorage (we pitched, other boats rolled). Then a sizable ketch attached itself to a mooring ball near us, which appeared to be too close. So we went to the trouble of re-anchoring Ashiki 100m away. Then we saw the ketch release itself from the mooring and anchor out. Thanks, all our trouble for nothing! Half an hour later the Rockhampton ferry picked up the mooring, looks like it was them who told the ketch to shove off, it was their mooring. Next day a catamaran wanted to anchor on top of us, Susie popped her head out the companionway and let the guy on the bow know that’s a little close to us. He apologised and moved elsewhere.

We didnt do any exploring of the island outside the settlement area, we looked around the resort ghost town, fenced off. There’s a sign showing off the proposal, colossal $1 billion project complete with canal and marina. Its approval was withdrawn by Canberra on environmental grounds, the investors are back on the drawing board me thinks.  One plus for Great Keppel, the one pub on the island serves up very decent meals.

Then the weather forecast turned ominous, a 65 knot gale was predicted and the Coast Guard even motored past checking on boats in the anchorage if they knew of the weather warning. My preparation consisted of dropping a second anchor and hoping for the best. Actually, our second anchor, the cheap (and heavier) plough, we believe is better than the SARCA. It has never let go in sand while the SARCA has, usually by unsetting itself in 180˚ wind changes and tide reversals. The plough has a hinged stock and has never dragged even in tidal streams. Several boats upped anchor and headed for Roslyn Bay marina eight miles away, many stayed here with us. Result was, we waited and the most we got was 20 knots. The big blow never came.

I noticed a few folks were braving the jellies and swimming without stinger suits, so I threw on some full length clothing, mask and goggles, jumped in to check out the hull. What I saw was the rest of the Great Barrier Reef on the keel. Big fat chunks of white coral, plenty to slow a boat. That explains the loss of 1 knot going to windward and motoring. Hmmm.

Four days at Great Keppel and winds were ripe for our exit. We weighed anchor without bothering to motor and started our 120 mile passage to Bundaberg. Since we’ve drunk plenty of their rum we might as well see the place too!

One of 23 ore carriers off Rockhampton

Cruising downwind

Eight hours later we rounded Cape Capricorn and officially sailed out of the tropics. This is significant as our mission from Darwin was to get out of the tropics as quickly as reasonably possible during cyclone season. There were no cyclones in QLD so far this wet season (this being mid January). We’ve have been quite fortunate as there was a risk to this voyage. The consolation was the QLD coast has many cyclone holes to escape to when the seagull droppings hit the fan. Though we’ll really feel better when we’re in NSW, the border being another 350 miles to go.

I counted 23 ore carriers anchored in the roads off Rockhampton, providing quite the obstacle course for Ashiki, towards Gladstone there were another load but being very dark I wasn’t sure how many. This is the second biggest port in Australia (after WA’s Port Hedland #1).

24 hours later after a very fine sail, we were absolutely surrounded by thunder storms, 360˚. The air was thick with static. Storm cells were moving seemingly everywhere, the wind was varying from all angles, quite a hand full to keep up with setting sail. At one point while both of us were in the cockpit (most the time we are down below), the wind died off almost completely, then I saw a ripple in the distance, it appeared to be coming at us fast. We dived for the halyards and reduced three panels on each mast a few seconds before a 40 knot squall hit us. It took us all of 5 to 10 seconds to reef and we pulled it off. Ashiki heeled only 15 to 20˚ and drama averted and highlighted yet again the advantage of the junk rig. But the fork lightning continued, I didn’t like it one bit and couldn't watch. If one of those things hits us it’s the end of all our electronics for a start. Worst case is a hole blown in the hull and we sink! Hopefully the bonding of the masts would prevent that. I stayed below for most of the show, waiting for Ashiki to sail out of the cauldron. Susie was happy to watch, calling it nature’s fireworks, listening to her making “ooo” and “aaah” sounds. At one point she saw a lightning hit the water only one or two hundred metres from Ashiki! Sheesh, glad I didn’t see that… 

Ashiki was making way only a couple hours from the mouth of the Burnett River, entrance to Bundaberg, and what a relief it was to eventually look back and see all the thundering storm cells miles astern. We managed to survive that one! The race was on to reach the mouth river by midnight, before the tide turned against us. But what bad luck the wind happen to back to the West making it a headwind for our entry into the river. Looks like our little 6hp will have its work cut out for it. Ashiki motored at 2.5 knots the outer channel and made the Port of Bundaberg just at slack tide (high tide, no current - theoretically). After a tense little motor in the dark, identifying the sometimes confusing channel markers, passing the marina, fishing docks and port facilities we dropped anchor just outside the port limit as no anchoring in the port area is allowed. Plan is to motor onto Bundaberg itself, 8 miles upstream with the flood at 7am the following morning.

Another thunder storm, Bundaberg anchorage

Great Keppel

After ten days waiting out the SE gales on Magnetic we were on our way again, after the first 24 hours close hauled and one tack the wind backed to the north and Ashiki commenced a glorious reach toward Airlie Beach. We made the 124 Nm in under two days, the last 24hrs covering a creditable 85 Nm, and approached the built up resort town of Airlie Beach at dawn. It looked like a mini Monte Carlo with buildings ascending the mountain slopes, an interesting place to explore maybe, but as we closed in the gloom we saw the boats at anchor, maybe a hundred of them, all heaving, bows violently rocking up and down against strong onshore Northerly. Not very appealing so we gave it a miss and try the other Airlie anchorage, Shute Bay which would be sheltered. As we rounded the point, the Northerly stayed as strong as ever and even though the sight of the Whitsunday Islands was tempting, we really didn’t want to waste this wind. Our mission was to get to NSW after all thus set Ashiki gull winged and surged on through the Whitsunday Passage at 5 to 6 knots. We can always explore these islands next year on the return voyage north. The winds increased throughout the day, and being behind us Ashiki, like most boats tends to roll side to side when sailing downwind in swell.  To minimise this we ended up sailing with main only and 4 panels of the foresail sheeted in the middle. 

Engineless again

We anchored in Sandy Bay that evening, a few miles north of MacKay. The next morning the outboard stalled after weighing anchor and refused to start again. Seemed to be an issue with either flooding or fuel hose but I couldn’t coax it to do anything. The wind was very light and we ghosted along at 1.5 knots as I changed the spark plug. Without luck we crawled for 10 miles to a settlement called Bucasia on the chart, decided today was a dead loss as far as making miles were concerned and anchored, engineless, a mile off the beach. Bucasia turned out to be a Northern suburb of MacKay, we dinghied ashore and walked a mile to the local shops to stock up on fresh goods. At least we ate well that night, but I was confident the motor would start if I gave it a rest overnight, a rest from me attempting to start it that is, I had spent most the day yanking on the start cord and grew a new blister to show for it.

Engined again

Next morning the motor started second pull. Strange beast. It pushed us the 5 miles around the point in the sunny near calm conditions. Passing the thriving metropolis of MacKay to starboard, winds remained on the beam but light, but we were quite content to turn off the motor and cruise at 2.5 knots for the rest of the day, with 170 miles to go to Great Keppel Island. 

What was next was three days and two nights of gentle cruising, sunny days and nights of lightning thunder storms over the distant shore. This seems to be the rule over most of Australia, well the part we have cruised, is regular thunderstorms over land through summer months. Us being out to sea we avoid this electrical activity, but it is an entertainment each night. We passed over Viscount shoals, weaved through Northumberland Islands and rounded Shoal Water Bay. Not fast but at least we could hold the rhumb line, the gods still providing the NE winds we need. At one point the Tiller Pilot started acting strangely, changing course in a random manner. Susie thought it was a faulty connection under deck, I said nah, it’s Raymarine, their tiller pilot likes to recalibrate itself and act strange anyway. To placate her I pulled out the multimeter and checked the voltages around the circuit. 11.8V at the plug on deck and 12.8V at the battery. Well 11.8V isnt great but is still enough to run a tiller pilot, but why the one volt difference? I found a loose connection at the battery…  Fixed that and TP resumed working properly. Doh!

After entering the anchorage at North Keppel Island in the dark, we made the last six miles into the beach anchorage on Great Keppel Island the following morning, completing a 375 mile passage from Magnetic Island.

Great Keppel Island anchorage

The Rainforest & the coral coast

The mount for the tiller pilot on the tiller itself blew up next. There’s a lot of force on TP, up to 77kg. I have it offset on the tiller because of the narrowness of Ashiki’s double ender stern means TP will be hanging out above the waves if it weren’t. Anyway, the broken pine mount was replaced by a sturdier hardwood version the next day, while on passage. Both mounts eventually blew up again, and both times replaced and reinforced, so far they have held.

After a good 4 days in Cooktown we were lifting the anchor or anchors, since I dropped two of them, the holding is a little suspect here in the river. Also by hand, since the windlass lever fell over board somewhere in the Gulf and thusly the windlass has become a deck ornament. 

In a fair wind we quietly slid past Endeavour Reef. The place where an incident took place which could have been the knife edge turning point of Australia’s history, it could have gone either way. 245 years ago Captain Cook assumed the Great Barrier Reef had ended and made the decision to sail through the night. So he, the “greatest” navigator the world had ever seen, ran the ship up onto what is now known as Endeavour Reef and almost lost everything. If he wasn’t able to recover, patch the hole with sail cloth and limp into the creek next to what is now known as Cooktown, Terra Australis would have had a different fate. No Joseph Banks to lobby Aussie as a great place for a penal colony and no English colonisation. Maybe the French would be here, maybe they wouldn’t colonise, just “run” the mining tenements and “manage” the natives like it was a big Vanuatu. Whichever, if Cook screwed up a little more than he did, none of us would be here now.

Daintree River

A couple days later we were motorsailing up the Daintree River where we spent Susie’s birthday. The gods tried to serve up a birthday present, because overnight a 4kg snapper jumped into the dinghy and remained there. Alas, it was rigamortice rigid when I found it in the morning. We did explore the river by dinghy but failed to get to the rainforest walking trails. Really need a car to get that far inland.

The day after we were dropping anchor in Port Douglas. An excellent and scenic location with a very hospitable yacht club where we used their laundry and bathroom facilities to the max. We liked the town, it is a full on tourist place, with a busy harbour ferrying punters to the reef. The food is cheap which is a pleasant contrast from WA, in fact, everywhere is cheap after W.A. …

Port Douglass anchorage

Port Douglass Yacht club signs

While in Port Douglass we met a chap who saw us sailing north of Cooktown, I remember a boat passing us 2 miles inside of us, it looked like a racing boat (it was). He said the crew were surprised it took so long to catch us, and how we were pointing so high to windward being a junk. We were doing around 4 knots hard on the wind to round Cape Flattery, which didn’t seem that quick, but faster than the norm of late. I didn’t see them till too late but looks like the junk rig left a good impression on them. 

Downtown Port Douglas

But I’m getting a little suspicious of the hull, we have lost a knot in speed motoring and speed drops off dramatically when going from beam reach to a more windward course. She didn’t used to, she’d usually perks up a little when turning her bow towards the wind with the boost from apparent wind. I vaguely remember her sailing 5.8 knots hard on the wind off Mandurah.. Maybe there’s too much growth somewhere slowing us down, but I always scrape the hull near the waterline.

Never left the couch..

The day we left Port Douglas for Cairns may have been a little unlucky, because the wind turned against us and by Zeus a gale came upon us in the night. As well as being back to making little progress with the wind on the nose nonsense, the wind started howling and the ride got rougher. I was in my usual position, on the couch reading and about to get up to reef the sails when I saw Susie was already near the companionway. So I asked her to do it, drop a couple of panels each sail, thanks. She climbed out, I heard the can cleats snap a few times and she finished the job in 30 seconds. Both sails reefed, noise reduced, motion calmed, I never left the couch! Sometimes the value of the junk rig really pays off. The storm remained with us all through the next day.

So that supposedly “short” 50 mile sail was a real pain, or maybe as some Aussie Prime Minister (almost) said, it was the storm we had to have. One positive about the hull, although it can get noisy with waves crashing into it, like solid thuds, there’s no creaking or groaning sounds. That’s what we hear, solid thuds as if the entire boat was one solid object (as it is, all epoxied together). We must have built this thing right.. 

Coast between Cooktown and Port Douglas

Cairns was the realisation of 1) probably Queensland at is best and 2) this is the motherlode of cruising. We hear QLD has all the nations cruising and live aboard yachts and the river packs about a hundred of them at anchor. (Port Douglas and Cooktown were packed out too, must look hard for anchoring space.) It’s a big tourist town (& presumably a big party town - we wouldn’t really know, being aboard each night) with great atmosphere and cheap, choose where to have your $12 steak, with beer included..  Unheard of for us sandgropers.

Enroute to Cairns

Cairns

Dinghy Dock Cairns Marina

The winds turned to northerlies the day after we arrived, wouldn’t you know it ?!  Thus we kept our Cairns visit regretfully to three nights and headed off with a Westerly one fine morning. To add drama the motor conked out just as I raised the anchor and wouldn’t start right away, so Susie pulled up the foresail and suddenly we had steerage and easily winded our way through the anchorage and up the channel. Who needs a motor anyway?! (It did start when I tried it 20 minutes later.)

Speaking of anchors, I was still hauling up the anchor by hand since no lever had materialised yet. To top that off the depth sounder stops working 80% of the time, so we’ve been using a crude leadline, actually, an old pipe wrench on the end of a line to measure depths. So far in Cooktown and Cairns we have struck out in finding a piece of steel flat bar to use as a lever for the windlass. Thinking of installing a through hull transducer type sounder during the next haulout, the current one, which doesn’t work, is a “shoot through” type - it sits inside the hull and shoots through a wall of solid epoxy towards the sea bed.

Cruiser outside Cairns

After a night at Fitzroy Island, a hideaway for Cairns locals, I had to resort to the handy billy (block and tackle) to get the anchor up, it was a deep anchorage. But 4:1 purchase of the tackle made it an easy job. Can lift anything with that thing, very handy to have on a boat. We had a dream run down to Magnetic Island, opposite Townsville, Ashiki holding a 5.5 knot beam reach for hours on end. I know from reading the old cruising books and speaking to sailors who’ve done ocean crossings that 100miles/day is common and often exceeded by small sail boats. In  coastal sailing, the wind never stays around long enough. Ashiki would reel off 55 miles in 10 hours, then the next 14 hours are either light breezes or calms, only adding 30 miles to the total. So still, we never cracked the hundred in our 3600 miles to date. Closest was 98 miles coming out of Carnarvon in WA (the opportunity was there to go well over 100 but that night we reefed right down to go 2 knots so the windvane steering could cope while we slept). The difference is, I’m told, is that the ocean trade winds blow 24 hours and those big daily distances should be no problem. 

Magnetic Island

This is a mountainous island covered with pine forests, Hoop pine to be specific - one of the few marine type soft woods native to Australia, the other being Huon Pine in Tasmania - far superior but is now unavailable. (If ever we wanted to build a solid timber mast, this is the place to come, just quietly slip in a fell a tree..). We anchored in the south end at Picnic bay the first day, when the wind switched to the SE we weighed anchor and headed for Horseshoe Bay on the Northern shore. A perfectly protected anchorage with a lively holiday town on the shore. Just as well is was lively because we were stuck there for 10 days while gales were blasting over the hills from the SE. The only criticism of the place is cars. They let punters ferry them across from Townsville, thus we have traffic in paradise… Rottnest is far superior in this regard, being a no cars all bicycle zone. But in Magnetic’s defence, it is basically a Townsville suburb with private housing unlike Rottnest.

Townsville

We spent a day exploring Townsville, a short ferry ride from Magnetic electing to leave Ashiki with her securely dug in anchor. Townsville is clearly a working town as opposed to Cairns the tourist town. There are several large marinas and lots of river moorings in Townsville which I liked. But by comparison Cairns seemingly built from the ground up to please the casual visitor, has lots more to offer and more choice. Noticeably too, Cairns is very multicultural (Asian food rules!) while Townsville is closer to the Aussie norm. But Townsville does not cater well for the anchor out cruiser, the one anchorage called the “duck pond” is a long dinghy ride to the beach and questionable protection.

Magnetic Island, Townsville

The good news is, we found out about getting a lever for our anchor windlass. I was on the phone to a “Maggie” local who had a hire/tour boat business and built his own boats, thus had a workshop. Over the phone I gave him the measurements for our lever, made from steel flat bar (he had no stainless steel) and he delivered it right to us for $30 all up. You’re thinking that’s going to rust in no time, right? Well, I sprayed it with lanolin oil, that stuff dries to something like a thin plastic coating and left it out on deck in sea salt spray passages and it hasn’t had a spot of rust on it since.

Nice boat, on Ross Creek, Townsville

Cape York

After 3 days provisioning at Siesia we hit the sea lanes again. Siesia was a good provisioning port, the comfortable anchorage was a short dinghy ride from the beach and the water and supermarket were close to the beach. That Sunday at the supermarket, mindful of the absence of meat at the big brand name supermarket in Gove on a Sunday, I asked the staff if they had any roast chickens, not expecting much. The aboriginal staffer (all the staff are aboriginal here, Siesia is an aboriginal mission), turned and looked at a rotisserie which was loaded with brown chickens, and said, “Five minutes?” And of course the meat fridge was fully loaded with vacuum sealed cuts. That supermarket in Gove should give up, these folks here in Siesia know how to run one!

Had a fair sail for 6 hours through the islands, the coastline here, our first patch of Queensland, is noticeably different to elsewhere so far. Greener and mountainous. The tide changed when we entered Endeavour Strait and we couldn’t make it past Cape York. So decided to run for the coast, which happened to be behind York island right adjacent to the cape itself and that’s where we anchored for the night.

Our anchorage, that's Cape York lighthouse over the hill

Rounding the mighty Cape Ashiki had turned a corner in her voyage, she had made the milestone in reaching top of the Aussie continent, sailing over 3,500 Nm since Cape Naturalist in W.A. and commenced the journey down the East coast. We were in the coral coast waters sheltered by the mighty Great Barrier Reef. The scenery continued with its mountainous coastline. Stunning. The next three days was spent fighting headwinds and currents, continuing the pattern of (not) sleeping and periodic peaks out the companionway, just like the previous month, but with the added fun of dodging ships in the shipping channel. One afternoon after a long tack, getting close to a mile of a reef (Hunter Reef), I climbed out of the companionway to tack her around and surprised to see a large power boat alongside us. It had “Customs & Border Protection” emblazoned on its side and 5 or 6 guys staring at me. So I answered the same old questions over the VHF. At the end of it the friendly guys informed we are heading for a reef. Err, thanks, I know. 

Some very agreeable Far North Queensland coastline, and some laundry..

Another time we made a long tack towards the coast, the further from that busy shipping lane the better, to waters where the chart said incomplete survey but soundings were still marked. While sailing along I thought I saw a log coming past, but then noticed is wasn’t bobbing up and down with the chop. Water was splashing over it..  It was a rock! A sharp pointy one in supposedly 13m deep water and Ashiki glided passed it only 30m away. That did freak me out a little, we promptly tacked around and got out of there!

After 3 days we made less than 90 miles made good. Nothing great.. Where were these so called Northerlies that are supposed to be prevalent this time of year? I’m really hating these SSE winds and had forgotten what’s it like to sail even a beam reach let alone downwind. That seemed a distant dream. At this time we came upon Cape Grenville with a sheltered Margaret Bay in its lee and I suggested to Susie we anchor there for better wind. A North wind must show up eventually and we were prepared to sit and wait for it. It’s always a relief to be in a calm anchorage after days of try to live beating into the chop. We had a nice meal and settled into sleep for the night. I woke sometime around midnight and thought I noticed something odd about the boat at anchor. Climbed out the companionway and saw that Ashiki was laying to anchor the other direction, nothing unusual the tide had changed, but the wind was coming on the beam..   Shone a torch on the compass to figure out whats going on. Ashiki is pointing Eastward, therefore the wind is from the Nor…  it.. it’s… it’s a NORTHERLY!! Unbelievable. Nice that we didn’t need to wait long. We didn’t up anchor and go then and there, the sleep was more important at that stage.

The shipping lane complete with car transporter

The next day, the wind was light and from the NE, but what a thrill it was to scud across the bay on a beam reach on flat water. Can’t remember the last time… Winds strengthened throughout the day and Ashiki sailed 78 miles made good in the next 24 hours, alternating between wing on wong and a broad reach. Almost as much as she made in previous three days. We’re liking this favourable winds business. Northerlies up here means light winds interspersed with periods of calms, which is still much better than beating. Even drifting along at 2 knots is great, that’s 2 knots in the direction we actually want to go, still doubles the progress of beating into it. 

A day later we were in the 90 mile straight, it’s a stretch of shipping channel almost a straight line fitting between the reefs, a mile wide swarth. Ashiki held a perfect line a few metres outside the actual channel the whole length, with Tiller Pilot a twitching, gliding along at 1.5 to 5 knots depending on wind strength at the time. There were a lot of ships, all of them bulk carriers, those 700’ long things. At night you see their two steaming lights, one on the bow and a higher one near the stern, this way you can identify which direction they are heading. One light directly above the other tells you it is heading straight for you. In the evening I saw a vessel heading up our stern which looked very different, it appeared to be a solid wall of light. A mile away it turned towards the other side of the channel to avoid us, either seeing our stern light and anchor light on top of the mast, or us on their radar. Considerate of them. Seeing it present its side to me I figured out what is was. 

Passing in the night

A large cruise ship. Passing a half mile off our port beam we could see moving pictures on the top deck. Punters were watching a movie under the stars… completely oblivious to the rigours of sea navigation and a classic example of intrepid sailoring going on just off their starboard rail. Susie and I were sitting in the cockpit watching this spectacle go by, joking about the perpetual all you can eat buffets those people were probably queueing for five times a day, getting fatter by the day. Our fresh food was gone and we were feeling a little peckish, we have several months supply of canned stuff but that’s not the same… Wonder if we had manoeuvred up to them they’d throw us a chicken leg or a dozen, a few tinnies too. I suppose we could’ve bailed them up on the VHF and pleaded starving intrepid sailors nearby.. Cooktown, our next hope for civilisation (and real food) seemed a long way off. Over 200 Nm to go and with the light winds and regular morning calms, at least another four days.

Where did the wind go?

Just to show, this is the Great Barrier Reef!

We were about to make Cooktown, the place Captain Cook careened the Endeavour for repairs, three days later not four, but not wanting a 4am anchoring we stayed the night at a bay 18 miles north of the town. Next morning we were making a sailing entrance into the picturesque town nestled below mountains and anchoring in its shallow creek. I’m liking Queensland already. 350 miles in 9 days, including three nights at anchor. We had made a good start down Australia’s Eastern coast and the cyclone season had just begun.

Anchorage at Cooktown

Cooktown sunset

Carpentaria

Gove is both a heavy industry port (Bauxite strip mining) and an Aborigonal community with its own name: Nulumbuy. The Gove yacht club has great food with huge servings, biggest I’ve seen in a restaurant since last time I visited the USA 20 years ago.. The slight inconvenience exists in fact that the club is 13km from the town where provisions can be bought. Transport can be a bit of a bummer, but we struck up a conversation with a local and he offered us the use of his car for the morning! So in one trip we filled up one trolley load of Woolworths goodies and filled up all our petrol gerry cans. Not happy that Woolies had no fresh meat, being a Sunday it was sold out. Also this town require you to obtain permission to purchase any take away alcohol (being an aboriginal mission they’re a bit touchy about the devils drink). Lucky we still have some rum left..

We had the big body of water known as the Gulf of Carpentaria before us, 330 miles across to the next settlement, Siesia, another aboriginal mission/town just South of the Cape of York ( - which is the most Northern point of the Australian mainland). We were warned that the seas can get quite rough in the Gulf too. The winds were still from the East so that bogey was still in place. I was hoping we can knock this off in 10 days, to the surprise of other boaties here, who plan on a 5 day trip, for reasons…  never mind.

Gulf sunset

It was great the first 1/2 hour sailing West through the harbour, the wind was behind us, such a rare event! Swung around the point and made Eastward into the 10 to 15knot SE’er. We sailed 42 miles made good that first 24 hours, compared to the 28 mile average of the last leg I’m not complaining. The we settled into a pattern, lashing the tiller most of the time, sometimes using TP when I thought it would do better. When the wind was closer to SE we’d make good progress as Siesia is on a ENE bearing. But most the time it seemed the wind was on the nose, ENE which made us go wildly off course. At least the currents this passage aren’t as bad as over Arnhem Land and we were doing better distances made good this time. Usually 30 to 35 miles/day. Doesn’t sound great but, our expectations have been lowered.. Some days there was a very light Easterly and tacking at 1 knot means more leeway and wider tacking angles, its much better to motor, 2.5 to 3 knots directly there. 

One time I was standing on the aft deck leaning against the boom crutch with hearing nothing but the relatively loud Tohatsu when suddenly a huge roar blasted from behind me. It was our old mates, the @#$% Border Protection plane flew really low over us, almost up the wazoo, to get a pic with their high tech camera mounted under the fusilage. Never heard them coming and scared the living c#@~ out of me! Of course they radio’d us to ask the same questions to which the answer was: “Fremantle, Gove, Siesia”.  Susie, who tends to do the talking with those guys, carried out her threat and asked them if they knew the weather forecast. You know, make them useful for a change, the border protection guy answered, “well its a SE’ly now” (thanks, we can see that) “we dont have any forecast reports…”.  She tried..

Gulf fishing boat

At one point the Tohatsu wouldn’t start. Usually its a problem of flooding, but un-flooding it didnt help. As Ashiki bubbled along at 2 knots I changed the spark plug, to no avail. That’s it, we’re one of those engineless cruisers now, and this doesn't particularly worry us. Thinking back, almost all the anchorages in the past 6 months were doable without motoring. I don’t think it's that hard. So we push on, sailing around 50 miles a day, of which about 30 is made good. That is to say, we are 30 miles closer to our destination. Two  days later, as I’m always puzzled why something stops working, I give the Tohatsu another pull on the cord, and the thing starts. Must have been a severe flooding problem and that's all. We are no longer “engineless” cruisers.

We made the halfway point in the Gulf and set our clocks forward 30 minutes to Queensland time zone, Ashiki is in QLD waters for the first time. Also we are officially in the “Eastern states” where strangely (to me) the sun sets on land and rises from the sea, as Susie is from the Eastern states, she gave a little “yay”. I dunno, I’m a sandgroper, but could become a banana bender, if coerced enough. I asked another cruiser in Darwin what he thought about that and he, having been to both places replied “the mind boggles”, maybe thought it was a concept beyond comprehension. (WA people and QLD people are both known to be quite parochial species.)

Anyway, we are now struggling against wind on the nose in QUEENSLAND and someone, Neptune, Poseidon or who ever decided no more mister nice guy and sent a 30 knot gale our direction. We’re down below, as usual, laying around reading our kindles, as usual, when Ashiki starts heeling a little more and is noticeably more bumpy. Poking my head out the companionway it all looks quite violent pitching over 1.5m waves and decide its time to reef. All it takes is to sit in one corner of the cockpit, release a line and drop 2 or 3 panels, snub up the 2 parrels, move to the other corner do the same to that sail and the motion completely changes. Less heel and more gentle and I’m back below with my Philip K Dick novel. This is what a storm is to us now. No big deal. Ok, sometimes when Ashiki is pounding my mind does wonder whether the foremast is strong enough, will the hull stay together.. I really paid attention to detail building this hull, over built a little, extra layers of glass on all the chines. Over the next couple days the sea remained quite rough as we were warned about, but don’t think the waves are ever over 2m. If this is as rough as it gets in a the Gulf, well, from a West Oz sailor… “..you call this rough?”  (Holds up a piece of WA coastline) “This is Rough!”

As with the leg from Darwin, we get into a routine, we grow accustom to life at an angle. Susie actually likes the completely water borne existence, with no land in sight, only flat horizons and and the length and breadth of Ashiki becomes our known world. It does take a fair bit more effort to do anything at an angle. You must climb everywhere even at 20˚. (I can see the point multihullers make..) I try to keep the heel to no more than 20˚, though going to windward she will go faster at 30˚, but that angle is too hard to live with. Oddly enough, Ashiki doesn’t become more efficient as we reef. Most Bermudan boats when overpowered in a strong breeze will sail faster after reefing down. On the other hand Ashiki goes a little slower after reefing, both windward or on a beam reach. Overpowered and on her ear she loves, however, an overpowered junk sail doesn't look overpowered, there’s no ballooning out off the sails like on a bermudan, because the battens keep it in shape. She just heels more, and goes faster. This could be to do with the hull shape too, the dory is quick to heel the first 20˚ then hardens up considerably. She’s never been over 35˚ in the strongest squalls. 30˚ just may be a performance sweet spot. But it's too much.

The easiest dish to serve when its rough is to open a can, otherwise cheese and something else in a mission bread wrap is a favourite, that’s after the fresh bread is finished. Sometimes when Susie feels energetic she’ll make one of her Thai style coconut curry veggie dishes with white rice, yum. Dessert is canned fruit and if lucky, Susie has a batch of home made yoghurt to serve, both cold from the fridge. Breakfasts are commonly either Wheat Bix, Museli or porridge. We drink lots of tea too, with biscuits.

Sleeping is variable, if is calm enough, Susie will sleep in the forward berth with me on the couch. If its rough the forward berth is bouncing too much, she’ll take the couch with lee cloth up or not depending on the tack and I found sleeping on the sole (cabin floor) on a few cushions the best location. The pilot berth at the stern has fallen out of favour for now, it is hard to climb out of and is has since turned into a defacto storage area. We set the alarm and climb up from a look each hour. Waking up every our isn’t the most peaceful sleep around, and I usually fall asleep right away, but never the less, a night at anchor is a nice change.

The last half of the voyage is slower, the winds are more against us and currents seem a little more bothersome, I had a tide app downloaded online while in Gove but its not as user friendly as Navionics one, of whom were still offline (they’re having problems). Then I remembered fiddling with the tide info on the OpenCPN chartplotter on the laptop a few years ago and had decided it didn't work. I reread that part of the manual, hit the “show tides button” on the screen, and presto….  tide stations showed up all over Australia! I had nationwide tide charts all along.  Double checked it with the WA tidebook and its spot on correct.…  DOH.

Siesia, Cape York Peninsular.

On one of the better days we nodded along for 32 miles NNE, tacked and 32 miles SE, 64 miles sailed in 24 hours but 34 miles made good. We ended up approaching the York peninsular more South that we prefered, but the seas were getting flatter, protected by the mainland and started seeing more ships, I assume coming from the bauxite mining port of Weipa. Drawing closer to Seisia we negotiate the long shoals and opted to anchor in the shallows in the lee of Crab Island for a peaceful sleep, just below the entrance to Endeavour Strait. Yep, Captain Cook territory.

We anchored off Australia’s northern most mainland town, Siesia by midday next day, 12 days out from Gove. Averaged 29.6 mile/day made good which was slightly better than Darwin/Gove but consumed less than half the fuel. Time to re-provision.

Over Arnhem Land

Ashiki's zigging and zagging

We’re in the Arafura Sea and we are beginning to experience the problem with leaving Darwin. Where are the NW’ers and the Westerlies? It’s all Easterlies, on the nose against us, so are the currents. Sometimes there is no progress at all even while motorsailing, and no where to anchor. What do you do? We want to go East, the wind and current only let us go either North or South. That is a 180˚ tacking angle. So we aim Ashiki North, after two hours, say, she starts sailing a few degrees towards East, eventually she’s heading North East, not bad. The current is slowing changing and letting us make some Easting. Tack around and she can make South East for a couple hours, then the current starts moving against us and Ashiki is heading more Southerly. 

I find sailing her with the tiller lashed is best, this will let Ashiki follow the wind if there is any change in direction. TP can't anticipate this and wants keep Ashiki pointing on a compass course. She inscribes these weird rounded Z shapes across the chart plotter, its the pattern of the changing currents letting her do what she can. But wind is on the nose and we are tacking day in day out, making good only 30 miles/day. It will take two weeks to get to Gove at this rate! We are spending large amounts of time at 1 to 2 knots. 2.5 knots is a good speed! We had one memorable afternoon when the winds swung from the NE, strengthened and Ashiki can make direct East, romping along at 4.5 to 4.8 knots. I was thinking she had forgotten how to go that quick.. So quick a big pod of dolphins joined us, cavorting over each other to sit on our bow wave. Later that night its back to Easterlies. I prefer the calms at least we can motor straight east, making good 2 to 3 knots (instead of the normal 1 knot made good tacking). 

One morning we were surrounding by a large pod of midget sized
dolphins. None of them over 1.5m (4ft).
Few days later it was a pod of normal size dolphins,
twice the size of these.

Another night its blowing a gale, at least 35 knots. I’m thinking we could make 3 or 4 knots SE into this, but the Crocodile Islands are only a few miles away so the decision was made to reef down and head North. At least we could sleep and not worry about land. After the storm abated we tacked and headed South again, back on exactly the same track the night before, we ended up making zero progress in 12 hours.

Good thing we always keep a large stock of food on board, at least 3 months supply and 6 weeks of fresh water, because two weeks were up and we still had 56 miles to go. We’ve read in the old time cruising books about crews on small sailing boats taking a month or two to cross oceans end up dreaming of the meals they’re going to eat when they finally reach port. We’re were already at that stage! I was thinking lamb cutlets and sausages at that point..  

Anchorage at the Wessel Islands

We made the Wessel Islands, our first anchorage in 10 days, further south in that chain than we wanted, but we’re there! It took us most the next day to get back up along the island to the “Hole in the Wall”, the gap in the islands we needed to pass to continue on to Gove. It’s a fun little gap and we’re looking forward to it. Time the tides right and you're sailing through it at 10 knots. Of course, we don’t have any tide tables so we’ll have to wing it. We arrived at the entrance and proceeded to sail through, it looked ok. About 300m from it we are starting to go backwards….  yeah, not the right time, fortunately the bay back from the entrance is quite protected and we anchor there for a few hours. We try again and get a few hundred metres inside the narrow channel, I swear the current looked right, Susie was completely skeptical saying its all wrong. Well, Susie was right, we failed again. Hmm, we sail back to the bay and settle in the for the night and missed the radio transmission from that pesky Custom/Border Protection plane that flew low over us.

In the morning I woke to see another yacht had anchored in the bay the other side of the point. I suggested to Susie we’ll follow them through, they are surely more organised than us and know the tides. Sure enough this boat weighed anchor and made its way to the Hole in the Wall at 8:30am. It was big modern plastic beast, an Oceanis 47 and they seemed to picked the right time as we watched them progress through without getting blown backwards. So we up anchor and head on after them. As we get closer Ashiki is going faster and faster, by the middle of the channel I see 9.9 knots on the GPS. A gust comes, Ashiki heals over violently and heads for the rocky shore! Susie quickly drops the foresail and boat gets back under control. I think main only is best in these circumstances. In a few minutes we are through the other side, the course for the straits between the next set of islands is more Southerly and for once the Easterly is favourable! First favourable winds in almost two weeks! We raise all panels and Ashiki is averaging 4 knots. The big Oceanis in the distance slowly pulls away from us, that’s the difference more waterline makes. 

Looking back, the Hole in the Wall.

Good thing is those people on the other boat obviously did their homework because we need the current to be with us for the next two straits we have to shoot. The next, “The English Company Islands” is 16 miles away, another “Point William” is 5 mile after that and the tide changes in 6 hours. It’s a good thing Ashiki is sailing fast today because we made both straits within the allotted time and shoot through both at 5 to 6 knots. After the 1st strait Ashiki is surging along beautifully at 4+ knots when I see another large yacht behind us and making ground on us fast, I actually hauled up the last panel on the foresail to give Ashiki more drive and we’re making 4.8 to 5 knots to windward, they gradually pass us, looking to be holding 6 to 7 knots, an R45. A good 15 foot longer waterline than us.

R45 racing past.. and I thought we were going great guns..

That last strait cleared and its only 21 miles to Gove, Ashiki is holding over 4 knots, a day we never experienced in the previous 2 weeks, apart from that 4 hour session with the dolphins. In the distance Gove looked like a city of high rises. There aren’t any high rises in Gove, the refraction on the sea made the smoke stacks of the bauxite refinery look taller. But it did make Gove look kind of prosperous and inviting. We were anchoring off the Gove Sailing Club by 8pm that evening. 

Later we met the couple on the Oceanis 47, from NZ, they had bought the boat in Croatia having never sailed before. That was eight years previous. I thanked them for showing us the way through the Hole in the Wall, they obviously had their act together with tide tables and timed it beautifully. The skipper said “We don’t have tide tables either, we were winging it…”. 

But its interesting to hear them say they go “slow” everywhere, 3,4 and 5 knots (most yachties tend to overstate their speeds but not these guys). I thought the mighty Oceanis would be quicker than that. In comparison, up here in the tropics I would say Ashiki goes everywhere at 2,3 and 4 knots and the shorter WL amounts to roughly 1 knot lower hull speed.

It took us 15 days Darwin to Gove, that is 28 miles/day made good. Really slow, but that’s the reality of sailing with wind on the nose. Put it another way, Ashiki sailed over 700 miles to cover the 420 miles. We motorsailed over 50 hours too, can’t say how much time that saved us, it could be 2 days or a week, it may have got us over a patch which might have taken days if sail only. There were several cruising boats in Gove which had just made the same voyage, they mostly took 5 or 6 days. They tended to motor 5 knots straight into the wind the whole way. We can’t do that. They’d run a fuel budget of a several thousand dollars too (including getting down some of the QLD coast). Something we don’t do either. I think we’re happy the way we do it, Ashiki is a sail boat after all.

Over the Top

A cruiser in Darwin describe the route East across the top in less than glowing terms, expletive laden in fact. The problem is all winds lead to Darwin, from the West its Westerlies, from the East its Easterlies (work that one out..). Easy place to get to a bugger of a place to leave! Anyway, in November Darwin is about the most uncomfortable place on earth, try sleeping in 35˚ and 85% humidity at midnight.. so its a good time to leave.

Dinah Beach Yacht Club careening poles.
They bring the boat in at high tide, tie it
to the poles and at low tide, the bottom can be painted.

At our previous outpost of (semi) civilisation, McGowans, an aboriginal run camping ground in the Kimberley, Susie learnt some news from family which prompted a change in plans. The cruise to SE Asia will be delayed another year, and we’re sailing to Gosford NSW instead. Which meant we had some things to do in Darwin before the big sail across the top to Queensland. One of them was the purchase and installation of a Raymarine tiller pilot ST2000. We had always planned to install one, an alternative to windvane steering and now was the time since we have 2,400 Nm to sail and we’ll need all the steering help we can get, especially when this voyage needs to be completed before the SE trades start up again in late March (this being late October now). Originally I planned for the cheaper ST1000 which would connect to the trim tab, but since no more trim tab, the beefier ST2000 is the one to go with. We also bought an extra 100Ah battery and another 80W of solar panels to supply power to the new instrument.

I hadn’t completely finished the installation of the solar panels when we weighed anchor and sailed around Darwin’s harbour. No hurry, there’s always time at anchorages for boat work. Besides, the winds were still favourable, coming from the West. We steered Ashiki to the entrance of the Cullen Bay marina where there is an excellent floating pier with water and fuel available, at road house prices too.

Fuelled and watered, we anchored for the night opposite the Darwin Sailing club, a rolly roadstead, where I completed the solar panel installation. We set sail the following morning on the 420 mile voyage over the top to our next port, Gove, still in the Northern Territory on the Western edge of the Gulf of Carpentaria. The plan was to make it to the tip of QLD, Cape York in the month of November. That is 420 miles to Gove then 350 miles across the Gulf of Carpentaria to Cape York. A month should be plenty of time to make it which means we have those two legs over before the cyclone season. 

The winds were flukey, full sail was set all day, winds started with a light NE’er then switched to a NW’ly as we made our way to Van Diemen Gulf with the odd small session of motorsailing during the calms. Ashiki is not a boat set up for serious motorsailing, at sea while she may only sail at 1 knot into the 5 knot breeze, firing up the 6hp Tohatsu will only boost her to 2.8 to 3 knots, which makes a difference, but a far cry from the 5 or 6 knots most other cruisers tend to motor at. At least the Tohatsu only burns 1.1 litres/hour at 3/4 throttle and we carry 65 litres of fuel onboard.

It wasn’t till after dark we entered the strait and later on I slept in the cockpit, in a semi sleep state I remember seeing 6 knots on the GPS, must be at least a 3 knot current assisting in the narrows and a good thing I was awake to negotiate the tanker coming the other direction, the tiller pilot kept us on a dead straight course. It was pure luck the tides were timed right because a glich on Navionics software update have left us without tide data. We had no idea which way the currents would go!

TP at work

Over night winds increased for an hour or so, kicking up a nasty chop, there was a “crack” from the vicinity of the tiller pilot (TP), which had been working flawlessly till then. No more steering suddenly, the wooden tiller pilot mount I had built in Darwin snapped. Because our bearing was as close on the wind as possible, lashing the tiller worked. So rule no.1 with the tiller pilot, either reef down in heavy weather or disconnect it. TP is not really necessary going to windward anyway.

Van Diemen Gulf turns out to be quite the tidal nightmare, and by morning flukey winds and nasty currents meant Ashiki couldn’t make any Northing. A NE’er was blowing and the current against us, it was either sail East on one tack, or NW on the other (backwards), so the decision was made to drop anchor East of Cape Hotham and wait for the tide to change. It wasn’t deep near the shoals, around 4 to 5m and it was an opportunity to fix the mounting point for the TP. I bolted on a piece of hardwood this time, replacing the pine which snapped and the job was done within an hour. Susie made lunch then we hung around, snoozing or reading our kindles. By around 4pm Susie announced we’re facing the other way, the tide had finally turned, the wind had become an Easterly and we can start sailing North.

The top of the gulf was 48 miles away and Ashiki took 24 hours to do it in the light winds and for part of the time, adverse current. A good portion of the leg was 3 to 4 knots, then many hours at 1.5 to 1.8 knots. Running 6 to 7 knots with a near gale and 3m waves up the wazoo in Western Australia is a distant memory! We just made the exit when the current turned again and we were beginning to be swept backwards when we made a mad motorsailing dash towards the coast and dropped anchor for the night, best to wait out this nasty current. Boats coming the other way would have it easy I thought, with winds behind them what an easy sail that would be, but the one yacht we did see, a flashy 70 footer had her sails furled and was motoring!  Hmmm.  But at least we were finally out of Van Diemen Gulf and in the Arafura Sea with Melville Island to port and Arnhem Land to starboard, we had taken three days to cover the first 90 miles, maybe we can do better than this on the mostly straight run for Gove, still 325 miles away. A “straight run”, yeah..  sure!