Lovett Bay Boatshed

We had a nice week long stay in Port Macquarie waiting for the south winds to abate. Christmas eve we had some boaties over for drinks and miscellaneous food and drink stuffs. Then we took advantage of the light northerly wind that set in and headed out off the bar a few hours before high tide on Christmas morning. Lots of incoming current, not much in the way of waves. As soon as we got to the deeper water (300ft+) we picked up the East Australian Current again and were making quick time south (often at 10kts+).  After a long day we headed back in toward shore for an anchorage in Broughton Island. As we approached we had some very playful dolphin elves come by the boat to wish us a merry Christmas.
We picked up a mooring ball just before dark. I think it must have been reserved for us as it said Private Keep Off on it. The picture above is sunrise from Emerald Cove, Broughton Island the next morning.

We headed out early the next day to make Pittwater. Pittwater is a busy boating area north of Sydney. On the way we passed a lot of shipping, leaving and approaching the port of Newcastle. They export a lot of coal from here to China and India. There are a lot of freighters (bulk carriers) anchored in the ocean in front of Newcastle. There are also a lot just drifting offshore like this one pictured above. Their AIS status reads NUC (not under command) which used to mean in the old days that the captain and officers were dead or so sick they couldn’t run the ship. The ship is moving at about 1 – 1.5 kts with the wind and current. Odd - must be saving money while they await new orders.

We entered the main entrance to Pittwater Bay and took the finger that goes toward the Hawkesbury River. Pulled into American Bay and grabbed a mooring near friends on Fairwinds just at sunset. This is a picture of Fairwinds in the bay early morning. It looks like the white is washed out in the photo, but that’s just because they have a new, shiny paint job. Nice bay, but lousy cell connection.

Next day we motored over to Pittwater Bay to try and find a paid mooring for a week. Our plan was to spend until after New Years in Pittwater then head to Sydney Harbour when the crowds lighten up a bit. We lucked out and got a mooring from Michael at Lovett Bay Boatshed. The small ‘marina’ is located in the Ku-Ring-Gai Chase National Park. Access is by boat or bush trail only.

The boat yard has been here for over 100 years. The current owners have lived in the beautiful house behind the boat shed and rails for the last 14 years or so. It is a really wonderful setting, except perhaps for the non-stop squabbling of the Sulphur Crested Cockatoos and the harassing laugh of the Kookaburra birds. Check out their famous laugh here (scroll down to the audio clips).
We are leaving the boat on the mooring and taking a ferry, two busses and a train up into the Blue Mountains west of Sydney for a couple of days over New Years.
Paul

A Day Closer to Xmas

Being in an advanced country we are one day ahead of the US and Europe. So today is Xmas eve. We are spending it in Port Macquarie, New South Wales. That’s about half way from the Gold Coast to our next destination Sydney.
We left the Gold Coast about 10:30am, giving our friends on Fairwinds a 4 hour head start. Being the first time we have crossed the bar at the Gold Coast Seaway entrance we decided to go on an incoming current closer to high tide. We are not in the mood to test any more of the entrance bars in this country. The ride out was a little bumpy, but all over 15 feet plus deep. At this part of the coast the Eastern Australian Current comes in close to land and heads south at 2-4kts, giving anyone going southbound a major boost.
We picked up the current and started sailing south often making 9-10kts over ground with the push. Nice. In the wee hours of the morning the deluge rains started. This made the winds go up and then go down, leaving the boat with a very uncomfortable motion. To make things worse there was a lot of big ship traffic going to or from the port of Newcastle up and down the coast – pretty much on our course.
At about one in the morning Chris got me up because she was concerned about how close the CPA (closest point of approach) was for a northbound freighter. The boat was about 3 1/2 or 4 miles away, but not visible in the rain. The CPA was bouncing around .1 miles – way too close for comfort. As I shook the sleep out of my eyes the CPA slowly changed to 1 mile. 1 mile is typically the standing orders given to the bridge officers on freighters as a minimum clearance. When I see the change to 1 mile CPA I am pretty confident they know we are there. They either see us on Radar or AIS.
Just then the VHF radio crackled with a call Georgia, Georgia this is Corona Infinity. It was the captain of the Japanese northbound freighter letting us know he had opened up the CPA and wishing us a warm watch.  Then we only had to dodge two or three more freighters before we were clear for awhile.
As the sun came up we were fairly close to Coffs Harbour. No one on the boat was feeling good, as the night had been really sloppy and wet. Coffs does not have a bar entrance so we turned westerly and headed in. The anchorage was rolly as the swell makes it past the break water. Not really comfortable, but a shower and nap helped.
Next morning we sailed down to Port Macquarie, again with a great push by the current. This was fast, pleasant sail – the way they usually are after you had a sucky sail the day before. The bar at Port Macquarie is pretty dangerous and needs to be taken carefully. There is a daylight visible sector light that aligns your entry. If you are too far south it shows red, too far north it shows green and if the porridge is just right it shows white. We rode one set in and headed to the marina’s moorings.
We’ve been here for a week now waiting for the weather to turn back to a northerly wind. Probably a good thing as the Sydney area has had wicked storms with hail, lightning and excess wind.

The Port Macquarie coast with the two entrance break waters center top.
Looks like we’ll be off on Xmas day to continue moving closer to Sydney.
Hope all our family and friends on land have a good holiday season, as well as all the ships at sea.
Paul and Chris

Back In The Water

We spent a week in the yard at The Boat Works up the Coomera River, south of Brisbane. This is really a great yard. The most comfortable yard to live on your boat while on the hard that we’ve ever seen. And trust me, living on your boat while it is on the hard usually sux. They use airplane style steps instead of ladders, free loaner cars, clean and private showers and heads, a nice AC lounge, plus they are very careful while hauling and blocking your boat.
We had some great help on a few items from Ryan and crew at 143 Boat Building. Also got the Yanmar engine mounts swapped out by MMC. New galley seacock, new lower rudder bearing, 18 liters of Blue Carboline bottom paint and a shiny buffed hull.
After we dropped back in the water we headed down the river toward the Gold Coast. This place looks like Miami or Ft Lauderdale without the charm. Really nice beaches, jetskis, helicopter rides, Sea World and high rises. We installed our new Spectra Cape Horn watermaker and tested her out while at anchor and only sprayed salt water all over the cabin twice.
We’ve  been lucky enough to re-connect with friends Judy and Sherman, on Fair Winds, and will be following them down to Tasmania.
We plan to leave the Gold Coast Seaway in a few hours. Sail south down the coast for about 2 1/2 days or until the north winds change direction, with the goal of getting to Pittwater, a good anchoarge just above Sydney.
Paul

Off the Dock and Southbound

We finally got off the dock at Bundaberg. It wasn’t a great start. We headed out of the river in the early hours and pointed toward the Great Sandy Straits. Rolled out our staysail and had a bit of a rolly run south. All day the winds kept picking up. By the time we started to enter the top of the straits the winds were blowing 40kts gusting to 45. Chris and I were looking at each other with that look that says Why are we doing this?
By late afternoon with made it into the SW anchorage on the unfortunately named Big Woodie Island (25*19.93S, 152*59.23E). It was at least flat waters and some protection from the north winds. Bed time came early. The sun comes up around 4:40am here, so we woke early. The winds were now 6kts from the west, the sun was out and there were turtles in the bay. Life was not near as depressing as yesterday. A days run timed so we hit the high tide while going through the narrows of the Sandy Strait saw use make it to the Inskip anchorage near Wide Bay Bar before dinner. Since we’d done this whole area last year we weren’t in our tourist mode, just wanting to get south.

We spent the night in the Inskip Anchorage, outside Tin Can Bay, which is just around the corner from the Wide Bay Bar exit (25*48.85S,153*02.47). This night image was of the Tinnanbar fire. There has been a brutal heat wave in Queensland and hundreds of bush fires to go along with it.

2017

2018

Before exiting the Wide Bay Bar the prudent seaman (or seawoman) calls the Tin Can Bay VMR (Voluntary Marine Rescue) group to get the latest ‘recommended’ bar crossing coordinates. You can see the significant difference between the route in 2017 and the route in 2018. In 2017 when we went across and the shallowest we saw was about 10 feet. This year it was 21 feet.

Our crossing was benign. But……

they can be exciting (photo from the blog of S/V DreamTime).

After our bar crossing we did an overnight passage to Moreton Bay (aka Brisbane area). We arrived at the main ship channel at about 1:30am, just in time to hit large traffic rush hour. At this point of the inbound and outbound transits the big ships have pilots onboard. We ended up in radio conversations 4 times with the pilots on various big ships working out safe passing scenarios. We didn’t want to get run over and the pilots didn’t want to limit their careers. All very friendly and handled over the VTS (Vessel Transit Service) channel 12. The picture above is the cruise ship Pacific Dawn passing close by our port side after contacting us on the radio.

Paul

Bunnings Sausage Sizzle Saga

After a long, but good flight on Air Canada from Vancouver to Brisbane I landed back in Australia. I rode the tilt train for another 4 hours and got to Bundaberg where Georgia has been sleeping for the last few months. I got a room in the Lighthouse Motel. This is one of those places that is clean enough, but they don’t take any online reservations that I can find and certainly don’t push for any high star count.

While staying in the motel I got to enjoy the best of Australian TV. The news was all atwitter over the Bunnings Sausage Sizzle controversy. Bunnings is the local hardware store chain, much like a Home Depot or a Lowes. They like to regularly sell have a sausage sizzle on temporary tables setup out front of the doors. Its usually a charity doing the actual selling. In North American that means they are selling hotdogs on a slice of Wonderbread. For safety reasons they have decided to move the cooked onions to underneath the hotdog instead of on top. This reduces the chance of a rouge onion slice falling on the floor and causing someone to slip and fall. Very controversial, even the Prime Minister has piped in when he was in Singapore for a world leader meeting: https://www.sbs.com.au/news/pm-weighs-in-on-bunnings-sausage-sizzle-debate

While back in the US for so long the constant news cycle of the next less than honorable thing that Trump did was getting really old. There's just so many times you can listen to yet another bold face lie and bother to keep listening. We need a hotdog saga to ease the pain.
After a few days got Georgia back in the water. It takes a long time to strip a boat for a long storage. Unfortunately it takes even longer to put her back together. Most things seem to be still working. The Yanmar engine fired right up. Pumps are working. Failures include the gas-struts in the boom vang and the remote radio microphone. Next up is to get the sails back on, get Chris back here from Nepal and start to head south. Plan is to do a quick haulout with a bottom paint and miscellaneous in the Boat Works yard up the Coomera River south of Brisbane. Should take 3-5 days to get there, weather depending.

 (politico.com)

Jumping Through Visa Hoops

Yea, I know it's been a long time since any new blog posts - lots of family stuff going on, not much sailing stuff. We’re getting ready to get back down to Australia and get Georgia back in the water. She's been sitting in the Bundaberg, Australia sun being carefully watched by kangaroos for too long. We’ve had a great time being exceptional grandparents to our above average granddaughter. We can both speak toddler like a charm, are very experienced with some great kids shows, Curious George being my clear favorite.

Happy and above average grandkid with just as happy granparental units

Australia is really anal about requiring visas for travel. They have a number of tourist visas, each one with increasing stay times and increasing hoops to jump through. The first issue we ran into was when I realized I only had 6 months left on my US passport, not enough to apply for a one year visa. Because I lost my passport ID card a few years ago when my wallet went overboard in New Zealand I could not apply online. I made an appointment at the Bellingham post office and got some great service.
After a couple of weeks I had my new passport in hand. Now to start the online forms for an Aussie visa. A 30 day visa is a couple of forms to fill out and free. A multiple entry visa good for 12 months with a maximum stay of 90-days at a time requires a few more forms and about $25. Having to leave the country every 90-days to re-up the visa was not going to work for us. That brings us to the 12 month, multiple entry up to 12 months at a time stay visa. This visa requires a bunch more forms, including listing every country you’ve been in for the last 5 years with dates. A not short list for Chris and I.
After filing for this visa online we fairly quickly got a response that we are required to have an Aussie approved medical, including chest xray and UAs (urinary analysis). There are a limited number of approved sites in the US you can use for a medical. There’s one in Seattle, but that's a long drive for us. We decided to make an appointment with a clinic in Vancouver, BC. I expected this to be a quick pay your bill and the doc would make sure you can still fog a mirror held under your nose type exam. Wrong. They take this stuff seriously. You have to explain all meds you are using. Get poked and prodded. Chest x ray, UA and plus a blood donation for me.
The purpose of the chest x-ray is to protect the delicate Australians from tuberculosis. Certainly a noble cause, but just doesn’t seem very practical since we have already spent 3 months in the country. After about 3 or 4 days we were both told we had to get another UA. Apparently the quality of our piss has been compromised by drinking too many bottles of Black Butte Porter. So we set up with a lab in Bellingham  to collect our piss and look closely into it so we could send the results to the Vancouver clinic. About a week after the second UA Chris got her visa. My med results were referred to something called Buppa, the medical review company the Aussies use to check the hardcore cases. After another week of being Buppa’d I received my visa.
Around $750 and 3 weeks latter we had electronic visas in-hand. Now was time to figure out flights back to Australia. Chris has to do a few weeks work in Kathmandu before heading back. I was gonna head back to Bundy the first week of Nov but there is a too large sailbaot cruiser rally from New Caledonia heading to the marina and they don’t have any slip space for me to put the boat while I get her back together for cruising. So I’ll head out of here Nov 11 and we can launch Georgia Nov 15. At least that todays plans.

Paul

Kyoto

On our way from Australia back to the US we decided to stop in Japan for 10 days. We spent our time in the old city of Kyoto. It was the heart of winter there, so walking around the narrow streets took some getting used to. We had our cold-weather clothes from the boat with us, but things didn't get comfortable till we purchased some gloves. Because a US high government official had visited Kyoto, the city was spared any bombing during World War II and the hundreds of shrines and temples are intact.

A typical shrine would include a plaque telling of its history in English. I was always disappointed when it said this was the rebuilt 6th century shrine of some Buddhist or Imperial Leader, till I read further on and it would note that the last rebuild was in 1250AD.

The shines are mostly guarded by Lions and Liondogs. You tell the difference between the two, as one has his mouth open, the other closed. Its interesting that these are used to protect the temples, as there are no lions in Japan or liondogs, anywhere.

The food in Kyoto was great. They have a lot of Japanese restaurants there. of the first restaurants we went into. The restaurants focus on one type of food, such as Udon, Ramen, Sushsi, Yakatori and Tempura. This means you pretty much have decided what you will eat when you pick the restaurant. This is a Udon restaurant with a single row of bar seats.

To order you go to this machine and press the buttons corresponding to what you want, stick in some Yen and a ticket comes out. Seems complicated for a 8 seat restaurant, but it works. Good Udon too.

The shrines of Kyoto bring lots of Japanese tourists. The women often like to dress up fancy rental kimonos and take selfies in front of temples.

Groups of older school children are brought by their teachers to learn about their history and show respect.

Each of temples has a way to purchase some small item to leave there. These papers have prays on them and you can ask for good luck in romance, business and life. I'm not convinced it works, but I didn't want to take any chances.

 Food stores are always interesting to check out across the world as some insight to the local culture. Here's Chris in a supermarket picking out apples. The fruit is individually wrapped and blemish free.

This is one of the canals dug in the early 1600's used to trade cargo in Kyoto.

Doing a little street shopping for used kimonos.

On a particularly (really, really) cold day we took the train and subway to a weekend antique swapmeet at one of the temples. We could have filled a cargo container with the cool stuff that was offered. Chris bought an antique kimono and I scored a set of cool old Kyoto steel wood chisels. 

It made my trip to Japan even if I near had to freeze to death get them.

This temple has arches that lead up and then down the side of a mountain for a 45 minute walk around. This is only a small sample of the hundreds of pictures we took in Kyoto.

Paul

Cairns

We put Georgia to bed in her snuggy cradle on the hardstand in Bundaberg (Queensland, Australia). Along with the hardstands there's also some nice bright blue ropes holding her down just in case she has to sit through some high winds. The field behind her gets a fair number of browsing kangaroos that hopefully don't jump the chain-link fence.

On our trip back to the US we decided to make a bunch of stops on the way. The basic itinerary: Brisbane-Cairns-Osaka-Honolulu-San Diego-Ft Lauderdale-Jacksonville-Greensboro, GA-Spartenburg,SC-Seattle-Bellingham,WA.
We landed in Cairns in the rainy off season. It was still clear it is a heavily tourist focused town. Can you guess where a lot of the tourists come from by the sign above in the airport toilet?

Since our flight was going to go through Cairns anyway we decided to stay for a few days to ride the train up to Kuranda and take the Skyway gondola back down. Cairns is pronounced Cans - don't ask me why. Kurunda is an aboriginal tourist town. The railway went in the 1890s for gold extraction. It began being a tourist railway in the 1930's.

The train station in Kuranda is fairly original. It has a switching yard so that the train direction can be turned around. This is the switch house containing all the manual controls for the yard switches. The three colors separate the controls for turning the switch, locking the switch and setting the signal. Visiting the switch house was right up there with checking out rusty stuff.

This local was playing a large didgeridoo on the sidewalk, making sounds of the jungle animals.

It was dumping down rain when we headed into Bird World who's claim to fame is that it is the largest single collection of free flying birds in Australia. I should have saved this photo for Valentines Day or, as I was convinced it was pronounced as a kid, Valentimes Day.

There was something really tasty to Chris' rubber soled shoes for this ring necked parrot.

Hungry critters.

This dinosaur looking Cassowary is native to Queensland. They can get to 5 feet tall.

Lots of waterfalls viewable from the train ride.

This 'crashed' DC3 is not really rusty stuff as it is made from aluminium. Plus it was actually a plane used as a movie prop and then moved to Kuranda for tourist enjoyment.

Just to help you understand the general level of culture in Australia, here's a central gift item in the Kuranda Railway station store. Kangaroo scrotum bottle openers - a gift for all.

  Ok, it was touristy-- but really fun.

Paul

Aussie Animals

After getting our rudder somewhat back together we decided to pass on doing the 1,000 miles down and back passage to Sydney. We needed to do a Visa run the first week of February and were feeling pinched for time.  We are on a 12 month visa in Australia that is multiple entry for a maximum of 90-days at a time, and our 90-days are up soon.

So we spent some time in the Southport area, which is Fort Lauderdale with more jet skis, less charm but nicer beaches.

While in Southport we did a road trip courtesy of our friends Judy and Sherman on the half US and half Australia boat Fair Winds. I managed to forget to bring my camera with me, so only got a few cheap Huawai phone shots. This is the Byron Bay Lighthouse on Cape Byron, the eastern most part of mainland Australia. It was built in 1901 and still flashing away to the cruisers passing by offshore at night.

Almost like a selfie but with some additional help.

We drove inland into the coastal mountains to the town of Nimbin. The main reason to go here was to see the Museum of Marijuana. Unfortunately it burnt down two years ago. Pot is illegal in Australia, but Nimbin seems to be a Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell kind of town in the state of New South Wales. It makes its money selling pot paraphernalia and t-shirts to tourists while supporting a robust 1970’s hippy community.
After Southport we brought the boat up to Manly and took a slip for a few weeks so we could explore Brisbane. Manly is about a half-hour commuter train ride from Brisbane. It is a major boating stop on Moreton Bay. After we purchased our GO Cards (Queensland trasport cards) and learned to use the train, bus, ferry system, getting around was easy.

The bird life in Queensland is really impressive. You see a wide variety of interesting critters just walking around town and the parks.  This is a white ibis that goes after junk food like sea gulls would in the states.

These cranky and noisy Rainbow Lorikeets come out in flocks to feed each evening.

If you didn’t get the hint from the photo at the top of this blog, here’s another hint. We went to the Australia Zoo. This is the private zoo started by Steve Irwin – the Aussie who was famous for saying ‘Crikey!’ every time he got near a wild animal.

The zoo is nicely laid out with a bunch of somewhat interactive exhibits. The Saltie Show, aka saltwater crocodiles, doesn’t allow for a lot of customer interaction with the Salties. In practice, you don’t really need to be concerned about the crocs in NE Australia as long as you stay at least 25 feet back from the waters edge and never swim in it
The waters around here are really full of unfriendly creatures. You don’t swim in any of the murky waters due to the territorial bull sharks. The clear waters are OK as long as there are no Great White sharks. Over the last two weeks three people have been stung by Stone Fish – majorly painful. There was just a warning not to swim off the beaches on Fraser Island because of the poisonous and potentially deadly box jellys. It’s a tough crowd here.

Koala’s make for an iconic picture of Australia. Big claws, but not deadly.

Chris snuck up on this Koala and followed the petting rules: not on the head.

Meerkat looking for overhead predators.

The bird presentations at the Zoo were even more interesting than the Salties. This Red-tailed Cockatoo was in training. She’s workingon showing less attitude about people being close by.

The other iconic Australian critter is clearly the kangaroo. Look close and you can see the Joey in the mothers pouch.

Joey sticking his head out of the pouch to get a little fresh grass treat.

The Kookaburra – I’d say iconic but you aren’t allowed to have three iconics in one blog post. We were walking back at night from seeing a movie (and to escape the heat) and saw a Kookaburra sitting on a No Parking sign and occasionally swooping down to pickup bugs attracted to the evening lights. Check out their famous laugh here (scroll down to the audio clips). The movie was Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – two thumbs up.

A few more gratuitous koala pictures. Mom with a baby – neither one very alert.

Now this youngster was busy getting to the freshest gumtree leafs.
We are still in Manly, Moreton Bay, till some weather passes through. Then around Wednesday we plan to make the 200 mile sail north back to Bundaberg. We’ll put the boat on the hard there and fly out just before our visas expire. This will start an extended state-side visit and grandkid fix.
Paul