Greetings from Mackay, Australia. We arrived safely on May 14 with our boat mostly in tact. (More on that below). In the words of the legendary Willie Nelson, We are on the road — ahem, sea — again. 🎶 As you know from our last blog entry, we left Scarborough Marina early on May 1. We wish we could say that the sail up the coast started like our stay in Scarborough ended — all lollipops, rainbows and ponies — but, unfortunately, that was not the case. In fact, if we had to characterize it, we would say that we got off to a rather inauspicious start and a rocky end. Where do we begin . . . .
Before we left Scarborough Marina we developed a detailed itinerary that would take us from there to Mackay over the course of about 2 weeks. After our long sabbatical, we were anxious to get going so we took off despite the fact that there were high winds predicted for the next 3 or 4 days. Our first planned stop was Mooloolaba Marina (love these Aussie names) and we figured that, if need be, we could hide there for a few days while we waited for the weather conditions to improve. Though the wind was directly behind us (causing us to motor rather than sail), the wind and waves weren’t too horrible that first day. While we were in the open ocean we had some wind gusts in the 18-20 knot range but once we turned into the protected waters of the river where Mooloolaba Marina is situated the gusts were down to a manageable 12 knots.
We had a choice of 2 berths at the marina. Both of them were positioned in such a way that the current and wind would push us away from the dock and toward the boat in the shared slip. As a result, we deliberately chose the berth that was towards the end of the dock with a wide channel so we could easily swing in. With relatively benign wind conditions, our plan would have been perfect if the marina hadn’t sent the Three Stooges to help us. (Well, it was only 2 stooges but they were so bad it felt like 3). One of the “dockhands” sent down to help us, we later learned, was the groundskeeper. That explained why he didn’t catch the bow line Jill tossed to him and why the other guy sent down to help was explaining to him how to secure a line around a cleat when he should have been securing the midship line we had tossed him before tossing our bow line to the groundskeeper. (It also explained why, when we was trying to tell us that the bow of our boat was touching the dock, he had a hard time communicating, apologetically informing us that he “didn’t know boat terms.” That is a direct quote.) But back to the docking . . . We can control our bow with our bow thruster so we are always less concerned about our bow line but we really need our midship line cleated off quickly so we can back down on it and get closer to the dock. At any rate, with our midship line wrapped around the cleat with only a single wrap and not cleated we drifted towards the other boat. Most humans simply can’t hold a 30 ton boat in place with bare hands. Fortunately, though, it was a controlled, slow, drift. The only small issue was that the other boat (which shall remain nameless for reasons that will become obvious as you read on) had the outboard motor for their dinghy mounted on their port rail and canted so that the propeller leaned out away from their boat. Not a very smart placement. So as we got close to the other vessel Zack noticed that the propeller for their dinghy lightly grazed our stainless steel rail. There was no hull contact at all. If there were we would have known about it because: A. Zack, who was looking right at their boat would have seen the hit, B. we both would have felt the impact and C. our black hull would have left some sign of contact on their white hull. Jill was on the other side of the boat trying to manage the dockhands who still couldn’t seem to get the idea that they needed to secure our vessel so she didn’t see and did not feel anything. Eventually, the dockhands (after many “pleases”and “thank you”) got our boat secured and we headed to the office to check in.
By the time we were secure in our berth and settled up with the marina office we had just enough time to briefly explore the town and check out the beach before dinner. As promised in the online brochure, Mooloolaba was a lovely little coastal town with cute local shops, a nice selection of nearby restaurants and a beautiful long horseshoe beach with fine white squeaky sand and some low flat rocks. (A picture of this beach with Zack looking out into the distance is the feature photo of this blog entry.) It was quite picturesque. We planned on staying at Mooloolaba Marina for 2, or possibly 3, nights depending on the wind forecast. All went well our first night and, after a stroll through town and along the beach, we enjoyed dinner at Rice Boi which serves a wonderful selection of Asian street food. We went to sleep thinking that Mooloolaba was not a bad place to be stuck if we had to stay an extra day.
Unfortunately, day 2 was not so successful. While Jill was out for her daily walk in the afternoon, Zack received a rather officious (okay, nasty) email from the marina office that our neighbor boat reported that we had a collision and that we were in breach of marina policy and Queensland law for failing to report. The email attached 2 lengthy forms to fill out — one for the marina and one for local authorities — to report the collision. Zack forwarded Jill the email and while we were both beyond incredulous, we agreed that it would serve no purpose to get aggressive back unless absolutely necessary. Instead, Zack would go to the marina office, explain that we weren’t involved in a collision — at least not how we understand that term — but we would nonetheless gladly fill out the required paperwork. The marina office staff remained officious and though Zack politely stood his ground that there was no collision which is why we didn’t make a report he stayed calm, professional and polite. He specifically stated over and over that he understood that since the marina had received notice of a “collision” from the other boat, the marina had to follow protocol and that meant that we had to complete the forms. He did ask if the other boat reported any damage and the office staff replied that the owners had indicated that they were still “assessing” the situation. (Oh brother!!!)
So we completed the forms that evening, attaching copious pictures (from every angle) of the other boat’s pristine white hull. No, as we have said many times, you truly cannot make this stuff up! The next morning Jill went to the marina office to make sure they had received the forms and to again apologize for our oversight in not reporting the “collision” that didn’t happen. By this time, between Zack’s gracious response to the marina’s rather accusatory email and, we believe, the pictures of the other vessel that unequivocally supported our position that there was no collision, the marina staff had changed their tune. They were quite nice as Jill checked out and assured her that they didn’t think that this matter would go anywhere. What a shock! But, yes, we were checking out and not staying the extra day. Though the weather forecast was for continued heavy winds and high seas we just wanted to get out of there. We notified the marina office that we were casting off at 9 AM and they sent the groundskeeper back down to “help” us. This time we clearly went through the plan — several times — before backing out of the slip to make sure he understood. With our neighbors out on their deck watching our departure closely (Jill gave them a friendly wave and smile as we pulled away — though she didn’t blow any kisses), we departed the dock without incident.
Of course, now we had to deal with the wind and wave conditions. It wasn’t pretty. The wind kicked up to 25 – 30 knots creating really high seas. It was no joke. The were many waves up to 15 feet (and some bigger) — definitely some of the biggest waves we have encountered — which had us heeled so far that our deck on the down side was underwater. Not a very common occurrence for a heavy boat like Che Figata. If we had any doubt whether these were really big waves or we merely didn’t remember how big the seas can get, a trip down below deck by Jill quickly settled that question. Things we thought were secure and generally don’t shift, were tossed about. We had heard lots of clanking in our cabinets and pillows, clothing, books, assorted electronics and avocados (yep, they were in a fairly deep vegetable basket but the bouncing was enough to toss them out) were strewn about the floor. Jill then secured the cabin more thoroughly (which we should have done before heading out given the wave forecast) before coming back up to the cockpit a bit queasy. We endured about 5 hours of big seas knocking our boat over (sort of like being in a boxing ring and getting knocked over every time you stood up) before we were able to pull into a somewhat protected bay — Wide Bay off Double Point Island — for the night. It was a rolly anchorage but nothing like what we had experienced for that last 5 hours so Jill was able to prepare a nice meal (white bean and avocado salad with crispy garlic chips) which we enjoyed with a bottle of red gifted to us by Scarborough Marina as we were leaving.
After a really challenging day (nothing like jumping back into cruising with both feet!) we had originally planned to stay put for a day to relax and decompress. It’s amazing though how quickly you recover after a nice meal a decent night’s rest. The next day we were up by 7 AM and we wasted no time discussing our departure. We had two options: go back out into the open ocean and have 2 days rough days like we just had the day before or try to pass through the Great Sandy Strait which would take us between an Fraser Island and the mainland. The second option would get us out of the big seas into a protected straight relatively quickly but it did require us to pass through an area called the bar which, due to the narrow and shallow channel, could produce high breaking waves and was best approached at high tide. Fortunately, because of the known dangers of this pass, the Australian coast guard has a number to call so you could get information on the current conditions. When Zack contacted them, they gave him coordinates to guide our passage through the narrow area (keeping us well within an area where there would be sufficient water under our hull to accommodate our keel) as well as information on a website that reported real-time wave conditions at the bar. The day before the authorities were reporting 7 meter breaking waves — that’s equivalent to a 23 foot wall of water! — but, fortunately, that day the maximum wave height was reported at 4.5 meters. That’s still nearly 15 foot waves but having sailed though (and survived) seas equal to or greater than that after leaving Mooloolaba we decided to go for it. Better to “rip the band-aid off” and have one short, painful passage than possibly 2 days of unrelenting waves. So Zack calculated the time we needed to leave to hit the tides right and, again, we were off. It was only a ~16 nautical mile sail to the bar but with the currents running against us we knew it would take about 4 hours. As promised in everything we read, the sail through the bar was rough (though, again, not any worse than what we had encountered the day before) but when we got to the other side we were rewarded with the calm waters of Elbow Point where we anchored for the night. Jill made another Che Figata crew favorite (cauliflower shawarma with spicy tahini dressing) and we enjoyed a bottle of one of our “go to” affordable Central Otago (NZ) Pinot Noirs (Roaring Meg) while savoring in the absence of rocking!
We wish we could say that our first few days back cruising were marked only by the rough ocean conditions but, unfortunately, that was not the case. We experience mechanical malfunctions as well. Our inverter (that converts 12 volt DC to 110 volt AC which we used for most of our appliances) started cutting out. The first time it happened we didn’t think much about it but it started happening more frequently on our trip and, after several YouTube tutorials, we determined that our 11 year old inverter was just simply starting to die. We also notice a small leak in the port window in our salon — there is nothing like having your boat heeled over so far that the port is partially submerged to find a leak — and that our sink drain pump didn’t seem to be working (despite the fact that we had it replaced before we took off as part of our routine maintenance). The pièce de résistance though was our inoperable electric furler. Our electric furler furls and unfurls our genoa sail so we were effectively without a headsail — somewhat important in following seas. Zack reset the breaker and that initially seemed to do the trick but when we went to unfurl it the following day it would not budge. So we were slowly collecting a list of repairs, some of which could wait until we arrived in Darwin and some that needed attention sooner rather than later.
But wait, that’s not all — yes, there is more! Aside from the issues that would definitely require repairs, we had one other malfunction. Our engine quit suddenly while motoring to Great Sandy Straight. Given the experience we have had with our engine at this point it sounded like we simply had an empty fuel tank. (Yes, in the past, we had on occasion inadvertently let a fuel tank run dry.) Of course, we knew the tank in use was not empty so we believed that the stoppage was caused by a blockage in one of the pipes leading from that fuel tank. That would mimic an empty tank. Zack changed fuel tanks and that quickly resolved the issue. As we always say, when crossing oceans on a sailboat the sailing is the easy part. This system stuff is the real challenge but we have both learned so much after living on our boat for 5 years that we can trouble shoot and correct many of the mechanical issues we encounter. Still it’s frustrating, especially after all the repairs and preventative maintenance we did while Che Figata was in Brisbane. We had to remind ourselves that this was really our “shakedown” cruise after a long hiatus with many people mucking around in the bowels of our boat comprised of a labyrinth of wires and piping. Something is bound to get hit causing any number of problems. A particularly violent shakedown cruise only amplified the opportunity for boat stuff to break.
But we digress! After our lovely evening anchored in Elbow Point we continued our sail (well, motor — remember, we have no genoa sail) north through Great Sandy Strait, heading to North White Cliffs. There was nothing particularly remarkable about this anchorage. The most notable part of our overnight in Whitecliff Bay was its calm waters and the delicious Harissa & White Bean Chili Jill prepared and served for dinner from a new recipe she found in the NYT cooking app. It was a definite winner and will be added to the passage making rotation! (Though we should add that the cliffs that ran along the shoreline were actually white in places — and quite stunning — courtesy of a combination of opal mining and unique geological formations in the area that produce a white shale). The main reason to stop there was to simply break up the trip from Elbow Point to our next major destination, Bunderberg Port Marina. With our growing list of boat projects we wanted 2 nights at a marina (with a chandlery) to do some trouble shooting and repair those things that we might able to address on our own. Our highest priority was the electric furler but we also hoped to remedy the blockage that was giving our sink drain pump anemia. (After a week at sea we were also looking forward to a light grocery shop and access to the marina’s proper washer and dryers. They are definitely a big improvement over our small combined washer/dryer unit that washes fine but the dryer function, well, not so much.).
From White Cliff Bay it was approximately 54 nautical miles to Bunderberg Port Marina. We wanted to get in early afternoon so we could begin tackling our to do list. To ensure our early arrival we were up and going at first light. The winds were pretty steady from the S/SE at 20-25 knots but the seas were moderate and we were able to maintain a consistent speed of 7 knots. That allowed us to arrive at the marina by 2 PM, giving us a day and a half to get our chores done (shopping, cleaning and laundry) and, hopefully and importantly, fix stuff!
What a productive and successful 40 hours. Though we did get hit with a torrential downpour during our walk to the local IGA grocery store, overall, the cruising gods shined down on us favorably. We were able to check all our boxes and Zack “MacGyver” Hummel fixed both the electric furler and the sink drain pump. The furler was pretty straight forward. All our bouncing after leaving Mooloolaba loosened the wire connections. Zack not only tightened the wires but he also secured the box the houses them so that it would not be tossed about as violently in high seas. The sink drain pump, on the other hand, took some ingenuity. After a number of diagnostic steps, Zack had determined that the sink drain pump and float switch were working fine. The most likely cause of the failure was a blockage somewhere in the water pipe that runs from the bilge in the middle of our salon across the boat and forward to the port side of our boat near our navigation station. (That covers a lot of pipe real estate.) He first tried blasting out the blockage with water hose on at full power. He did this on the outside of the boat by spraying water into the through hole where the water is supposed to exit and also on the interior by spraying water into the beginning of the pipe that attaches to the pump. Though Zack got a great shower out of the process it didn’t seem to loosen whatever was lodged in the pipe. At that point we both decided we needed something akin to a snake like plumbers use: but where could we get something like that long enough to go through the entire pipe? We thought we might find something we could use at the marina’s chandlery but we had no luck there. We both kept wracking our brains — surely with all the parts and pieces we had in the boat we had something that would work. Then Zack remembered that long, long ago he had saved a cable that was removed from our previous boat (Shadowfax) during a rudder repair. It was a very random thing to save for about 10 years — and somewhat miraculous that Zack not only remembered he saved it but also where he had put it — but it was the perfect tool for the job. Zack inserted the cable and, after a precisely calculated number of wiggles 😀, he re-tried to spray the hose at the beginning of the pipe while Jill watched the exit through hole for signs of life. After some promising gurgles, water streamed out the through hole like a fountain! You haven’t experienced pure joy until you have used your creative powers to successfully resolve a mechanical failure on your boat.
Our stay at Bundaberg Port Marina was defined primarily by our task list and accomplishments. (Though we would be remiss if we didn’t mention our delightful dinner at the decidedly local restaurant, the Lighthouse. The food was good and the hospitality excellent.) We left Bundaberg on May 8 feeling good even though we still had our inverter issue to deal with. Continuing our fast paced trip north, our next goal was to reach Gladstone Marina on May 10. The passage there would take 2 days. Day 1 entailed a long 10 hour sail to Rodds Harbor so it was another early departure. Day 2 was an easy 3.5 hour sail to Gladstone. Our electric furler worked like a charm both days allowing us to take advantage of the following winds and do some motor sailing. We had 2 uneventful day sails (yay!) which we coupled with a wonderful on board dining experience during the night in between. Jill prepared a penne pasta primavera loaded with onions, zucchini, mushrooms, red pepper, diced tomatoes and garlic and paired that with the NYT vegan Caesar salad recipe complete with home made garlic croutons and crispy seasoned chickpeas. A Sauvignon Blanc with grapefruit notes washed it all down beautifully. Sailing life is back to being good!
Gladstone Marina turned out to be a gem! Gracious and incredibly competent staff, beautiful immaculate and modern facilities (with the lovely touch of light classical music and jazz softly wafting in the background in the toilets and showers) and a location surrounded by a curated park (allowing for lots of good walking) but not too far from restaurants, shops and groceries. Our own little oasis. We had planned to spend just one night but we extended another evening because the weather prediction for our original departure day forecasted steady winds at 30 knots with gusts up to 40 knots. The last time we left a marina in those conditions it didn’t work out so well for us 😀 so we decided to wait a day when the forecast was had the winds in the more manageable 20-25 knot range. Still strong but much better and nothing we couldn’t handle.
Staying that extra day ended up to be a proverbial blessing in disguise. We used the extra day to do some boat chores which included doing a load of laundry. While in the laundry room, Jill struck up a conversation with a young dad (his adorable 5 year old daughter in tow). They talked sail talk — when are you leaving, where are you headed, what route are you taking to get there, etc. The usual stuff. Jill learned that this fellow who sailed SV Tandanya (of course they exchanged boat names but not given names — so typical!) was planning on leaving the next day headed towards Keppel Bay Marina (our destination) via the “Narrows.” The Narrows is a very narrow and shallow strait that separates the mainland from a barrier island, Curtis Island. When we say shallow, we mean shallow. In low tide there is no water in the strait. It is so dry that it in years past it was used as a cattle crossing and the corral fencing leading down to the dry strait from Curtis Island and up from the strait on the mainland are still present! Jill responded that we were headed there too but that we planned to take an alternative (longer and more exposed) route because we didn’t think our 2 meter keel could successfully cross the Narrows even at high tide. Tandanya immediately responded that his keel is also 2 meters. Hummm?
So Jill reported that laundry room conversation to Zack and we decided to take a second look at that route. That included getting input from the ever so helpful marina office manager, Grahame, who also happened to be a very experienced sailor. He was very reassuring about our ability to take the Narrows route. His combination of local knowledge and experience and the additional source materials he was able to share gave us the confidence that we could do this. It meant departing at 5:45 AM the next morning to ensure we got to the entrance to the Narrows at high tide but it would be worth it. It would provide us with a much calmer sail in protected waters and a passage that was 2-3 hours shorter. As Zack likes to say “winner, winner, chicken dinner.” And, aside from those benefits, the trip through the Narrows is really not to be missed if you can manage it. The trip takes you through a dense mangrove forest with the water up to the tree tops during high tide. It was like sailing on a magic carpet along a forest canopy with the mangroves close enough to touch in places. Totally unreal and delightful!
One funny tangent on our stay at Gladstone. Apparently, we were both suffering from PTSD after our experience at Mooloolaba. Before we arrived to Gladstone Marina we reminded the marina that our beam is 15 feet. We asked about the beam of the other boat in the slip to make sure we could enter the berth without making contact with the other vessel. Grahame could tell we were a little anxious so following our conversation, on his own (not at our behest), he moved us to a wider berth on the super yacht dock — the dock for the big boys. Even despite this, and excellent support from Grahame and 3 dockhands (they knew how to cleat lines!), the 20 knot winds push our heavy 30 ton boat over to our neighbor vessel and our fenders touched their hull. Our hulls didn’t touch so, of course, there was no damage. Still, we thought “does this mean we’ve had a collision?,” “Do we need to report this to the marina office?,” “Will we have another 2 incident report forms to complete?,” etc. Not wanting to take any chances, Jill reported the incident to the marina office when we checked in. There was a blank stare from the lovely receptionist like Jill was leaving out some important “and.” After a while the receptionist simply said, “so your fender touched their hull and there was no damage?” “Correct” Jill responded. The woman smiled and said “that’s what fenders are for” and, without skipping a beat, she proceeded to finish the check in paper work. And that was that! What a different experience. Even if the marina had no other redeeming features (which was NOT the case) we decided Gladstone Marina was a pretty awesome place.
After our passage through the Narrows, and then further North along the coast, we arrived at Keppel Bay Marina early afternoon. Even after stalling outside the harbor a bit to wait for the tides to rise we arrive early enough to get settled, check in at the marina office and shower. A nice Mother’s Day dinner at the marina’s restaurant capped our day. Our plan following Keppel Bay Marina was to get to Mackay. It would take us three long days to get there. We were pushing ourselves though because Mackay is the gateway to the Whitsundays and the Great Barrier Reef, some of the most incredible places on the planet. When we reached Mackay we would have covered just under 700 nautical miles in the 2 weeks since we left Brisbane. Our “plan” was to slow down when we arrived in Mackay to enjoy the 350 nautical miles, comprised of beautiful islands and reefs, between Mackay and Cairns over the course of the next month. In other words we would cover half the area in twice the amount of time. The point is that the hustle to Mackay would be worth it. [Spoiler alert: the “plan” didn’t quite work out as expected as our intended brief stay in Mackay lasted 2 weeks. Keep reading . . . .]
Day 1 of our marathon 3 day sail took us from Kappeli Bay Marina to Pearly Bay, about 49 nautical miles — the shortest of our 3 days. We had steady winds in the 20 knot range for the SE allowing giving us enough wind from the right direction to fully power Che Figata — no engine assist required. Though it was a lumpy day at sea (we shared videos with our families just to remind them we are a bit nutty), we enjoyed sailing along in relative quiet with only the soothing sounds of the waves swooshing around our boat. We made great time and arrived at a beautiful anchorage (2 bays separated by a long sandy beach) at around 3:30 PM.
If you read the subtitle of this blog entry you are probably wondering by about now (if not sooner) when we are going to get to the “rocky” part. If you have stick with us this far you are about to be rewarded for your commitment because, as it always seems to be the case, it was the end of a perfect sailing day that things (including our boat) went sideways quickly. We had just taken our sails down and were very slowly motoring into the anchorage. Zack was at the helm and Jill was at the bow getting ready to deploy the anchor. We were debating the perfect spot to anchor when we both felt something under our keel — it felt akin to that feeling you get when you are driving along a smooth blacktop road that suddenly transitions to gravel. In other words, there was no defining “bang” per se but rather the feeling like our boat was being raked over something hard and rough. We initially hoped we had just grazed over a lone underwater outcrop. Unfortunately, as we moved along (our heavy boat doesn’t have brakes and doesn’t stop on a dime), it quickly became evident that we were in a patch of the ocean where the depth was not quite deep enough at low tide to accommodate our 6’4” keel. This spot was not marked with these insufficient depths on the chart displayed on our chart plotter through this area was highlighted on a separate chart, Navionics, Zack keeps on his iPad. Zack keeps the Navionics chart up when navigating into an anchorage and generally keeps on eye on both. As he was navigating, and focused on our communal debate about where to anchor, he simply misjudged where that raised rocky seabed was causing us to end up in the middle of it. An important editorial note by Jill: though Zack hit a stray rock once in the Long Island Sound when we were very new to sailing in that area many, many years ago, this was the first time in the nearly 20 years that we have been sailing together that he has done anything remotely like this. Not even close. He beat himself up about it while I felt bad for not being a better first mate, being that important second set of eyes as we navigated the area. (We do get points for pointing our fingers at ourselves and not at each other.) The irony that we had successfully navigated both the bar and the Narrows — tricky skinny water areas which required precision navigation — without incident but, in essence, beached ourselves in a fairly benign bay was not lost on us!
At any rate, being on the rocks with our boat’s waterline partially out of the water allowed Che Figata to really teeter from side to side as we were hit by waves from the swell and we couldn’t move forward or backwards to do anything about it. It was like we were captives up on a stand. A trophy for the triumphant sea gods! Our biggest concern was that with the sideways motion, or the current pushing us back into the rocks, we would destroy our rudder and we’d be in serious trouble. No rudder would mean no ability to navigate, with wind or motor. At this point, our only option was to wait for the tide to rise while Zack tried to protect our rudder by keeping Che Figata steady with our engine, preventing her from being pushed backwards. There was really nothing Jill could do to help so we both agree she should go below deck and start her dinner prep. Of course, the sounds of our boat scraping on the rocks was amplified in our galley and every scruff sounded like nails on a chalk board. Finally, after what seemed like hours — but in reality was only 30-45 minutes — we were free. The combination of the rising tides and Zack’s persistence at the helm eventually gave us just enough space between our hull and the rocks to move forward out of the area. In all the years we have sailed together this definitely makes the top 3 for stressful situations. Though we don’t get high marks for getting ourself into that mess, we do give ourselves credit for remaining calm, focused and good partners to one another. And, even in the face of something that could be fairly catastrophic, we had a welcomed moment of levity. That was when, in the middle of the debacle, we were hailed by an Italian boat anchored in the same bay. We thought that, perhaps, the crew could see that there was something wrong and were calling us to see if we needed assistance. Nope. They saw on AIS that our boat was named Che Figata — which you all know is Italian slang for “totally awesome” — and they were just hailing us to commend our boat name choice. Of course, the captain of this vessel (SV Kidnapper), with his thick and classic Italian accent, started the conversation by asking how our day was going. When we informed him that it was not going particularly well since we were stuck on the rocks, the captain gave us a well articulated two word response in perfect English: “Oh Shit”!!!! Just not what we were anticipating out of the mouth of an Italian. Though he was clearly right — it was a distinctly “oh sh*&!” moment — we did get a good chuckle by his spot on but unexpected pronouncement.
It was not an entirely pleasant evening on Che Figata. To start with, the anchorage was very rolly. Not great for sleep. But the real issue is that we were both incredibly anxious. Once we were released from the rocks’ grasp, we only motored a short (but safe) distance away from the shallow waters to anchor. With adrenaline pumping through our system, neither of us had the wherewithal to motor around to really test our rudder. It seemed to be working fine but was it really? We wouldn’t know until the next morning when we took off for day 2 of the 3 day sail to Mackay. This unspoken fear (combined with the less than gentle rocking) kept us both up most of the night. There was one bright spot in this otherwise somewhat somber evening. Once again we used food as therapy. Jill made black bean and veggie burritos topped with house made salsa, a cilantro and lime crema and fresh avocado. It was an indulgent but delicious gastronomic pleasure which was much needed after a really stressful situation.
Not able to sleep, we were up bright an early the next morning and got underway by 7 AM for day 2 of the sail to Mackay. Fortunately, everything worked well. 🙏 That didn’t mean there was no damage to our rudder (we’d need our boat hauled in Mackay to check things out) but there was nothing — other than some additional self-inflected wound — that would prevent us from getting to Mackay. Much to our glee, Day 2 of the sail to Mackay generally went well. We were headed to West Bay on Middle Island in the Percy Islands. The wind was directly behind us all the way so we motor sailed but we made a great time and were anchored by 2 PM. It was wonderful to get an early reprieve — with the knowledge that everything was working — after the drama of the day before. Beside, it gave us an opportunity to do another boat project. (Oh joy!) In the litany of failing mechanics and clogged piping that we mentioned above, we didn’t write about our main chart plotter — the one connected to our helm. It was an old unit — it was commissioned with the boat in 2014 — and it was starting to get balky. It was slow to load when we turned on the unit and it would freeze intermittently, and always (it seemed) when we were entering a bay and really needed it. We thought the issue was a data overload so we removed some data (e.g., our prior tracks) from the system and the performance did improve but that didn’t fix the problem entirely. Fortunately, we (believed) we had a solution. We had an identical chart plotter in our salon below deck at the nav station. We never used that unit so though it was the same vintage as the one on deck, it had much less wear and tear. We took advantage of the early arrival to swap out the systems. We would be keeping our fingers crossed that this would do the trick but, if not, we’d have ample opportunity to find that out during our sail to Darwin and could get a new chart plotter there. In the meantime, we also had a third, and relatively new, chart plotter that we had installed above our companionway. We primarily used that chart plotter during overnight passages when we want to be sitting down. (It is always Jill’s chart plotter of choice!) We can steer the boat using the autopilot adjustments on the chart plotter so we were okay testing our workaround. We had everything we needed to navigate.
With the chart plotter exchange executed, we had a few hours to enjoy the beauty of the bay — we were anchored off a stunning sandy beach liberally sprinkled with palm trees in clear sky blue water. As if on clue, the local dolphin constabulary came to greet us as soon as we settled in to relax. Spending the night anchored in a gorgeous bay is a great antidote for whatever ails you — these “ahhhh” moments literally melt the tension away. (Another great dinner and Jill’s killer G&Ts helped as well!)
With another long day ahead of us to get to Mackay (our 3rd and final day!), we were up and out of the anchorage early. Unfortunately, as we were getting ready to leave another plague descended upon us. Our inverter that had started conking out with heavy loads totally died while using our coffee machine and could not be resuscitated. Fortunately, both our refrigerators and freezers as well as our propane oven and stove top work off DC power so they were not affected but no inverter meant no microwave, blow dryer, toaster, induction plate or, gasp, coffee maker. (Thankfully, we also had a redundant inverter which we could use for charging devices — and, importantly, to plug in our Starlink — but it was installed only as backup to keep our communication systems running and did not have the capacity for our voltage hungry appliances.) Of course, while sailing up the Queensland coast we had been trouble shooting the issue with electricians in Airlie Beach (about 10 days away) and Darwin (about 7 weeks away) but with the inverted totally incapacitated (depriving the crew of caffeine) the inverter issue became more urgent! We should clarify here that there was no shortage of qualified electricians to install a new system. The issue was that we needed a 120 volt system which is distinctly American. Much of the rest of the world — including Europe and Australia — use a 240 volt system. They means that most inverter distributors in Australia do not carry 120 volt systems because there simply isn’t much demand for them in this part of the world. We could get a system shipped from the USA but that would take a minimum of 6-8 weeks. Ugh! But just when you think that you must have been an ax murderer in your prior life because nothing is going your way, Zack gets an email from the Darwin marine electrician that he located a 120 volt inverter — apparently the only one in Australia — just south of Brisbane. We could have that system in a matter of days. With this development we reached out to the Airlie Beach marine electricians to ask them to order the unit. Airlie Beach is not far from Mackay and we could hasten our sail there. While that would mean sailing past the small uninhabited islands just north of Mackay we had planned to anchor off of, Airlie beach is a lovely coastal resort town in a the Whitsundays — there are worst places to visit. 😀 So we had a new plan, or so we thought.
We had a really nice motor sail to Mackay and arrived at the marina by 3:30 PM. As you head up the coast the water gets progressively bluer and the sandy beaches more expansive. And, as we approached Mackay, we got to have some fun. Mackay is a busy international shipping port. As large freighters wait for dockage space to load and unload their cargo, they anchor in crowded shipping lanes just outside the entrance to the marina. This required us to snake through these large ships — sort of like threading a needle. Jill, who loved navigating around the lobster pots in Maine, had great fun at the helm!
We were thrilled to make it to Mackay without incident and with our rudder working! Still, as a precaution following our close encounter with rocks in Pearl Bay, we arranged for Che Figata to get hauled at the Mackay Marina shipyard the morning after our arrival, Thursday, May 15. We will cut to the chase and say that we were very lucky! As we thought, we really just scraped the bottom of our keel. There was absolutely no structural damage to our keel or rudder and we could have lowered Che Figata back in the water and been on our way. There was, of course, superficial damage and we didn’t feel right ignoring it. Unfortunately, on such short notice, the shipyard didn’t have jack stands available to secure our boat up on the hard and, of course, our boat had to be up on the hard to effectuate bottom touch ups (e.g., sanding and repainting). The soonest the shipyard could have jack stands ready for us would be Wednesday the following week. We had planned to high tail it to Airlie Beach for our inverter installation and arrive there that day. We would have to push back the inverter work if we wanted to proceed with the bottom repair work in Mackay. We were beginning to think that we would be spending all of our time in the Whitsundays at shipyards. But then we had an epiphany. The good folks at Airlie Marine Electronics had rush ordered our new inverter. Airlie Beach was only a 2 hour drive from Mackay by car. If the inverter arrived by Tuesday or Wednesday they could have it couriered to us and the Mackay shipyard could install it. That would mean that we wouldn’t lose anymore time than we originally expected to lose due to the inverter issue (famous last words — more on that below) and we could enjoy some of the islands just north of Mackay without having to sail directly to Airlie Beach. The electricians at Airlie Marine Electronics were incredibly understanding and readily agreed to courier the inverter to us. (Well, we will spare you all the details but there was some drama there too because that seems to be a theme with us. Longish story short, the good folks at Airlie Marine missed our email with the delivery instructions so they didn’t courier the inverter as promised. Fortunately, we figured that out early enough on the day of the expected arrival to contact them. Though it caused a bit of a scramble for us as we quickly developed a contingency plan, they acknowledged their error and had someone drive it to us the next morning. It arrived just before 9 AM the next day which allowed us to meet the very narrow window of time given to us for installation by the local marine electrician. Phew again!)
Still, after a litany of failures and mishaps we had to acknowledge that we were extremely fortunate: as mentioned above, we hadn’t done any real damage to our boat (phew!) and, with the assistance of industrious electricians, we had located and purchased the only 120 volt inverter in all of Australia. By the way, when we say that we purchased the only 120 volt inverter in Australia this is not hyperbole. The Darwin electrician who had originally located it for us gave a heads up to the Australian distributor that he had clients that wanted that unit and he gave us the contact information for the distributor so we could purchase it directly. We never contacted the distributor though because we gave that information to the Airlie Beach electricians who ordered the unit for us. Unbeknownst to us, the Darwin electrician gave our contact information to the distributor as well. After the Airlie Beach electricians ordered the unit we received an apologetic email from the distributor that the unit we wanted was just purchased and that they would not be getting in any other 120 volt units given the lack of demand for 120 volt inverters in Australia.
In the end, everything took longer than expected so we didn’t gain the time back that we had hoped. The shipyard got backed up and didn’t haul out out boat until a day later than promised — Thursday rather than Wednesday. One day may not sound like a big deal but the one day delay meant that the bottom work couldn’t be compete before the weekend. That, of course, added another 2 days to our time in the shipyard. Then we had to get on the schedule to get launched and the shipyard was backup there too. The first opening they had was the following Wednesday — the two week anniversary of our arrival to Mackay — adding another few days. And, in the end, that didn’t really mater because the repairs took longer than expected and we weren’t ready to get splashed until Friday morning. (A full week after we were hauled.) Ugh. But the repairs to our bottom were beautifully executed and our dead inverter/charger was successfully replaced with the new unit. (The good folks in the shipyard also resolved our fuel tank blockage issue.) As we put the final touches on this blog entry we have just been re-launched, gotten fuel and are finally on our way. It will be a highly condensed sail through the Whitsundays but we remain grateful that we now have a functioning inverter and, as we have already mentioned several times, that the damage to our keel was superficial. For an unlucky situation we can’t stress enough how lucky we were! (We are coining a new phrase “Lucky in unluck.” There’s got to be a song in there somewhere.)
And don’t despair. Once we realized that we’d have to settle in at the marina for a while we took a deep breath and figured out how to spend our “bonus” days in Mackay. When you are cruisers you’ve gotta make lemonade out of lemons or, as the crew of Che Figata likes to say, make Gin & Tonics out of quinine! The marina had a “rent a wreck” program — for $26 USD we could have a car for 1/2 day and for $40 USD we had the car for a full day — which allowed us to plan some excursions. One day we drove about 1 1/2 hours hours into the interior to Eungella National Park. While there we hiked along Finch Hatton Gorge which takes you through a dense rainforest to a vast landscape of waterfalls, lush flora and volcanic boulder formations. (Just getting to the gorge was part of the adventure as we had to drive (slowly) across 4 streams and rivers to reach the trailhead.) We also hiked to the Sky Window Lookout which provided breathtaking panoramic views of the Pioneer Valley and the steep, rugged northern wall which is a prominent feature of the landscape.
Another day we drove north up the coast for about an hour to Cape Hillsborough. There we walked along the beautiful expansive beach — blue ocean sprinkled with a just a few small islands if we looked to our left and lush forest with large rock formations (replete with fossils) if we looked to our right. We timed our visit to coincide with low tide which allowed us to cross the natural causeway to Wedge Island, providing us with a lovely view of the beach we had transversed from the ocean. It felt almost as if we were on our sailboat! (We earned the right to pretend.) Rather than return to our car by retracing our steps along the beach we followed the trail that ascended up into the forest. In addition getting a great workout, we were treated to magnificent views of the beach and surrounding sea which was spotted with local sea turtles enjoying the water. Two final excursion took us to the Bluewater Trail and the Bucasia Beach loop track. The Bluewater Trail is a 20-kilometer shared pedestrian and bicycle pathway that winds around the Pioneer River, connecting several key Mackay attractions and landmarks. We didn’t walk the entire loop but we hiked the 5.5 mile portion that took us through the Mackay Regional Botanic Gardens, the Bluewater Lagoon, the Bluewater Quay and a public art installation. Not the most picturesque walk but it was a nice way to spend the better part of a Sunday and explore the metropolitan Mackay area. The Bucasia Beach loop track gave us another long walk along a deserted beach followed by a stroll through a park.
But, as noted, now we are finally on our way. Our first stop will be Goldsmith Island, on of the many beautiful islands north of Mackay. We will write about our experiences there as well as our sail through the Whitsundays in our next blog entry which we plan to publish in 2-3 weeks after we arrive in Cairns. And, in case you were all wondering, despite the challenges of the first sail following our hiatus — the last 4 weeks were a doozy (and probably made for a very painful read!) — we remain very excited about our adventures yet to come. Our sense of humor has remained intact and, if there is truth to the expression that “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,” we are now invincible!
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