A family visit

Last week my daughter Sara, her husband Marcus and their three-year-old Matilda joined Mike and I for a week aboard Meander--and what a fantastic week it was. It did however get off to a somewhat shaky start when an hour before our visitors were due to arrive Mike discovered a bilge full of radiator coolant! It appeared one of the heat exchanger hoses had sprung a leak. Mike managed to replace it - which wasn’t an easy task on a Saturday afternoon in a small coastal town, but replace it he did, and albeit a few hours later than planned, we were on our way to anchor off Great Keppel Island to enjoy some swimming, snorkelling and general relaxing. The relaxing side of things was made much easier due to the fact that Mike had enclosed the rails around the boat with safety netting which turned it into a giant play pen for young Matilda!!

Matilda and
Grandpa Mike

Matilda and
Grandma

Note the
netting!

Sara Marcus and Matilda slipped into life aboard Meander very easily. Even when the weather changed and the gentle breeze turned to 30knt winds they weren’t perturbed. As the forecast was for three days of strong winds, we sailed the boat back to the safety of the marina, hopped aboard the ferry, and returned to the Island and rented a lovely rustic A-frame house until the winds subsided. As soon as things began to calm down, Mike and I returned to the marina and sailed the boat back to Great Keppel to retrieve Sara Marcus and Matilda.

We hiked through the bush around the Island one day, stopping off at some fabulous secluded beaches where Sara managed to gather (and eat!) some lovely fresh oysters. Other days Sara and Marcus did some snorkelling and fishing. Marcus and I also snorkelled and managed to see some beautiful fish, giant clams and a sting ray hiding on the bottom in the sand. Matilda thoroughly enjoyed the beaches and was quite content to play in the water and build sandcastles.

Matilda and
an octapus

All together

Putney beach

Hiding form
the sun

Marcus, Sara
and Matilda

Off on a
fishing trip

Off snorkelling

The week seemed to go quite slowly which we were all pleased about, but all too soon it was time to say goodbye: our intrepid travellers boarded a light aircraft to take them to Rockhampton in time for their flight to Brisbane then onto Darwin and home to Jabiru next day.

A friend of
Sara's on
Keppel Isalnd

Jo goes underwater

Since Dee’s departure from Meander Mike and I have been quite busy. The courtesy car from the Marina may only be taken as far as Yeppoon and as we needed to do quite a few chores so we decided to rent a car for the day and head into Rockhampton. We went to the dive shop just outside of the city where I bought a wet suit and some snorkelling gear. Mike bought me (as a wedding present) all the gear I need to do some scuba diving. Oh yes, I must mention, Mike and I are getting married on 16^th October. We have talked about it for some time and decided now was the right time to do it, mainly because we discovered that we needed to give one month and one day’s notice beforehand. We are not sure when we will be anywhere again for one month and a day, so now seemed like as good a time as any!!

We’ve been out at anchor around the islands of Great Keppel, mostly snorkelling….. how fantastic!!! Today we anchored off a reef and took the dinghy closer to the coral and snorkelled around. Mike has taught me to snorkel (which includes duck diving, something I have never been able to do before).[not to mention getting back into the boat in a somewhat more elegant manner than impersonating a beached whale! (Mike)] Excuse me!!!! After a couple of days of practice I can now dive down and look at the many fish and the beautiful coral. I even saw a turtle today as I was duck diving!!! I nearly drowned trying to get Mike’s attention so that he could see it too. I must remember to come to the surface next time before I start yelling and screaming and getting excited underwater.

Jo impersonating
a duck

Jo impersonating
a beached whale

Mike discovered that his dive computer had given up working, and on top of all this other dive gear, he sadly came to the realisation that he needed to buy a new one. Now he is busy working out how to use it – and, needless to say, I will be busy for the next decade trying to work out how to use all my stuff!!!

Of course I needed to try out my new dive gear. Mike took me for a shallow dive which I really loved (didn’t like the idea of hurling myself backwards off the boat though!!! But even that wasn’t as bad as I had anticipated) So… now I am in the process of undertaking a dive course and I am very excited at the prospect.

Jo the intrepid
diver!

My daughter Sara, her husband Marcus and their three-year-old Matilda are coming to join us on the boat next week. In anticipation of this visit, we are attempting to make Meander child friendly and adult stress free. Hopefully the weather will continue to be as glorious as it has been for the past two weeks and we can spend lots of time in the water and on the beautiful beaches around the Islands.

Great Keppel Island

We spent our time in Yeppoon maintaining the boat and also making excursions into Yeppoon and Rockhampton. The marina isn’t too bad but it is quite isolated. Fortunately they do have a courtesy car that we can book in advance and drive ourselves into Yeppoon to the local supermarket. This was particularly useful, as the winds kept blowing so strongly that we weren’t able to leave the marina… The courtesy car was also necessary, as we were expecting Jo’s friend Dee to stay with us for the week, and we needed to stock up with food and drink!

After a week on the boat, Dee left us today, and before she left, she was persuaded to write an entry for the blog. This is what she wrote.

I leave Mike and Jo today feeling refreshed and re-energised after what one could describe as a ‘real holiday’ shared with good friends. During the past week I have learned many things:

1. That a sundowner is a gin and tonic consumed while watching the sunset.

2. Mike is an extremely agile man who moves like lightning when asked for a sick bucket.

3.And that I must continue to keep buying tattslotto tickets so one day I may change my lifestyle to that of Mike and Jo!

I arrived last Sunday and spent my first night at Rosslyn Bay marina. The next morning we sailed to Svendsen’s beach on Great Keppel Island and anchored overlooking beautiful sandy beaches, going ashore to explore and sunbake. It was on this second night that I disgraced myself after sundowners on the rolling boat. As a result, I was made very comfortable in the cockpit and fell asleep under the stars. Thoughts flooded my mind as to how I was going to spend the next five nights aboard without offending my hosts!

Thankfully there was a wind shift the next day which reduced the swell and presented perfect conditions for the remainder of the week. The following day were off on an overland adventure to find Great Keppel Resort. Not knowing how far away this was, we packed water, chocolate, muesli bars, compass and other safety equipment. Jo went through the checklist before boarding the dinghy: water-check, food-check, camera-check, fuel in outboard-check. My senses were tingling as we boarded the dinghy and headed for the next beach, about 600 metres away. 500 meters from shore the outboard ran out of fuel!!!

I learned what a fabulous rower Mike is - Olympic standard – given that he had two people on board, battling headwinds, and how patient a man he is with two pack seat drivers full of helpful suggestions as to where he should go, and what he should do… The tank refilled from the boat, we made it to shore and set off into unknown territory, only to come across a ‘resort clad’ family with small children who informed us that just over the hill was the 4-star resort we were looking for.

The view from the top of the hill was magnificent: green/blue water, clean sandy beaches, neighbouring islands, and Meander floating at anchor in the midst of it all…The resort was pleasant, but the meals didn’t measure up to Jo’s cooking, and, as we walked back to the boat, thoughts of Jo’s chilli prawns came to mind…

The view across
Svendsen's beach

Svendsen’s beach was a great anchorage for SE winds, but when they moved to NE, it was time to move, so we headed back to the resort and anchored the boat off shore there for most of the rest of the week.. This was a very relaxing time, as we snorkelled, dined in the restaurants land, and lay around on the beach (we even sneaked a spa in the resort’s pool area: Jo).

The intrepid
snorkellers

Dee earning her
keep, polishing
the bell

Thank you so much, Mike and Jo, for the special memories I hold of our time together.

And now Jo:

Dee took us out for dinner at the resort restaurant one eveining where we drank Domaine Chandon and ate from the buffet. We did lots and lots of laughing…which we had done the whole time she was here.

Dee was our first live aboard visitor since our departure from Geelong and what a pleasure it was to have her onboard. We weren’t sure how it would go but we set up the spare cabin (previously being used as our storage area) and she plus her belongings fitted in really well. I was amazed that she only brought a small over night bag for a whole week but it was like a scene from Mary Poppins every day there would be a new outfit appearing from this tiny receptacle.

Yesterday as a grand finale we did a circumnavigation of Great Keppel, stopping off at a reef where Dee and I snorkelled, while Mike followed us around in the dinghy. This afternoon Dee flew off from the island, but not before persuading the pilot to make a pass over the anchorage so that she could take pictures of Meander.

A fantastic week was had by all and now we are looking forward to our next lot of visitors (but they will have a lot to live up to!!)

Yeppoon - Rosslyn Bay Marina

Our friends on Bardoo (Robert and Robyn) were already at anchor off Big Woody Island when we approached. They were off our Port side just off the beach. We headed over to join them but it wasn’t as easy as it looked after checking the GPS. We had to actually sail quite a way past them then turn to the shore and head back the way we had come as there was a long sand bar to pass before we could head in. Once safely at anchor our travelling companions turned up in their dinghy (which is slightly bigger than ours) and offered us a ride over to the beach. We had a lovely long walk along the shore which we thought was deserted until we came upon a few people just strolling around or sunbaking. However we did feel a bit out of place as everyone else was naked.

Next morning after consulting the weather and deciding we would head off to Bundaberg we left with a reefed main and full Genoa, and had a wonderful sail – with 25 knot following winds pushing us along at a cracking pace – we even beat the 52-foot Bardoo to Bundaberg!

It was one of the best sails of the trip and we all enjoyed it immensley. It was Robyns birthday and we were invited out with them for a meal on shore at the marina. We had a very lovely time talking and listening to the many fascinating tales of Bardoo on her world circumnavigation. I don’t know if Mike and I will get that far but our interest in going further afield has certainly been aroused!!

Jo

The following day we left Bardoo in Bundaberg and headed for Pancake Creek, a narrow inlet just south of Gladstone. What we didn’t realise was that this was to be a 71 NM trip, the last hour of which was in the dark.

Entering a narrow creek in the dark, with no lit buoys and knowing that there was little room under our keel was not a very pleasant experience. Add to this the knowledge that the tidal flows up and down the creek were reputed to be very strong and the bottom was not that good for holding anchors, meant that it was perhaps the most fraught hour of the whole trip so far (not counting, of course, the entry into Eden!).

Still we anchored safely, and settled down for a couple of easy days in this picturesque spot… That is, until the next morning, when we downloaded the weather forecast from our trusty CDMA modem. The forecast was for a day of almost no wind- great for staying at anchor, but this was followed by three days of 30knot winds! The prospect of a long day’s sail in strong winds and mounting seas was hardly a pleasant one, so up came the anchor and away we went.

While 30 knots were forecast for the following day, 10 knots were forecast for the day of our departure… so we knew it was going to be a long day on the motor to Yeppoon, our destination. But what we didn’t know was that, apart from the great distance we would need to cover across ground, we would also need to fight a current of up to two and a half knots. Result was that that day we did 87 nautical miles through the water, and only got to the Rosslyn Bay Marina off Yeppoon at 8.00 in the night.

The trip was quite eventful, though.

This was our first success with trolling a line behind the boat. We actually caught a 1m long wahoo, a fish like a mackerel, but with a beak. It was quite a fight pulling the line in hand over hand while the boat sped along, and we actually got it beside the boat, but we had no means of landing it – so the line broke and the fish got away. Wahoo is reputedly excellent eating… Needless to say, the top of our shopping list here in Yeppoon, was a gaff and a decent landing net!

The second event was the arrival of a cormorant, which first sat on the bimini and then moved to the dinghy on the back of the cockpit. It sat there for about half an hour, repeatedly tucking its head under a wing for a doze, and then looking around as if it owned the place. It finally flew off, showing an interest in the lure on the end of our fishing line as it went, but thankfully only a passing one.

We got into Yeppoon late at night, and wandered around in the boat with a hand-held spotlight, trying to find the berth we had been allocated.

Rosslyn Bay Marina

We were followed several hours later by Gary and Lorraine and their guests Tony and Jen on Somoya, who had been anchored off Great Keppel Island, but who were unwilling to spend a rollly night off shore when the marina was so close.

Gary and
Lorraine with
Tony and Jen

The next day the winds came in - and they’ve been in ever since, howling away day and night, making exploring the numerous islands around here all but impossible. We’ve had to resort to heavy drinking aboard Somoya… again…

Mike

Waves are
breaking even
in the marina!

Fraser Island

It’s now more than a week since our last entry and quite a lot has happened (or not happened as the case may be!!).

Our attempt to leave Mooloolaba was aborted at the eleventh hour due mainly to the fact that the swells were over two meters high and forecast to continue throughout the night and next day. This meant potentially a very lumpy sail to the much feared Wide Bay Bar then an impossible crossing once there. The forecast for the rest of the week didn’t look any more promising, so it was a ‘wait and see’ situation - which we are now quite used to and not at all perturbed by.

Mike suggested I go back to Melbourne and spend time giving Adam and Emma a hand for a few days. He didn’t need to say it twice, I was on the net, had booked a flight and was at the airport all within a few hours of him making the suggestion. Mike spent the time I was away chatting to people around the marina and getting lots of tips from the more experienced cruisers. He also bought a bicycle (a K-Mart special) and in between torrential downpours he went cycling around the town and, of course, visited Andrew and Marie.

After a very very busy week in Melbourne I arrived back in Mooloolaba on Monday evening to be told that we were to set sail at 0500hrs the next morning - destination, the dreaded Wide Bay Bar, gateway to the inner passage past Fraser Island.

Mike had arranged to sail in company with another couple who have a lovely old (33 years old to be exact) 52 foot Ketch ( ok Ben what’s a Ketch? If you get it wrong it’s brussel sprouts for dinner next time you come on board) which they have sailed all around the world for 16 years. They are heading to Bundaberg then across to Solomon Islands (as you do), so we arranged to go as far as Bundaberg together.

The technical term for the state of the seas coming up from Mooloolaba to Double Island Point, just south of the Bar, was ‘sloppy’ – this meant that the boat was rolling about in a succession of short 1.5 meter waves, making it quite impossible to relax. What was good about the trip, however, was that the wind was coming from behind, so we sailed (yes, sailed!) for the entire day with only the foresail up, making well over seven knots!

Once we passed Double Island Point and turned into Wide Bay the seas calmed down considerably, and our sailing became much more sedate..

Mike put the two Wide Bay Bar waypoints into the chart plotter. These are the GPS co- ordinates that tell you where you should start your transit of the bar and where to turn once you have crossed it. We reached our first waypoint, informed the Coastguard we were crossing (very dramatic), and then headed cautiously for the infamous breakers and the second waypoint, where we were to make a left turn. However, by this time the sea had become so calm that the breakers were nowhere to be seen. We only realised we had gone across the bar when Mike noticed that we had passed the second waypoint and were heading for the beach!

A few swift changes of course, and we were all clear, heading up the channel to Tin Can Bay, making for Gary’s anchorage, where we spent a very calm night.

We planned to leave early next morning to arrive at a very shallow part of the channel just before high tide. It was a long slow motor with Mike downstairs at the computer and me upstairs at the helm following his directions, but we managed to navigate through the sand banks without incident.

A new way to
give the
helmsman
directions!

We got through the shallowest part using not only the GPS and all of our relevant available printed matter including Alan Lucas’s Cruising the Queensland Coast book to aid us. Imagine our surprise, when, right in the midst of these shallows, we passed a familiar-looking yacht coming the other way - there on board waving vigorously at us was none other than the Man himself, Alan Lucas, aboard his yacht Soleares. Mike said it was a bit like meeting God!! (how blasphemous).

The Fraser Island
shoreline

Tonight we sit at anchor off Big Woody Island, waiting to brave the open spaces of Hervey Bay, on the way to Bundaberg, forty miles distant. More later…