Wild
weather blew us out of the Percy Islands and continued to dictate our
destination passages. The seas were very
rough with huge swells, rogue waves and winds up to 25 knots. It was about this time that we got
communication of the Trawler sinking off 1770 and the loss of 6 young seaman.
Such a tragedy that shook us to the core as we negotiated huge seas to get to
safe waters.
Reminding us that the sea has a power that can never be underestimated
no matter how good your seamanship or how well your vessel is equipped.
My
blogs I write of wonderful scenery and great experiences to those who are interested
in our adventures but the reality is that it’s not always Cocktails at sunsets,
fishing and relaxing. Indeed our yachts
name Sens de la Vie(the meaning of Life) has given Terry and I much dialogue of
discussion.
“what
the hell are we doing owning a yacht and sailing around in this big ocean, we
must be crazy”
It
ends with us both agreeing we are a bit crazy but we kind of like it that way.
It
takes hard work being constantly vigilant
for our safety, charts, plotting, weather, tides, sail trimming, anchoring and
passage planning as well as maintaining the safety and working order of the
yacht to get us to our destinations.
Certainly,
the good days sailing out weigh the bad and I am convinced that life is best
enjoyed by understanding and accepting the bad days and rejoice in the good
days.
You
need to experience all the ups and downs……………..that’s Life.
It’s
like this…………………Metaphorically speaking. If you witness a beautiful sunset over
the ocean you are amazed and in awe, the next day another beautiful sunset and
its wonderful, the next day another beautiful sunset, great and this goes on
for the whole week by which time the glorious sunset you witness gets a casual
“oh that’s nice”. Having beautiful
sunsets everyday becomes somewhat expected and ordinary.
You
need the not so expected and out of the ordinary. A storm, a rainy day and not
so great a moment to really appreciate joyous and amazing moments and to
recognise what is important and meaningful in your life. To have the ups you
must have the downs.
So our
passage took us to Island Head Creek where we did not get much comfort from
swells and wind, we moved onto Port Clinton which gave us some comfort for a
sleep even though we still had to get up to do anchor checks.
To add
to our big days on the sea we developed electrical problems and a broken pump.
It
must be said that despite the big seas the scenery of the ocean and our
anchorages are beautiful and we a very thankful to get to experience all that
is about sailing the Queensland coast in areas less travelled by most.
 |
| Keppel Bay |
WE
headed for Roslyn Bay and stayed a couple of days. I was thankful to be in port
as weather conditions of storms and big swells meant that we were safe and
comfortable in port.
 |
| Storms at Keppel |
We
would be at marina until we could get the parts needed and contact our Marine Electrician
on the Gold Coast for assistance. At this point Capt Teza had lost all his good
humour. We had a pump on board that Terry used to keep our fridges and freezer
operational but it was oversized and we nursed our refrigeration condensers
with care until the marine suppliers opened up on the Monday.
The
job got done with some problem solving by Capt Teza and some serious and robust
discussion with our Electrician. By passing the ubeaut new inverter that cost a
fortune and a transformer and we got our batteries charging properly.
I
cancelled the Hitman on our Electrician that Terry had ordered, and our
electrician has accepted that he now owns the expensive invertor and he will uninstall
it when we get back to the coast and sort out the mess of redundant cabling and
electrical components and professionally finish the job to the original scope
required.
As for
the pump we managed to purchase a pump that is different than our normal pumps
in the it is a diaphragm Pump, so our boat has this little heart beat for our
fridge and freezers. Capt Teza says “I
can do emergency heart bypass with this pump and I Have the jumper leads to
start you up again”. Such a resourceful
man my husband.
 |
| Heart Pump |
We stocked up, did washing, scrubbed the boat and decided that embark to get 4 days at Lady Musgrave if the weather and sea conditions are favourable.
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