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| Sens de la Vie Lizard Island |
We departed Port Douglas making way to Hope Islets, a small
coral Cay near Cape Tribulation.
Hope Isle is a Beautiful little island we have visited
previously but on this occasion arrived in in gusting winds to 25 knots and a
swell. Picking up the public mooring was
a failure and I lost our boat hook to the sea.
One Captain’s boat hook is another Captain’s Treasure. We farewelled our 25 year old trusted Boat
hook at East Hope Island. It was
difficult to pick up the public mooring in 25knots of wind and a choppy swell. Just a tad sentimental losing this very old
Bronzed boat hook. On the few occasions
when I use to give it a yearly polish, I would wonder about its history of service
to the crew on this yacht in faraway places, across oceans, many seas and
exotic locations. One passage this boat
hook helped with the deployment of 40 large Sea Data buoys when the yacht was
contracted for a Marine Science Expedition from Galapagos Islands across the
ocean to the Cook Islands.
Not the first time we have dropped it and previously Capt
Teza free dived some 12 m in clear water to retrieve. Not this time, waters had poor visibility
from the recent rains, local knowledge of Crocodiles and currently a lot of
Bull sharks washed out from rivers. We
will purchase a new one on our travels further north. Not many public mooring balls where we are
going in the next month.
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| Hope Island |
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| Sens de la Vie Hope Islands FNQ |
We caught up with Nigel and Kerry from Duet for sun-downers
and shared our plans for the passage to the Kimberly Coast. Nigel and Kerry kept an eye on our Yacht last
year in Townsville Marina when we came home to pack up our house.
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| As the winds howled through the rigging I read this incredible story |
We met a colorful character Steve “Sharkey” of sailing Cat
Shark Bite. After a few days here we made the decision to swap back over the
new lithium batteries and get the AGMS as the Lithium batteries just did not
have the capacity, we needed without buying more of these. Our thinking is that if we had further
trouble along the way replacing an AGM would be far easier to procure and
trouble shoot than Lithium. So we made arrangements with the supplier, true to
his promise if we were not happy he would swap them over. Headed to Cooktown
and booked a tie up on the working fisherman’s wharf, awaiting the batteries to
arrive.
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| Capt Teza Study Charts |
A couple of days in Cooktown gave us time to explore this
historic township and certainly got to know all the fishing boats that operate
in the coral seas as far as the Torres Straights. The industry of live rainbow crays and live
trout exports was fascinating. I asked a
lot of questions to get understanding from these hard working men and women of the
industry, learning about the struggles
and challenges that they have experienced over the past 12 months.
It was told by an owner of one of the live trout fishing
boats, that a department of Primary Industries Aqua Culture project, supported
by State Government to develop pisciculture of groper and trout fish in an
effort to maintain sustainability of our fishing stocks has now been sold off
and now owned by a Chinese Company exporting live farmed fish to China. The company is called “The Company One”,
employing most of the Australian scientists that originally were with the DPI
project. Whilst, I believe that this assists our fish stocks, I cant help thinking that China's appetite for
live fish and now growing them in aqua culture Chinese farms in Australia, exporting
back to the Wet markets has caused an in balance.
Greed and Gluttony degrading the quality of produce and
homogenizing our taste buds and expectations for fish all to be the one size
and perfectly all the same. If you have
had the pleasure of eating wild caught fish as opposed to farm fish, there is a
significant difference in the taste.
Australians rarely get any of this wild caught fish as it is
cost prohibited for most of our budgets. China is willing to pay the huge retail
prices of $150 to $200 a Kilo. It’s a
very expensive exercise to get these fish off the boats and onto a plane for
the China Wet Markets.
The boat owners only get about $40 a kilo. The buying agents both Australian and China
who bear the cost of transportation, fees and all other costs get the
rest. There are a lot of hands this
product passes through before it presents on China's Plates.
What will happen to these small Australian Commercial
fishing operators as more and more aqua farm raised product floods the market,
who knows? The Australian Fishing
Industry is well regulated for sustainability unlike the massive fleets of
China that recently where granted commercial fishing licencing by PNG at a “ By
off fee” of $200 million. The areas they
are fishing are just off our waters in PNG. Fishing the Ashmore Reef which is a
pristine area for breeding of these Coral sea species. These fleets have also
been caught in action in the conservation areas of the Galapagos islands, they
appear to be not a party to sustainable practices, are unsupervised, monitored
or regulated. But this is just my
opinion.
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The site where Miss Doreen Lays at the bottom at the entrance to Endeavour River |
With new batteries finally on Board after a few stressful days being taken off the dock, moved to another dock then moved into the channel on a dropping tide with little water underneath us, we finally cast off the dock lines again. It was a bit crowed on the dock with one of the fishing fleet boats with engine problems and the dock master and fishermen were nervous about another boat coming in fully laden trying to dock in a limited area.
Only weeks before we
arrived a fishing boat, Miss Doreen, sank in 5 minutes, human error of a
dock hand that caused a bowline to come a drift and the current so strong that
turned the boat 180 degrees and sank off the wharf with its cargo of fresh
trout. Miss Doreen, built in Townsville
in 1964 as a supply ship to Low Island lighthouse out of t Port Douglas. The
ship has many colorful stories , she is part of maritime history in this area and locals at
Port Douglas and Cooktown were sadden by the loss of this historic ship.
With expectations that we will have no more power issues as
soon as the batteries were transferred and installed we made departure to catch
up with some of the Cruising pod going to Kimberly Coast.
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| Amazing Coastline where Rainforest touches the Sea |
We had some great days of sailing, with only the head sail
out the SE trade winds pushing us along in a decent swell, we achieved and
average speed of 7.5 knots.
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| Big Day Sail |
An overnight anchorage at North side of Cape Bedford, was
uncomfortable so we hauled up the anchor at first light and made our way to
Lizard Island.
Terry caught a huge yellow fin Tuna under sail, it took him
40mins to bring this massive fish onboard.
Processing the fish is never easy when under sail but we traversed
a few reefs to give us less swell on the leeward side of the reefs.
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| Capt Teza Catches Tuna |
Arriving at Lizard, we caught up with Matt and Lisa on Cool
Change and had a relaxing couple of days in good company with like minded
yachties making way over the top end.
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| There is a Croc on the Rock Little Bay one..............Where is Muma? |
No swimming or diving for me this time at Lizard, Wind, swell,
and rain squalls plus a small croc which Capt Teza found as we walked up the
creek that flowed into Watsons bay at Lizard island. The University research station was still not
opened for visitors, but the resort was back in operation.
It was a very social time getting to know some of the
yachties and motorboat cruisers making way to Darwin. We made instant connection with them, enjoyed
a seafood paella supper at the campground on the beach, chatted weather, which
is always the number one topic, 2nd to fishing and then follows what
has broken on everyone’s boats. It does
not really matter if you have a new million-dollar boat or a grand old lady
such as Sens de la Vie, something always needs fixing or replacing.
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Installing the tender Depth Sounder and Fish Finder |
Capt Teza got his Mobile Depth sounder attached and
working. Thanks Glen Edwards for gifting
the bracket it works a treat. This
enabled Teza to plot a path to get closer to the Beach at Lizard Island to get
out of some swell. The mobile plotter
will be so valuable to us once we get to some of the unsurveyed waters of the
top end and indeed finding pathways up creeks to get into a safe deep hole for
the monster tides that leave river beds dry.
We departed Lizard Island ,prepared for some big days
sailing, navigating through shoals, reefs, small islands, currents and tides
and the North Passage Shipping Lane which is incredibly busy, making our way to
Cape York.
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