Up the mast!

This afternoon Michael went up the mast for the first time, and he swears it wasn't as scary as he thought it would be... imagine doing it on a rough and rolly ocean though...

Don't worry Mum, he was attached to the main halyard and had a professional-grade tether and a bosun's chair keeping him safe. Plus me on the winch, tying him off tightly and and keeping a close eye on things.

The job today was replacing the decklights and the anchor light with long lasting, high intensity LED globes, and checking out the set-up at the top of the mast so we can can plan the install of our new wind instruments.

Monkey boy....

And, the view from the top!!!

 

 

Seeds of inspiration

While on the train the other day I was thinking: we are at the end of journey which really started back in January 2007 when we went on a diving holiday in Far North Queensland and Michael came across a job in the newspaper for a coxswain on remote Orpheus Island. The job didnt pan out but ever since then we weve been determined to do something different, adventurous and a little bit crazy.

 Caitlin, Michael (background) and Potato Cod, The Cod Hole, Great Barrier Reef, January 2007

With a serious case of itchy feet, in April that year we went up to Cooktown and very nearly bought a business there - we rethought that wacky plan at the last minute, but our desire to escape the mundane didnt subside.

Main St, Cooktown, QLD, April 2007

Then in September 2007 we went on a 2 week diving trip to Vanuatu where we admired the cruising yachts  anchored out the front of our resort. One was home to a French couple with two brown-skinned blond-haired little boys who couldn’t have been more than 7 or 8 years years old, but were whizzing around on their tender on their own while their parents picked up supplies from the village. The confidence, independence and freedom of those kids really inspired us. There's no doubt that that little seed of inspiration has helped lead us here, four years later.

Yachts off the Beachfront Resort, Espititu Santo, Vanuatu, September 2007 

Despite getting distracted by careers in Melbourne (pesky things, careers...) we managed to buy a little Farr 6000 sailing boat Indian Summer and learned to sail in Port Phillip Bay and the Gippsland Lakes. Our time on Indian Summer confirmed our dream of owning a bigger boat and travelling by sail. Indian Summer now has a new home in Mission Beach QLD and we hope to see her again when we make it up that way.

Indian Summer, Gippsland Lakes, New Years Eve, 2009

 

Last year we tested our resolve by chartering a boat in the Whitsundays with our friends Su and David and their son Sasha. Despite being really sick with colds for the whole trip we had an amazing time and confirmed that yes, we really do want to do this!  Within three months the house was sold, and within four we had bought Bass Voyager...

Sasha and Michael aboard Christine, Hunter 39, Airlie Beach, August 2010

Whitsunday Islands, August/September 2010

This is where we want to be...!

I can hardly believe we've almost managed to pull it off. We're at the end of a journey - the dreaming-, planning-, wishing- journey - and almost at the beginning of the next one - the reality!!

Lets just hope that we can muster up the nerve to actually push away from the dock!!!

Video tour for Isabella

Hi Isabella, I thought you might like to have a little tour of our new Marina, so here is a video!

Playing catch-up

We've been really lazy about posting to our blog over the last few months, so this is a bit of a catch-up post. We've been settling into life aboard with all its joys and frustrations, going to work each day and getting boat projects done bit by bit. We've done major renovations to the roof of the boat, moved to a gorgeous new marina, and had major engine troubles, which threatened to derail (sink?) our plans but are thankfully resolved.

Here are some photos to give you a flavour of the last few months.

Stormy weather
Back in May we had a really big storm in Adelaide with nearly 50 knot winds - over 85 kph. That's called a "full gale" in meteorological-speak, or Force 10 on the Beaufort wind scale. No rain, but the wind was ferocious! We ran around the marina helping other residents secure neighbouring boats. One of our fellow marina-dwellers was frantically securing lines and fenders while swearing "Damn these weekend sailors! They never prepare their boats for conditions like this!!!"

I dont remember ever being outside in that kind of wind before, let alone while by the water. It was actually really exciting. Made me think of what it would be to be faced with that kind of wind while on the ocean - yikes!

Once we had doubled up our lines and done what we could for the neighbouring boats we camped out on our day bed below watching Master and Commander as the boat rolled and the wind roared around us - very atmospheric!

The photos don't do it justice, but remember, its usually a millpond inside the marina! The waves are all due to the wind - there was no swell at all.




BV's new hat
When we bought Bass Voyager we knew that some pretty major work would need to be done to fix the rust which had accumulated under the solar panels on the roof. Back in May we took her around to the Royal SA Yacht Squadron which has excellent maintenance facilities and spent a few days stripping, cutting, welding and then painting her new roof. Graham (family friend of the Harris's) helped out with the welding, training Michael as he went. We've since bought our own portable welder which has already proved very handy making the gas locker for our shiny new oven.







And me doing my bit with the power tools... This curved length of wood replaces the rotted beam that runs across between the steel roof and the canvas canopy. I was quite proud of my efforts here - I dont have much experience with power tools.


Michael's new hat
Michael playing silly buggers...



Adventure Cat
Kitty is settling in to our new digs at the beautiful new Crown Marina. Its very quiet as the marina has only been open for a few months, although we have seen about 10 new boats arrive since we moved in. The marina manager is fabulous, and takes a great deal of pride in the presentation of the marina. Im going to post a video tour shortly so you can see how it looks.






Engine troubles
Michael might post more detail about this soon, but for now, here is Kitty helping him diagnose the problem which turned out to be the water pump. The starter motor has also been replaced by a new one from the US. There's also evidence below of the disasterous afternoon when Michael's mobile phone accidentally became aquainted with the depths of the oily bilge.... yuck!





The offending water pump. We learned that the Volvo Penta engine in BV is older than she is - much older in fact - late 1970's, while BV was built in 1989. Makes getting replacement parts ... well ... interesting.


New outboard
We also decided to upgrade our outboard engine for our tender - here is Michael testing it out. So proud...




That's it for now. I have lots more to tell, and more photos, so I will try to post more regularly from here on in!

Kangaroo Island for Easter

We are now officially cruising sailors! As planned we spent the 5 days over Easter sailing over to Kangaroo Island and back and had a wonderful time. Except for day 1 the weather was pretty spectacular and I had such a memorable Birthday on the 25th sailing back across Backstairs Passage in PERFECT conditions. We had to sail to windward for most of the trip (southerlies on the way over, northerlies on the way back!!) and motor-sail with some of the lightest winds, but it was a fabulous experience .

Day 1 - dropping anchor at Rapid Bay


















































Gorgeous sunset over Rapid Bay Jetty. As I was taking the second photo I leaned (very gently I assure you!) against the kettle BBQ bolted to the railing at the stern of the boat, only to catch a glimpse of it sinking in a gray cloud of ashes into the 7 metres of water below. And no diving equipment on board! A $150 lesson in replacing rusted bolts!
:-(


































Day 2: Crossing Backstairs Passage. I thought this was meant to be the second most dangerous stretch of water in Australia/the southern hemisphere/the WORLD! pft!

















Day 3: Eastern Cove near American River on Kangaroo Island.
Bass Voyager can be seen anchored in the far distance.


















View of the entrance to the lagoon from the American River township.

















Dolphins circling our tender on the way back to BV.

















Day 4: Caitlin's Birthday - returning across Backstairs Passage and an encounter with a huge container ship which suddenly loomed up behind us. We started getting a bit nervous as he was moving so fast, but just as we were contemplating starting the engine and changing course, he veered off.

We had initially planned to motor-sail much further up the coast on Day 4 but the weather was so spectacular (25 degrees, sunny, calm waters) we were perfectly happy to just lazily tack back and forth under sail alone at about 4-5 knots, across the straight to anchor at Rapid Bay again for the night.

































Cape Jervis in the background...

































By about 4pm were almost back to Rapid Bay when we spotted an idyllic bay around the back of Rapid Head - the peninsula that that protects Rapid Bay from the southerlies. We couldt resist dropping anchor and exploring the caves and little beach - Im sure that it is very rare to have wind and ocean conditions that allow a boat to get this close to the cliffs - it is some of the most exposed and rugged coastline I have ever seen!


















































































Day 5: we motor-sailed in very light northerly winds all the way back to North Haven, having multiple dolphin encouters along the way. The dolphins in the photos below are the brown Common Dolphins, but we were also visited by a small group of the much larger grey Bottlenosed Dolphins. They played under our bow wave for ages, chasing each other and rolling on to their sides to get a good look at us through the clear water. I dont think we will ever tire of meeting these amazing creatures. A magical end to a great trip.


















































And finally, kitty must have picked up on all the happy vibes because by the end of the trip, despite my concerns about her getting sea sick, she had well and truly got her sea paws!