Summer in Brisbane and Gold Coast

We stayed at East Coast Marina in Manly for most of November and part of December. Manly is not far from Brisbane. We enjoyed the marina life for a while and Manly was surprisingly fun with all the Summer activities, the local markets and many of our cruising friends around, away from cyclone areas.

By mid December we traveled to Sydney and Melbourne for the Christmas holidays. Soon the New Year came and the first week of January we left the marina to spend some time around Moreton Bay before heading to the Gold Coast.

The weather was nice and we decided to explore Moreton Island. Just a couple of days in Tangalooma Wrecks were enough to convince us to look for a quieter place. We tried to go to the dolphin feeding attraction in the beach across the resort but incredibly you can only see the dolphins if you book a tour with them. This is a public beach, but apparently they can block you from accessing it while the dolphins come for their afternoon snack. We've seen wild dolphins feeding in Tin Can Bay and decided to skip it this time.

Tangalooma Wrecks, crowded during Summer

Not far south from Tangalooma we discovered  Little and Big Sand Hills. What a beautiful place with amazing sand dunes and water so clear that you can hardly believe this place exists inside Moreton Bay.

Big Sand Hills

Little Sand Hills

Hundreds of starfish can be seen at low tide

After spending 2 fantastic weeks we headed to the Gold Coast. We stopped at Dunwich (Deanabilla Bay) which we found has a good anchorage and a little town, where is possible to buy fuel and food. Expensive in the island but well provisioned. The anchorage gets a bit of swell from the ferries, but it seems well protected from easterly winds.

Arriving at the Gold Coast we headed to the anchorage at the Marine Stadium. We've heard a lot about this anchorage but had never been there so we decided to try it while the weather was good. It is a nice area but the tourist helicopters drive you crazy during the afternoons. After a couple of days we decided it was time to finally reach our destination at the Gold Coast City Marina and take care of regular maintenance jobs.

Early in March Zenitude went out of the water and into the storage area in Boatworks as we got ready for our upcoming overseas trip.

G.

Slowly Going South - From Cairns to Brisbane

19 September to 2 November 2018

This year the northerlies came early and we had great weather to sail south. We did it slowly stopping in many places as we've done many times before. We did stop at a few new places like the popular Middle Percy and Island Head Creek where we hided from unexpected bad weather, great anchorage by the way.

The highlight of this trip was the 5 days we spent in Lady Musgrave, what a fantastic place. We had tried many times before to include it in our stops but there was never a good chance to stop there for one reason or another. This time we didn't want to miss it, we were early in the season coming down and the weather was perfect.

Lady Musgrave:

From Lady Musgrave we headed to Bundaberg and then it was the usual stops at Urangan, Pelican Bay, Mooloolaba and finally arriving at East Coast Marina in Manly, Brisbane where we plan to stay for the summer.

Our new engines made all the difference in this long way back as there was always enough power available to keep over 6.5 average speed if we need it. We covered good distances and always got to our destination earlier than expected.

G.

From Maggie to Cairns with friends and family

16 August to 18 September 2018

Our friends Eduardo and Liliana came all the way from Argentina to sail with us. They've been with us in the Caribbean and the Pacific and this was the first time in Australia. They are quite familiar with life on board, it was great to have them back.

They arrived in Townsville and after a day visiting koalas and kangaroos in Billabong  Sanctuary Park we set sail towards the north. The plan was get to Cairns stopping along the way. This is a fantastic area and there are many reefs to explore not far from the continent. We stopped at Orpheus, Otter Reef, Dunk Island, Russell Island and Upolo Reef arriving at Cairns in time for our friends to take their flight to visit Sydney before returning home.

Soon after our friends left came our son with the grandkids and we spent a nice week between sea and land activities with the kids.

Once everyone left we decided it was time to start heading back south, slowly, towards the Gold Coast for the summer.

G.

A windy week in the Whitsundays before heading to Maggie

Ready to leave Mackay we kept waiting for a nice week of calm sunny weather to spend time around the Whitsundays. What we were getting was beautiful sunny days with strong winds or nice calm days with lots of rain, So, we waited, we were not in a hurry.

All in vain, there seemed to be no change in the weather pattern and finally we left on the 5th of July when forecast showed 3 reasonable days ahead with a strong southerly change arriving on the early hours of the 4th day.  This was good enough to get going, enjoy a bit of time at the islands and find cover to hide from the strong winds.

We headed to Shaw Island where finally were able to install our re-vamped sail bag back in place on a very quiet morning. With no wind it was easy to raise the full main sail at anchor and attach the bag properly to the boom, refit the lazy jacks and reef lines and then drop the main sail nicely in place.  It was still hard work and it took us about 4 hours to get it all done.

Looking at the weather forecast and seeing the strong southerly change winds would arrive in the middle of the night we decided to hide in Hamilton Marina. Good decision. When the winds arrived, at 4:00 in the morning we were tightly docked and secure. Later on a fellow cruiser that took refugee in Mackay Marina reported wind gusts of over 50 knots at the docks when the front was passing.

Zenitude in Hamilton Marina

It was a windy week in the Whitsundays and at the end it was time to move on. Our next destination is Townsville where we are receiving old friends from overseas in August. With that in mind we departed on the 14th of July with great weather for the trip north.

We sailed short legs to places we've been before. The first stop was Gloucester Island but rather than stopping in the south of the island nearby the resorts as we've done several times we decided to try the northwest part of the island. Our cruising guide mentions this as a popular spot for fishing trawlers but it is isolated and the only trawler that was there left before sunset. The place was all to ourselves. The guide also mentions this area is prone to wind 'bullets', this is wind that accelerates as it comes down from the mountain.  I must say the guide is right, not likely we'll try that anchorage again. We were lucky that eventually the wind completely died and we had a good night of sleep.

At first light the next day we sailed towards Cape Upstart and the day after to Cape Bowling Green. Two great stops on the way north. It was great to confirm that with the new engines and the calm weather we could have skipped the second stop and reach our final destination with enough daylight even in these short daylight days. We couldn't have done that with the old engines. However, Cape Bowling Green looked so appealing in the beautiful sunny day that we decided to stop there anyway and enjoy the afternoon.

At anchor in Cape Bowling Green

The sun smiles before disappearing in Cape Bowling Green 

We woke up at 6:00 AM for the final leg towards Magnetic Island to find a thick fog with no visibility. As there were north easterlies in the forecast for the afternoon we decided to go anyway hoping the fog would raise with the sun. It was the strangest thing, as soon as we started moving we left the fog behind, it seemed that the fog wast just over the inside of the cape.

Before noon we were approaching Magnetic Island (Maggie for the locals) and soon after we arrived at Horseshoe Bay. We found the familiar place as beautiful as ever, dropped anchor and relaxed, planning to be here for quite some time.

A perfect day at Horseshoe Bay

A perfect sunset at Maggie

G.

Back on board and ready to head north

We are back from our land travels and after almost a month getting Zenitude ready we are about to start our way up north towards Townsville and eventually Cairns.

The main project this time was the installation of new solar panels. After a good analysis we decided that new and more powerful solar panels would be better than getting a new wind generator, these have given us enough problems already and we feel like giving up on them. We have to wait and see how we go with power this season. 

But most of our time was spent refitting everything we removed to prevent damage if a cyclone hit during our time away. Incredible how much work that was, not surprising though, always when you do work on a boat new tasks that usually can't wait, somehow appear. For example, after removing everything that had been stored in the guest head (bimini, jib, etc.) I found a hatch handle on the floor, sure enough one of the small hatches had given up. This meant another week while waiting for a replacement hatch to arrive. The last big job, when we thought  we were done and were getting the main sail ready again, we found the sail bag needed patch up, the Velcro that keeps it shut had almost completed disintegrated and needed replacement. This plus other bit and pieces took 3 extra days of sewing. Sail bag is now ready but we have been waiting for several days to get a brake in the wind so that we can put it back in place.

Going back on the water

Going down and into a marina berth with perfect weather while we work ...

Finally it seems we are ready, just waiting for the miserable weather to give us a break so we can set sail and get on our way.

G.

Cyclone Season - Zenitude stays in Mackay

When we left the Gold Coast at the end of September our plans were to come back in December and spend cyclone season around there. Somewhere along the way plans changed and we decided to leave Zenitude well tied to the ground in Mackay as we did once before. The thinking was to be closer to Cairns for next season as we won't be able to start our sailing before June.

With that in mind we left Hamilton Island marina with no real hurry. The wind was blowing at about 20 knots and we moved only 10 miles south to Shaw Island where we spent the night in a beautiful and well  protected anchorage. The holding is excellent in about 5 to 8 meters, several boats where already there when we arrived.

Shaw Island

Next day we moved a little bit further south to our usual spot in Brampton, getting ready for the short sail to Mackay Marina the next day. With that our sailing for 2017 was over. 

We spent several weeks preparing Zenitude for cyclone season and soon the day came when she was taken out of the water and deposited in her new dry space. All stuff from the deck was then stored away, main sail wrapped around, bimini and jib removed and stored away, The straps to hold her to the ground were installed. Finally, with our bags packed for a season on land we left her there, hoping she doesn't have to face a cyclone.

We'll be back around June, there will be no blogs until then.

G.

Mackay to Hamilton Island - Welcoming friends from another time

3/11/2017 to 15/11/2017

There is one anchorage in Brampton Island for almost any kind of wind just 20 miles away from Mackay. Usually this is our first stop when leaving Mackay and this time was not different. We left  the marina just before noon, after finishing all last minute preparations, which included a stop at the fuel dock as we were hoping for good weather to go to one of the reefs nearby.

With light winds from the south east it took us about 4 hours to get there running just one engine with a good current in our favor.

Next day we moved on to Goldsmith Island. We chose the north anchorage that has an easier approach  and good space to anchor. Just two other boats were there and we spent a couple of lovely days.

Goldsmith Island

Sunset at anchor

It's a full moon night

Then the northerlies showed up in the forecast and we moved a bit further north to Plantation in Lindeman Island, a great anchorage protected from northerly winds. There were several boats there, it felt a little crowded, not surprising as we were now in full 'Whitsundays Charter' area.

Plantation, Lindeman Island

Welcome Swallows (not really welcome on board but too cute to scare them away)

Another nice couple of days until the wind turned again to the SE and the forecast started showing strong wind warnings in what seemed to be duration: indefinitely. 

We left Lindeman and decided to go to Hamilton Marina to wait for the arrival of our friends. Due to the weather we ended up in the marina two days earlier than planned, it was a good measure as the strong wind arrived that night.

Two days later, while the weather was still wild, arrived our friends Maggie and Roy as expected. They came in a tour to Australia and New Zealand all the way from Canada. We met them on another time, another world when we were sailing the Caribbean and they were in their boat Drum. We were part of a group that sailed together to survive Venezuela's increasing piracy threats back in 2008. Since then Venezuela has deteriorated further year after year, a real shame as the off shore islands are amazingly beautiful cruising grounds (our adventures at that time recorded in: http://www.bluewaterdreaming.com/zen/isla_tortuga.html).

We hadn't seen Maggie and Roy for several years but we had always kept in touch, so we were thrilled when they announced they were coming all the way from Canada to visit Australia. It was unfortunate for them that the wind didn't ease during their stay, even when Maggie had promised to bring the sun with her. Sailing out of the protection in the marina would have been miserable. It was a collective decision to even don't bother trying. They are sailors as well and knew it wasn't worth the trouble.

With so many wonderful places to go around the Withsundays it was a real shame to be tucked in the marina. Nevertheless we hope they had a good time as Hamilton is rather a nice place to be trapped in.

Roy and Maggie

With Maggie

Stuck in Hamilton Marina

Oscar and I did have a great time catching up with them and we sadly said farewells 3 days later with promises of meeting again when we visit Canada or maybe somewhere else around this small world.

A day after they left the weather started a new improving trend and we left the marina, this time south bound.

G.