And so we are sitting here, in Breakwater Marina, Townsville, on our own boat at last.
Ron, boat broker extraordinaire, collected us from Townsville airport on our arrival 7.30pm Sunday 23 October. He dropped us at the marina and we reintroduced ourselves to SOL after a nearly three month absence. Luckily she was just as we remembered!!!
After a not terribly restful night - sounds like water running, electric wires crackling and some sort of scratching kept us alert a lot of the time - Monday was filled with grocery shopping, sorting ourselves, finding where things were and trying to figure how they worked then dinner at our favourite little fish and chip place - Simply Tops - on Palmer St.
Tuesday morning 10am Ron took us out to Queensland Transport Department to change the boat registration into our names. Many forms later and parting with $460 to the nice people in Queensland Government, SOL is officially registered to us in Queensland. If we go to Victoria and register her there - only $82/year - we can cancel Queensland rego then apply and (apart from some various fees and charges) will get a refund for the balance of the year !!
Lunch on board in the marina then it was out to sea for our first trip.
A fairly nerve wracking (unnecessarily it turned out) departure - never having driven a 41 ft long, 23 ft wide vessel before - we raised the main and jib (one reef in each) in 18 kts of wind and set off for Magnetic Island. It was a multi-tack trip in the easterly but that was fine as we got in a fair amount of sail handling practice over the next 3 1/2 hours it took for us to get to our overnight anchorage in Horseshoe Bay.
This is where we encountered our first real teething problem - the anchor winch (witch/bitch) has a power switch - of course - but where the hell was it located ?????
We found the foot switch and remote easy enough - but on pressing both - nothing. No power to the switch. Come back to main switch board - nothing labelled "anchor" or "winch" or even anything remotely like that. Opened cupboards, searched under saloon seat where electrical cable came through. Nothing.
Getting rather frustrated and just a little bit desperate, we decided to drop the anchor by hand and search again after we had the boat secure. No easy task that. It was getting dark, and windier, the chain was wrapped tight around the winch and I had visions of Jamie losing a finger or two at the very least !!! We dropped about 50metres of chain - well it kind of dropped itself such was the force - there was no stopping it it seemed ! But at least we had the anchor down!
Time for a drink - and a think.....
Where would you hide the power switch for the anchor winch??
Half an hour later, after searching just about the entire boat - we found it - of course, in a locker, in the cockpit, behind the saloon door......obviously.
The night passed well, the anchor held perfectly, all those strange noises we had heard when in the marina were non existent out here, must be just marina sea critters having parties.
Up to another beautiful day, we decided to set off for Rattlesnake Island, about 20 nautical miles away, spend Wednesday night, and Tuesday afternoon we'd swim around, clutching our scrapers, and clean the growth from the bottom which had built up over the last couple of months lying idle in the marina.
So back to Townsville it was.
Thursday was spent provisioning for our trip south, refuelling, catching up with washing and generally trying to make sure that we were ready to leave at first light Friday.
A really pleasant BBQ dinner at Ron (boat broker) and his wife, Gillian, as well as George and Corry, the previous owners of SOL rounded off our stay in Townsville.
We were on our way south.
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| Coffee and Banana Bread for breakfast - Yum !! |
Ron, boat broker extraordinaire, collected us from Townsville airport on our arrival 7.30pm Sunday 23 October. He dropped us at the marina and we reintroduced ourselves to SOL after a nearly three month absence. Luckily she was just as we remembered!!!
After a not terribly restful night - sounds like water running, electric wires crackling and some sort of scratching kept us alert a lot of the time - Monday was filled with grocery shopping, sorting ourselves, finding where things were and trying to figure how they worked then dinner at our favourite little fish and chip place - Simply Tops - on Palmer St.
Tuesday morning 10am Ron took us out to Queensland Transport Department to change the boat registration into our names. Many forms later and parting with $460 to the nice people in Queensland Government, SOL is officially registered to us in Queensland. If we go to Victoria and register her there - only $82/year - we can cancel Queensland rego then apply and (apart from some various fees and charges) will get a refund for the balance of the year !!
Lunch on board in the marina then it was out to sea for our first trip.
A fairly nerve wracking (unnecessarily it turned out) departure - never having driven a 41 ft long, 23 ft wide vessel before - we raised the main and jib (one reef in each) in 18 kts of wind and set off for Magnetic Island. It was a multi-tack trip in the easterly but that was fine as we got in a fair amount of sail handling practice over the next 3 1/2 hours it took for us to get to our overnight anchorage in Horseshoe Bay.
This is where we encountered our first real teething problem - the anchor winch (witch/bitch) has a power switch - of course - but where the hell was it located ?????
We found the foot switch and remote easy enough - but on pressing both - nothing. No power to the switch. Come back to main switch board - nothing labelled "anchor" or "winch" or even anything remotely like that. Opened cupboards, searched under saloon seat where electrical cable came through. Nothing.
Getting rather frustrated and just a little bit desperate, we decided to drop the anchor by hand and search again after we had the boat secure. No easy task that. It was getting dark, and windier, the chain was wrapped tight around the winch and I had visions of Jamie losing a finger or two at the very least !!! We dropped about 50metres of chain - well it kind of dropped itself such was the force - there was no stopping it it seemed ! But at least we had the anchor down!
Time for a drink - and a think.....
Where would you hide the power switch for the anchor winch??
Half an hour later, after searching just about the entire boat - we found it - of course, in a locker, in the cockpit, behind the saloon door......obviously.
The night passed well, the anchor held perfectly, all those strange noises we had heard when in the marina were non existent out here, must be just marina sea critters having parties.
 |
| Rocks that reminded me of Canadian Inukshuk on Magnetic Island |
Up to another beautiful day, we decided to set off for Rattlesnake Island, about 20 nautical miles away, spend Wednesday night, and Tuesday afternoon we'd swim around, clutching our scrapers, and clean the growth from the bottom which had built up over the last couple of months lying idle in the marina.
However about four nautical miles from Rattlesnake up comes a very fast, official looking, powerboat - manned by two young gentlemen from the Australian Defence Forces, who informed us that we best be heading in the other direction as they were conducting live bombing exercises on Rattlesnake - So could we turn around and leave now!!
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| Live bombing on Rattlesnake Island |
Thursday was spent provisioning for our trip south, refuelling, catching up with washing and generally trying to make sure that we were ready to leave at first light Friday.
A really pleasant BBQ dinner at Ron (boat broker) and his wife, Gillian, as well as George and Corry, the previous owners of SOL rounded off our stay in Townsville.
We were on our way south.
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