With 15-20 knot winds we had a great 30 odd mile sail from Goldsmith Island to Cid Harbour. We must be getting some protection from the reef now as the waves were not big making for a comfortable ride and as we came passed Dent Island the water was quite flat. We rode the current north with sheltered winds on our own sunset cruise, dodged a few ferries and turned up the Hunt Channel to drop anchor at Sawmill Bay. It was a calm evening with 20 other boats for company - we’re truly in the Whitsundays now! Naomi was happy to be on flat water. For various reasons our plans in Airlie Beach got changed, which meant we spent an extra night at Sawmill Bay. After Naomi made puftaloons for morning tea, we took the ... read more

Friday 2nd May - Three other boats left the anchorage this morning and headed north, whilst we upped anchor and headed deeper down into the South Arm of Port Clinton to find a safe haven from the variable strong winds coming. The chart plotter came into it own guiding us along the deeper channels of these unmarked wide indistinct mangrove expanses. We came across two other boats at anchor, one of them we knew from Yeppoon Marina as Naomi had helped make his bimini canopy. We chose to anchor a little further around the bend within sight of the army ramp to afford us better northerly protection, scouted the depths around and dropped anchor in 6m of water just before high tide. Thankfully there are less sandflies here and the breeze is starting to pick up ... read more

1st May - I am writing this from Port Clinton which to our surprise has internet signal sporadically. Since I last wrote we set off one morning to walk across the island to the resort to top up on bread and milk supplies. For once we actually set off early enough so that we didn’t end up baking in the midday sun, though we did soon realise we were not on the path we meant to take. We walked by the mud flats near the barn that you can dinghy to up the creek when the tide is high enough, and veered right up a steep climb. We reached a rest stop after 40 minutes and when we realised we were not even half way decided to abort the mission. Got some great views down into ... read more

I have been a little slack in writing an up to date blog and although I left off with us at Hummocky Island we have been back at Yeppoon marina for the last week. After the last entry, we spent another uneventful night at Hummocky and by early afternoon the next day, as predicted, the wind shifted to the northeast. We lifted anchor and sailed slowly out of the shelter of Hummocky to be met by the 12 knot breeze. This built to the high teens, giving us a great sail back to the Keppel Islands in under 4 hours. We used the engine to drop anchor in Monkey Bay, closely followed by Neesea. We all met on the shore for a swim and stroll. Alex got to try his floaty ring that we had found ... read more

On Thursday 16th we left Keppel Bay Marina for a short cruise of a couple of weeks to the Keppel Islands and onto our first visit of Yellow Patch. It was a bit of a blustery ride close hauled into almost 20 knots. Naomi's parents on their motorboat Neesea left a short time after us and overtook us about half way across to the islands. We came around the top of Great Keppel Island, turned to motorsailing and then straight motoring to get us more quickly into the shelter of land. Anchored behind Neesea at Svendsen's Beach, pleased that there was only a slight roll. We spent three nights here in mostly pleasant weather. Occasional rain allowed us to top up our solar shower bags so Naomi was allowed to wash her hair. Did the usual ... read more