Darwin to Cocos

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Departed Dwn 29^thJuly with very light winds. Had to motor for most of the day and night. We knew this was going to be the case, and know there is more wind the further we get out there. Hopefully sooner rather than later. Quickly got into the watch system and routines, boat and crew faring well.

30^th July

Well today we had a bit of wind, not much, but enough to sail. We had a stunning sunset last night for our first night at sea. Well, I did as Phil was off watch. I love my 6pm - 8pm and my 6am - 9am watches as I get both the sunset and the sunrise. At this stage of the game, Phil is getting the moonrise at midnight! We had dolphins..3 of them playing in the bow for over half hr at about 5:30, a lovely way to end the day as we're both up from about 5pm - 6:30 with dinner and all. They were dark grey, but with a white stripe from their mouth down their sides, and a white patch on their back. Very fast and extremely playful. Both seem to be getting enough sleep at this stage, so that's a good thing. Seas are flat, so that's even better!! Thought we had some weed on our keel last night as we weren't going as fast as we should've been under motor and then the water intake filter had lots of weed in it this morning. At one stage today when we lost the wind, we took the sails down as they were just bashing around, and bobbed around for a little bit. That must have dislodged the weed, as we're doing just fine under motor now. I sent Dad a text with the distance to our first waypoint..can’t remember it, but over 300. Right now we've only got 209. That's not to anywhere in particular, but it's to our set waypoint.

Ok, I'm on watch, so best go check for boats. (Only seen 1 so far on my watch late last night)

31^st July

Day 3 and we finally found some wind. Not much, but enough to sail. It's so nice to be sailing rather than motoring. Saw heaps of dolphins on my sunrise watch this morning. That's when I was sitting up looking that is. Most of the time before 7am, I was snoozing with the alarm waking me every 10mins to check. I wasn't quite ready to start the day at 6 this morning. Oily sea last night and early this morning. Deep, dark and smooth. Quite eerie late at night with no moon. Best news is that we're now half way to Ashmore Reef. Still not sure what time we'll get there and if we'll stay, but we'll see. That's what cruisng's all about.

All good.

1^st Aug

Lovely day sailing today although we could do with slightly more wind (did I actually just say that??) I'm just repeating what SSD says!! Finally reached our set waypoint about half hr ago and now on to Ashmore reef, which according to our plotter is 24 - 27 hrs away (depending on winds) Our well developed routines took a slight change due to the time zone of WA. Now, I do not see the sunrise on watch and only see the sunset as it's sundowners time anyway....cutting into my off watch time. I'm usually up then anyway. Nothing very profound to share today....quite a few 'Sharrrr, Sharr' were heard from SSD in the cockpit as a bird once again tried to land and got hit by Wilbur (wind generator). Silly thing then tried to come back again. I thought he was yelling out fish, fish, as I was sleeping in my cabin (the one that Dad had) so raced up to see him wildly waving the extended boat hook in the air looking like a crazy hairy mountain guy. Well, it worked eventually and the bird gave up!!



3^rd august

So...update on Fri/Sat. We caught our first fish on Friday. A Wahoo we think. Took a lot to get it in (those of you who know the pandemonium of getting a fish in...try it with just 2!!) Anyway, now we've got enough fish to eat for a week. We had great winds all day and were cracking 6kts so decided we would stop at Ashmore regardless of the fact that we would enter at night. We had a good chart, and plotter info was excellent so Phil was confident. I ended up on the bow with a spotlight, had to dodge a couple of yellow buoys and then find the public moorings. Found them quite easily, but they were in shocking condition. We tried all 3 and then went back to the original. Even put on an extra line of our own as the ropes are not so good. That took a good hr so 2:30am by the time we were sorted for the night. Woken up more tired than every this am..more so than on passage, so will stay now for a day. Massive manta ray (and I mean massive) came up as welcoming committee scooping up all the debris that were coming off the mooring ropes. His mouth (if you call it that) wide open and stayed for ages, floating around. Stunning!!

So much to see here at Ashmore. We've had a tender come from a Navy ship to say hi! They were just dropping off crew to the Customs ship that is anchored here, then the tender from the customs ship came to check our papers and check we were all fine. Then...the customs boat towed out an illegal people smuggling boat that arrived about 3 days earlier. they're going to sink it out at sea!!! each day and sometimes twice a day we get called up on the radio from customs, navy, 'ashmore protector', ships and planes, sometimes to check where we're going and where we've been, sometimes to see if we've seen any illegal boats. It's a hive of activity on the high seas!!!

Staying an extra night here now...which FWT thinks is just excellent as it’s blowing 20kts out there!! Also, added to the fact that Michael the lovely guy from customs came back with two strong mooring ropes and attached them to the mooring buoy and then to our boat. So we are feeling very safe and secure here now. Michael came and did our paperwork this morning and is originally from Torres Strait, but lived in Cairns for 20yrs. As he’s leaving, he says “I feel better now knowing that you’re more secure on that mooring.” He was under no obligation to give us new mooring lines, I don’t think Customs are responsible for maintaining these moorings. I feel like I should let everyone know how amazing customs have been to us as they tend to get a bad name with some yachties!! Last night they were moored way a way from us over the other side of the lagoon near west island, but since returning from sinking the illegal boat, they’ve picked up a mooring very close. They are leaving tomorrow and another boat has come in today and picked up a mooring even closer. So last night we were out here all on our lonesome, and tonight we have 2 customs boats for company. Michael also said they watched us come in as he was on watch last night. (Lucky we didn’t cut the exclusion zone corner by very much!!)

4^th Aug

Had a lovely day today, started off listening to a sermon from BT (while I was in bed). It was the one on 1 John v4 (and old one) and his first few sentences were....it doesn't matter where you are or what distance away you are, there's something about being part of a church family. (or something like that- I will listen again and write it down exactly as it was great!!). then put on my music and played my flute along with my church songs for about an hour. I have to admit...I'm slack. who would've thought my mouth muscles would need strengthening!! I couldn't hold clear high notes for ages. (It may have also been due to the fact that that I had to follow my flute around with each wave). but I do know I need to pull it out again more often. I did enjoy it too!! then we got stuck into a few small jobs and got the boat ready for sailing tomorrow.

6^th July

All going great so far. Winds have been favourable and we've been cracking along at around 6kts or so. We could be going faster as we've got a double reef in the main and not so much heady out, but we're comfortable at this speed. Our wind auto helm has been working so well, and that's great as we're not using so much power. Only 1331nm (nautical miles) to go.

Lots of flying fish, but not much else to see.

7^th Aug

Lighter winds today so not much wind. Last night at dinner time we heard some noises coming thru the VHF radio which hasn't made a sound for days. We checked Radar, but couldn't see anything. Phil told me to keep a close watch out and to wake him up if I saw any lights. I am on first night time watch. Anyway, just before my 2 hrs was up, I saw some strobe lights of to our port. So I woke Phil up. We don't know what they were at all, very strange to see lights at all, but especially strobe. They didn't seem to be moving. i went off watch for 2 hrs and came back up to relieve Phil at 10pm. Sure enough again, 1hr into my watch there were 2 very bright lights at about 1am to our starboard. Once again I woke phil up (but only cause he told me to). They didn't come up on Radar, and had no nav lights. Not sure if these ones were moving or not!! We haven't seen any lights at night for 3 days!!! I told phil that I wasn't going to wake him up for any more lights, only if I was worried!!. Of course, no more lights. All good, only 1200nm to go

8^t Aug

Hive of activity last night, ships and oil rigs (or stations or something) to avoid on every watch, so no sneaky sleeps last night during watch times. Phil had the most. On his first pm watch, a ship was coming right for us, and had no idea we were there until Phil called him on the VHF. Then we turned on our spreader lights which light up the whole boat and he made a sharp turn to port to miss us and come behind. At the same time, one was bearing down on us from the starboard side, but he was further away, and we scooted in front of him easily. I didn’t have any ships to worry about on my watches, but had to avoid oil rigs. At one stage we were kicking a goal in between two. But they were both a good distance away. Then, this morning at about 8am when Phil was doing our radio sched, I noticed another rig coming up on our starboard side. I watched it for a while as it got closer and then looked at it through the binoculars. Actually it was a bright green Indonesian vessel. I took a photo of it with my super zoom lense and came down to show Phil (who was still on the radio) While I was taking the photo, it made a sharp 90 degrees turn to Port and headed away from us. I showed Phil the photo and he called off quite quickly and came to have a look. By this time it was headed away from us quite quickly. We called Customs on the Sat Phone. It could be a fishing vessel, but you just don’t know, so better to be safe than sorry. We couldn’t see any people on board, and that was one of the main questions they asked us....so mayhap it was just fishing!!



10^th August

I don't like Flying Fish!!!!!!!! They're stinky and smelly and slimy and horrid and putrid and land all over our boat!!! Last night I flicked off 5, and Phil 4 and then your hands get all smelly!! Then this morning I picked off 24 off the deck. Cockpit all smelly and had to be cleaned by me this morning (as I'm on first watch and couldn't stand the smell) One came from behind, and nearly went down the companionway. So, that's all for tonight...I don't like Flying Fish!! All good, only 934nm to go

That was last night, but for some reason couldn't send out emails...so following on for tonight. On first evening watch handover to Phil I reported that we'd had 9 attempted boardings, but so far fortunately, no pesky flying fish in cockpit!! So I figured we were going to be in for a big one again. As I was looking up at the windvane on top of the mast I actually saw one fly across the cockpit from one side to the other. Then, in the light of day the next morning and possibly slightly more awake....I realised that that there is no way a flying fish could fly 3m above the waves and that they really must be getting to me!!!

Another lovely day sailing, light winds, sunshine and a big, but not uncomfortable swell today. Saw another Indo fishing boat and narrowly missed a mooring buoy anchored in 3km deep water...What the?????

staying sane,

12 Aug

31 Flying fish off the decks this morning...did I mention that I hate STINKIN FLYING FISH???? Sitting in the cockpit on am watch, the sun is rising, the winds are blowing and the seas are kind....and the stench of dead flying fish is filtering down the sides of the boat. No wonder it’s my first job once the sun gets up.

18^th Aug

So, Cocos Keeling is STUNNING. Pristine blue/turquoise waters, reef, white sand. Oh photos just don't do it justice. (on that note, I don't have mobile phone or internet on boat so will have to wait till I go ashore on weekday to upload blog). We arrived Friday and then had to 'clear in', but the AFP (Australian Federal Police) could not come to us, but rather asked if we could go to West Island to see them on Sat



Then on Sat we had to go sort out our clearance. To get to West Island we have to Zodi to Home Island (about 15mins) and then catch a Ferry ($2.50 pp each way) to West Island and then a bus (50c pp) into the township. Both islands are just beautiful and so clean and tidy. So glad we're staying here for a while. There are 10 boats anchored here and we are the only Australian one. There were no Oz boats last year and only 5 the year before that!!!!! so last night it was Ben's birthday (from another boat) and absolutely everyone met ashore for a bbq. It was great and now we have met all the other yachties anchored here.

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Photos

West Island
West Island

Direction Island
notice hammocks

Comments

[Darren]

Stunning photos
G'day SSD & FWT, Thanks for keeping us up to date. Those are stunning photos! I'm glad things have (mostly) gone well, and look forward to seeing more photos soon. Lots of love from cold Adelaide.