Over the bar and
safely into the South Pacific Ocean on an absolute calm day with winds at 5
knots, seas with no swell and beautiful blue skies. We head north past Old Woman Island (looks
like a whale). Motoring along at a speed
of 16kmph. We are now really beginning
to feel like our trip is all speed ahead.
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| Turtle swimming passed us |
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Noosa Heads
We pass Noosa
Heads and Noosa North shore and we suddenly notice swimming passed us is a huge
turtle who is bobbing his head up and down in the water. We do a quick turn around to have a look at
him, swimming so gracefully with what seems like not a care in the world – Just
like us now…. |
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| Double Island Point Light House |
We can’t believe
how calm the sea is and the day seems so perfect. We see in the distance The light house on
land at Double Island Point and remember back a few months prior, to when we
were camping on the beach and walked up to this light house and watched out at sea to see
another cruiser boat motoring passed. On
that day we looked at each other and said, “Not long now and that will be
us”, Excitement ran through us both on
that day, but nothing like we are feeling now that we are living “ This Dream”.
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| "Bottle number 1" |
Before we left
Brisbane we bought four coloured glass bottles and decided that along our trip
we would drop these bottles in the ocean at sporadic points with notes in
them. In the notes we will write what we
are doing, our blog address and the point where we drop them and the date. In the hope that someone, somewhere, someday
finds them and contacts us.
So just passed the
Double Island Point light house, we pull out a red bottle and write our note,
we then seal the top with some silicone (as Andrew says – “ Silicone fixes,
cough’s, colds and sore holes”). We then
throw our first bottle with the name of Mingo written on the side over
board. Its funny the feeling you have
watching something of yours floating away behind you to who knows where.
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| Friday "Traffic on the ocean wave" |
Further during the
late morning and we have now been motoring for about 4 hours and see our first
yacht in sight. We could really begin to
love this type of Friday traffic!!
Its beautiful out
at sea and very surreal when you cant see another boat in sight. We are looking at sights now from the
opposite side we are used to. We have
camped on Bribie Island and Noosa North shore and have visited Noosa Heads and
Fraser Island and Inskip Point but we are now seeing them from sea instead of
seeing sea from land.
Up towards the
southern end of Fraser now and onto Inskip Point. We have been told this bar is pretty
treturous to cross, and Christie is at her wits end with the thought of having
to boat surf the waves for half and hour
whilst crossing the bar, especially when we are not able to find our line of
sight because the sun is gleaming off the water. Half an hour later and white knuckles for
Christie and a huge adrenalin rush for Andrew who finds the surfing of a 30
foot, five and a half ton boat exhilarating, we get to the other side and are
happy to be radioing in to Tin Can Bay coast guard that we are safely across.
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| Beautiful night at Pelican Bay |
We have now
entered “Great Sandy Strait” which is known as one of the best and safest
waterways in Australia for sailing with an abundance of wildlife including
dolphins, dugongs, turtles and birds, (and Christie thinking hopefully not
sharks). We find a quiet spot called
“Pelican Bay” with only 4 other boats anchored around. We then want to do a bit of exploring around
the mangrove areas before dark, so put the “Sea Joey” back in the water (as she
is now tied up at the back of the boat), and of course what else but find out
that we have filled her to much with air and split a seam. We look at each other and laugh….. Thank goodness for the bike tyre repair kit
for some quick fix it by Andrew. We then
watch the sunset as we have our fishing rods out and are sitting back having a
few nibbles on our line but unfortunately to our disappointment no catches.
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| Andrew having a fish |
After a nice sleep
in we wake to another beautiful day, and cant believe that we are only a few
hours from Brisbane and the weather is already feeling a few degrees
warmer. We have a nice coffee and warm
croissants with jam and butter for breakfast before heading to have alook
around the southern end of the Straits.
So off to Tin Can bay we head. First stop is a fuel fill up at the marina,
then head back out to Tin Can Inlet to anchor up the boat and take the “Sea
Joey” (who is now temporarily not leaking) for a ride to shore. We have a 40 min walk into the small town to
buy a paper and some milk then have a stop at a lovely little cafe on the
waterfront for a coffee. This café is
renowned for having dolphins come and visit out the front (we weren’t lucky
enough to witness this on our visit).
Back on Mingo and
we have a bit more of a rough ride to our next stop as the winds have blown up
and even though we have coverage from the islands, we seem to still have a bit
of swell. We head over to a spot on the
Western side of Fraser behind a “Dream Island” where we anchor up in once again
very calm waters with about a dozen other boats also having chosen here to get
out of the wind for the night.
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| Enjoying the view with champagne on the front of Mingo |
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