Extremes

We set off from Urangan Harbour on Tuesday morning (19th July) and had a great sail under spinnaker up the west coast of Fraser Island (Platypus Bay). It was fantastic weather - 10 or so knots of wind, seas at about half a metre, clear sunny skies, and deep blue water.




We were even lucky enough to snap this photo of a humpback whale breaching in Hervey Bay. Who would have known they could look so soft and cuddly?




We anchored outside Lagoon Anchorage and enjoyed some nibblies as we watched the sun set over Hervey Bay. After dinner though, the wind blew up, and because of the tide we were side on to the seas. It looked like we were in for a rough night.



Rather than a sleepless night at anchor, we all agreed on a sleepless night under sail. I did a quick passage plan, we battened down and rugged up, and set off across Hervey Bay for Bundaberg. The wind clocked 32 knots and the seas were about 2 metres, so it was not the most comfortable ride. Even under greatly reduced sail, it was a stark contrast to the sailing earlier that day. I took the first watch and Heather took over for two and half hours from 11:30pm, then I did the final stretch into Bundy - although neither of us really slept when we were off watch. Haydee snoozed in the cockpit, and was a little champion helping me do two tacks at about 2:00am and 3:00am. Cameron was comfortably curled up in his cabin all night and got the best sleep of all of us.

We pulled into the marina just after dawn on Wednesday 20th July. The rest of yesterday was spent cleaning up the boat, and catching up on sleep. We have decided we will spend two more days in Bundy, with today being a maintenance day and tomorrow we will do some of the tourist type things (read visit the rum distillery). We will then continue up the coast on Saturday. We will visit offshore destinations such as Fitzroy Reef, Lady Musgrave Island/Lagoon and Lady Elliot Island on the way back south. That will time our visit to these turtle rookeries with the nesting period of Nov/Dec.