We left Moreton Bay on the 31st August with S/SE winds forecast at 10-15kts and a sea/swell combination of 2M. It was a beautiful clear sky with lots of sun. The seas were calm until Caloundra where they picked up...but there were lots of dolphins to accompany us. AK also saw her first shark off the tip of Moreton Island, very exciting.
Manatee averaged 6.5kts with her headsail deployed, she really does motorsail beautifully! The entrance to Mooloolaba was shoaling so the port marker had been moved so that we had to enter the harbour beam on to the swell....interesting. The entrance was also shallower than we expected with not much depth under us in the 2nd hour of the flood tide.
We anchored in the Mooloolah River which was very crowded. We spent a very enjoyable few days here, lots of beach walking and chilling in the sunshine. We were joined by our friends Miki and Steve on SV Boris, a 40' Adams steelie that they totally rebuilt at Monty's over a few years. Their blog is stemik.net.
Unluckily AK lost her purse overboard on the 6th. Damn every card was in it.
We (crew of Boris and Manatee) all decided to leave Mooloolaba on the 7th. To get the right tide to leave the harbour we had to up anchor at 0340....shivers! Our destination was Lady Musgrave Island. Lucky it was dark as we probably would have freaked if we'd seen the size of the swell on the bar....which we had to turn beam on to. It is the first time Manatee has taken water over her sides. Jacki and Ruby did freak and had to be ushered downstairs. Pearl had to be woken to go as well...she's not a morning being either!
The weather forecast was winds s/se 10-15kts with the seas at 1.5m and the swell 2m decreasing. We waited until dawn to put up our sails by which stage it wasn't worth it..the wind was light and variable. We headed into deep water a few nm off shore while Boris hugged the coast looking for stronger winds. The sea/swell coming from the se mostly was 3-4m and hitting us on the beam, which made for a rolly ride.
The fur girls were antsy and irritable the entire way, it hadn't been a good start for them. We started thinking about options, as it was a good 24hr journey outside of Fraser island to our first anchorage. It wasn't shaping up to be a pleasant night!
After getting bar advice from Tin Can Bay we considered going over the Wide Bay bar (between the southern point of Fraser Island and Inskip Point) into the Sandy Straits, not something we were looking forward to due to its reputation. Abeam Wolf Rock we saw a magnificient sight....a humpback mother and calf lolling on the surface, mum waving her massive flipper. That helped us make the decision, if we see dolphins it means we enter an area, they generally escort us, so if we see whales....wow...
We headed up to the bar entrance, we already had the GPS co-ordinates, looking for the light leads. Yachts waiting to leave the area over the bar were reporting substantial breakers with replies from the laconic coast guard "yep that will be why they call it the mad mile". We couldn't find the leads, it was late afternoon by this stage, with the sun behind the leads making it a difficult task. AK never being one to totally trust a GPS, made the call to another yacht we knew was behind us 'Amazing Grace' to enquire of their bar experience. They had done 'it' 6 times so we were happy to follow them across.
Margot was on the helm with AK repeating 'just look straight ahead' with waves breaking either side of our path. At one point a red yacht made straight for us from the opposite direction, we both
said "who's that mad bastard". On closer inspection it was Eric on 'Isabella', hi Eric!
It was a relief to drop our anchor at Pelican Point at 1720.
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