weeks 34 35

Cape Talbot.  We’ve had to wait out a strong wind warning here for a few days.  The anchorage is not bad…

We are tucked in really close to the beach so we only have to deal with the wind.  There’s little wave and no swell.

The beach is good for scrounge by the Mustang 

.  She’s added about another kilo or two of collectables.

Been catching heaps of these …

… They are like blowies along the beach and have caught the odd one of these…

… trolling using a mini 2 deadly lure near the weed banks on either side of the anchorage at dusk.

The wind has blown so hard that it broke a blade off the wind generator…

… luckily there was a spare on board.  I only managed to drop one nut in the water during the repair.  Had a replacement handy so back up and running that afternoon.  Haven’t had to run the engine while we’ve been here.  The solar panels and wind gen have done the job (thankfully) saving us a bit of fuel.

The wind drops off at sunset each day for a while so we get to kick back at sundown…

… and check out the full moonrise…

On the last morning we had a visitor at dawn. 

… About three meters long and was having a chew on our anchor rope float.  The Mustang had a bit of slingshot practice.  He got tired of being shot at so he left and went up to the beach and waited by the driftwood tree stump I had used the previous night for filleting a fish…  Hmm…  not going ashore while he’s so close.

12^th  August 2014 –Cape Talbot to Governor Islands 13° 56.658S  126° 42.030E

Gave up waiting for the wind warning to clear so came over here this afternoon when the wind dropped down to 20 knots.  Lots of bad British accents and “Thanks Guv’” all the way here…

13^th  August 2014 –Governor Islands to Mission Bay 14° 6.426S  126° 42.852E

It was blowing 30 knots this morning and we started dragging anchor at Gov’na Islands so we headed over here.  Of course by the time we pounded our way here against the wind the breeze dropped, but not till we had dropped anchor. 

… This is the anchorage where we went for on shore to collect some bait.  The water is really clear here, it makes it really easy for the sharks to see our bait …

... and they are getting smaller in these bays...

We spent the afternoon catching up on some boat jobs…

The Mustang got rid of the salt build up and I found I had a spare one of these…

… which has been leaking since I got the boat.  Who would of guessed?

We went for a walked up Beauty Point to where we spotted a marker.  It turned out to be an avgas drum with a cairn on top that someone had put up there.  There are about half a dozen empty drums up there – can’t figure out why someone would go to the trouble of dragging them up there.

Beauty Point

 Not Beauty Point

Our LP gas usage has been a bit more this year.  We only have enough for 2 to 3 weeks left at the rate we have been using it.  The baking is the reason… 

… I hope we can get some more at Kalumburu.

We have started trying to beach cook a bit more  …

… which suits the Pyro but I can’t imagine not being able to boil water for our morning cuppas…

Trolled up a couple of new species…

Stripey Seaperch  and ...

PaddleTail (Red) Snapper.  Both a bit small but of interest. 

This is the entrance marker for the creek at Pago – note this is for the creek, not the entrance to the path for the old mission…

Just West of this is the landing for a walk to the Pago Mission ruins.  There’s a large gap in the mangroves to mark the spot to go ashore.  We went before low tide, so we had to anchor quite away out and walk in.

The driveway entrance feature includes Avgas drum and VB cans.  Buffy shows her appreciation…

On the way there is a community phone… 

…It’s free to call Australian land lines.  How many people do we know that have a landline? Only one.

… Found it.  Probably the first time we have gone on one of these jaunts and actually found what we were looking for where we expected to find it

 …well, well, well…

The old oven complete with rusty barrow.

The fresh water creek that the ruins sit beside.

… Camping fees or fine?

Buffy the Barra Slayer was covered in burrs by the time we got back to the boat. A clean up turned into a hair cut…

…I don’t think she minded…

The end result however was not what she expected….   She looks like a Gremlin that’s been fed after midnight.  Never mind…There is only two weeks between a bad haircut...

15^th  August 2014 –Mission Bay to Honeymoon Bay  14° 6.061S  126° 40.896E

 

 

… Honeymoon Bay anchorage. There is a pay phone here but, the bad news is there may not be gas available.  The water is not that bad for bore water so we have done some washing and used their amenities…

…  A nice relaxed bunch of campers, lots of really friendly and helpful people.  We’ve been offered lifts into Kalumburu next week with the school run.

The guys even drop off fish for us on the way back in…

… Fresh fish home delivered.

22^nd August 2014  Honeymoon Bay

We were going to make our second trip into Kalumburu to collect medications that have been flown in for us and to top up with fresh vegies, but the Mission nurse came out to camp last night and dropped off the drugs, so we didn’t need to collect those any more.  However, we did still want to get some more vegies, so I went into town with the blokes who were going in to get some fuel.

Unfortunately there is definitely no gas available either here or at Kalumburu but we were able to convince one of the campers here who was leaving to swap his half-filled gas bottle for our empty one.  They’ll refill the empty at Drysdale when they stop for the night there.  If we are careful we will be able to make it through with what we have now. We now also have a kettle that we picked up at Kalumburu shop for $30 …

… that we can use when the motor is running.  At least we can have our morning cuppa now without having to go ashore to boil water.  No one has died without smoking in the last months but there would be mutiny without tea or coffee.   It will just be better to do more cooking onshore.  It has been colder of the mornings lately… 

.

We have gone and got our own fish as well…

 Anyone know what this is?

Two at once.

 The Mustang adds another species to her list of catches.

We have really enjoyed the anchorage here and have had dinner most nights with like-minded campers.  We gave away our muffin mixes so that we wouldn’t be tempted to use up our gas.  They cooked them for us and served them up complete with whipped cream…

Saturday 23^rd August 2014 – Honeymoon Bay still

Had a quiet day today, not much happening. 

The Mustang spent $40 on the Community phone card to ring the kids this morning to make sure everyone is still alive, then came back to the boat and changed the fuel in Merv.  We ran some methylated spirit through the tank to clear out the blockage he was suffering from and he ran fine, but then we put some more fuel back in and stuffed it up again.  We’ve thrown out the bad batch of fuel now, but he still runs rough as guts for the first hour or so until he gets well warmed up, so we’ll have to see if we can get some more metho somewhere so we can run it through again.  The kiwis camped on the beach here went to town and got us some fresh fuel yesterday (thanks guys!).

We've been adopted by the travelling families at the camp and I was talked into  being a Grandad today – took one of the young blokes out to fish for some squid.  Cheeky bugger caught all of them himself.  Maybe I should ask for some lessons….

Went back ashore late this afternoon to have dinner with the families who have been giving us a lift into Kalumburu tonight.  Lots of rum later – a good time was had by all!

Sunday 24^th August 2014 – Honeymoon Bay... still...still...

Went out fishing this morning but I only managed to catch a couple of ugly baby cod (the Mustang reckons I caught the same one twice) while the Mustang caught a mackerel that we’ll use for bait somewhere.  It’s too small to bother filleting.  Our mates that drive us into town came out to Charisma for a visit this afternoon and had a coffee with us.  Wanted to see how the other half live.  I reckon we’ve given them some ideas about how they can keep travelling for a while (really folks, anyone can do this!).  Going to try to bake some bread tonight on the fire.  We don’t have a proper camp oven, but we’ll see how we go using our big crab pot.  Its got a glass lid, so we’ll put coals around it but not on top.  Should still work a bit like an oven right? 

We will post this on Monday for our last visit to town. We've made pretty slow progress but that's cruising.  We will head a little further west before heading back to Darwin next month...  

Week 33

31^st July 2014 – Berkley River mouth to Seaplane Bay 14° 6.314 S  127° 32.341E

A pleasant sail up here this morning.  The anchorage is subject to an awkward rolling swell which we haven’t had for a while. We’ve been spoilt in the river for too long.

 

The Mustang and Buffy the Barra Slayer lead us for a walk/climb/scramble up the hill. She’s quite pleased with her improved level of fitness(The Mustang that is. Buffy still need her nap time.)…

The view from the top.

Lots of copper ore and quartz on the beach here.

I‘ve found ,myself a new sundowner position…

1^st August 2014 – Seaplane Bay  to King George river 13° 57.891S  127° 19.877E             

 King George river mouth… Arrived here just at high tide so came on straight in.  We had only a high tide of 2.2metres which was as low as we got under the keels as we came through.  There is this beach on the south side of the entrance so the Mustang had to go a combing.

Pockets full of shells….. and

Buff checks out a petrified forest.

On the Northern side there is a creek so we went for a troll up for a look…

Caught this baby barracuda  

  and a small mackerel.  There wasn’t much depth in the creek although one metre was deep  enough for either a manatee of false killer whale that we scared out from under Merv.  The Mustang Said “Oh golly gee… that quite surprised me”

The next morning one of the large cruise boats was parked out the front and they ferried the punters in passed us in a large tour boat.  We had a quiet start and hauled anchor after having a good laugh at Buffy falling off her chair in the rush to get to the set rod when a shark took the bait.

Up to the next creek and trolled our way to the waterfall in Merv. Another Barracuda …

,,, and a small Queenie this morning. No picture of the Queenie as it managed to get off and put the hook into my fingers instead.  Nothing serious just difficult to flick the bird. 

There are a couple of ropes up the side of the waterfall that you can climb up. The mustang had to settle for just waving from Merv …

… while I did the honours… 

A BOF on top.

There is my private spa bath at the top of the waterfall…

Gold plated quartz.

The nest day we went further into the river…

… The gorges are not much higher than at the Berkley but appear older geology. We only went as far as a corner on the river called BBQ beach.  We actually went the other side of where it is suggested.  There is a only a dinghy wide break through the mangroves …

  Once through the entrance there was a large sandy area with shade, plenty of firewood and a ready made fire pit. 

…The Mustang did the cooking thing.  You can see Charisma’s mast behind here.  I made the table… 

… and The Buff got to scoff some leftovers…

Only about a nautical mile further on the river terminates at some pretty impressive falls.

. Not much water flowing but still enough for a wash.  I took Merv in for close look but The Mustang chickened out for the shower shot…

Of course no visit is complete without the climb to the top of the falls.  

  The Mustang is all smiles at the start of the trail.  It all fun until someone loses an eye…

 The cliché boat at anchor money shot.  Charisma is the second boat.

 Both The Mustang and The Buff make it to the top.

One of the things to try and locate on the climb up is “the gremlin box”  If you leave a little something in the box the gremlins will leave you alone.  The Mustang left a used tissue(hahahah)

  It was hard work on the Buffstarr . Her legs aren’t really designed for rock climbing. 

We sat out a couple of more days while the wind warning was current before heading out to the river mouth for an early start… We went for a scout on the beach north of the entrance… it was quite desolate and very small pickings for the Mustang. 

… Desolate beach. 

… Shell infanticide

… mummified sea snake.

There was this architect designed bus stop…

....  When’s the next bus?

8^th  August 2014 –King George river to Cape Talbot 13° 48.542S  126° 45.542E

We hadn’t intended to come this far today but it is forecast to blow up a bit after today so we used the good weather to get around cape Londenderry. This was the view as we left King George this morning at sunrise…

… and we had some neighbours pull up and drop the amenity of the area…

 

The Kimberley Kruising Klub Guide says “ Cape Londonderry is named after Robert Stewart Londonderry, known as Lord Castlereagh.  He cut his throat with a penknife in 1882, which is understandable if he’d just been around Cape Londonderry in a small boat when a strong wind warning was current.”!

This is the most Northern point in WA and the two conflicting currents merge just off the point and make it is a bit of a disturbed sea.  Timing and weather are pretty critical to make a passage possible and after a bit of calculation after leaving King George we knew it w3as quite doable today. Probably the best it would be for the coming week.  Bottom line is this is what the passage was like…

… yes those are the sails up.  The best days sailing we’ve had since Darwin! Complete with well deserved Backburn sundowners on the beach. ..

…sunset at Cape Talbot.  We will be stuck here for a couple of days while the strong winds blow over.  I think we’ll  manage…