Cruising - Townsville to the Louisiades (PNG) 2007

8 Nov,2007
We departed Townsville for the Louisiades on 8th November 2007 with a favourable weather forecast as we were expecting a SE breeze.

As usual though the SE didn't eventuate and the winds were variable thus making for sail changes and confused seas. Often we had to slow Hamamas down or to try and make her sail in light winds. It certainly wasn't  "a set and forget sail"
On the 4th night there were many squalls and buckets of rain. Then the wind and seas rose making for a very uncomfortable ride. We were not "happy campers" and we didn't have a lot of fun!

Departing from Townsville

Cruising -Keppel Bay to Townsville 2007

30 Oct 2007

We departed Keppel Bay Marina on 30 October. The trip from Keppel to Townsville was variable as we had some magic sailing, then had to drift through the Whitsundays as we collected weed around our prop in the middle of the night (when else would this happen?) Tom lay on the duckboard in the morning and managed to get it off.

It was not very relaxing the next night either as we had to play dodgems with the bulk ore carriers. Then the rebound seas from Cape Bowling Green gave us a rough ride but the crew managed to stay well.

Hamamas in Townsville

Just one of the big ships we saw.

We arrived in Townsville at 1.30 pm on 3 Nov and very quickly set about preparing to go offshore. Provisioning etc and all the while we were learning to use our Sailmail and Buoy Weather Forecasts and of course listening to Robbie Robot (the forecast from Charlieville). While in Townsville we also did some sightseeing.

Cruising- Manly to Keppel Bay- Australia- Oct 2007

22 Oct 2007

The big day had finally arrived! After years of preparations we weighed anchor, well left the dock really! This was after a very special early morning dockside farewell from many of our RQYS mates we finally left Brisbane on 20th October 2007 to cruise to the Solomon Islands via the Louisiades in PNG. Aboard we had Captain Tom, Captain  Fran and our pal Dr Jim  who was coming along to Gizo with us. It was great to have an extra hand on the shakedown leg of our journey.We had a fairly rough trip to Keppel Bay (near Rockhampton) as the weather was not as predicted. How unusual! It was particularly bad outside Frazer Island as we had our very own rain and storm cell sitting over the top of us! So the trip was wet too. We had to slow Hamamas down to make the ride more comfortable for two not so well sailors. The seas were very confused and the wind was strong so at one stage we were doing 7 knots under staysail alone!The sacrificial strips on both the headsails started to give way but fortunately didn't rip off. We assume the stitching was rotten. 

Captain Tom


Captain Fran

Dr Jim enjoys hand steering!

We arrived at Keppel Is at 10 pm on 22nd October and moved across to the Marina the next day. While there we had the sails mended and our fuel tanks cleaned as we had had a fuel blockage. Over the next week we caught up with a number of our friends.

Kay and Trevor Laister

John and Jenny