June 17-21
Hi All,
We loved Lizard Island but it had its challenges and disappointments. The 17 hour overnighter from Cairns was uneventful and a pretty good ride except for the last 6 hours when the wind and seas turned ESE and got pretty beamy….ugh!!! But, we caught up with the north bound current (the EAC splits to go both north and south at this point) and our speed was 8.0-8.6 kts, averaging 8.3 kts…..sweet as. We did have a lot of boats to contend with in a pretty narrow shipping lane…..we think close to 25……yikes…..mostly cargo ships and fishing vessels…..a cargo vessel passing 0.5 miles away at night is just plain huge!!! Most played very nice/[professional except for 3 fishing vessels on my watch. Those three vessels wanted to play chicken…..we were on reciprocal courses…..so I changed course to pass port to port and they changed course right to us…..WTH……so I turned 90 deg away from them and one actually turned towards us for about 5 minutes then turned away. Then as we passed he turned again toward Mystic and he passed 1/4 mile off our stern…….and then resumed his course….idiot. All this was at night, they did have AIS thank goodness and I had them on radar so I knew exactly what they were doing……we call it the little “di&*(k” syndrome:))))
We got in two very, very disappointing dives. Diving the GBR has always been on my bucket list since I was in grade school and it was a huge disappointment for me. Here is how Kathy wrote on Facebook:
“Did a dive yesterday, and as feared, the coral was in dismal shape. Evidence of bleaching was everywhere. Much of the coral on the bommie we dove was already dead and covered in algae. 🙁 Even the soft corals were showing some bleaching. The fish life, though, was surprisingly good. We saw 2 cowtailed stingrays that had to be 6 feet in diameter and the variey of coral fish was stunning. All in all though, sobering indeed. Will do another dive today a little further north, so we’ll see. It appears El Nino, along with the cyclones of the last few years has taken its toll….. 🙁
Did our other dive this morning, and this reef was in even worse shape than the first one. For all practical purposes, it was dead and covered in algae. We could see the beautiful structures the coral built, and what a beautiful reef it must have been, but sadly, it will take generations to rebuild, if it is even possible. Some say the scientists are exaggerating the damage to the GBR, but at least in this area, it is exactly as bad as they said was. We are really saddened and more than a little depressed…….”
We met a Aussie in the anchorage and he said a lot of this area is just like what we saw. His theory is as global warming gets worse and the seas heat up more, the coral is dying up north but the further south you go the coral is growing so he was not surprised when we said the coral in the Whitsunday’s was brilliant and healthy.
We did spend Fathers Day here…..as fellow cruisers/travelers know, it is hard to have a special Fathers/Mothers Day when you are so far away from your family. We did have a good day though…..got in a dive, albeit very disappointing, then Brett and Stacey came over for a bbq leg of lamb….got a good do on it……and of course some excellent wine……a 2000 Consentino CE2V Meritage……yummers!!! Brett was in a mood to drink some whiskey so we put a major dent in a bottle of Bullit Rye whiskey….his favorite….just wish my boys had been there to share a wee dram or two!!!
On the day we left I did a snorkel off our boat on clam gardens……OMG……it was fantastic and helped relieve some of my earlier disappointment. I’d say there was 30-40% coral damage but the 60% that was remaining while some signs of stress, most were in good shape. And the giant clams were everywhere. I took some Go Pro video and hope to get that on the blog in the next few days.
Unfortunately, the weather turned on us again….for the last several days it has been dark and rainy and very humid. The top of Cook’s Lookout was mainly covered in clouds so we had to cancel the hike…..arghhhhhh!!!!!
Today is winter solstice here downunder……the shortest day of the year…..we are only getting about 11 hours of daylight!!!
There is another large HI (1035) forecasted for later this week/early next week which is going to create another squash zone with 20-30 kt winds……arghhhhhh. So we made the decision to do a 360nm passage, 2 nights, to the top of Cape York and Horn Island. We will get there Thursday am, rest up, then get some fuel Friday morning and leave Friday afternoon to cross the Gulf of Carpentaria (325 nm, 2 nights, get in Sunday am). It is just an ok weather window….10-20 kts ESE winds with 3-6′ short chop waves which will hopefully be more on our stern than beam. We will stop at the Wessel Islands, probably for 3-4 days as we wait out the big winds from the squash zone. This will put us in Darwin sometime around July 2-4, a little earlier than planned but that is ok. It will give us more time to play in that area!!!
Boat Stuff:
Watermaker: Hmmmm…….went out on HI pressure again. Spectra finally is communicating and they are having me do a series of tests to isolate the problem. It ran fine this am so we have lots of water but we know something is about to break and we need to find it soon while we are still able to get parts……arghhhh!!
Hope all is well!!
John
Mystic Moon
GO MYSTIC GO!!!
PS: I wrote this blog as we were leaving Lizard Island hoping we would get some decent internet along the way…..wrong……”no service” since we left so I’ll send this update via the Sat phone on Wed am……guess we should be glad we had a very weak but doable internet signal while at Lizard Island.
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