July 3-5
Hi All,
WE DID IT!!!!! Leg 1 of our 2016 itinerary!!
Made it to Darwin…….66 days, 2730nm…..about 41nm/day avg or about 5 hours/day of moving. Of course, we didn’t move everyday and in fact had a total of 15 overnighters……yikes…..and yes, we are a bit pooped!!!!
And, we have another 2500-3000nm to go through Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia for a total of about 6,000nm this year!! To put that in perspective we did about 2500nm in 2014 and 3800nm in 2015.
This last passage was pretty nice…..15-20kt winds to begin with but then eventually calmed to <5kt and the seas were mostly behind and calm…..so a pretty smooth ride……EXCEPT……as we rounded Cape Don……a notoriously famous body of water than can be quite turbulent if you do not do it right. The forecast was for E-NE winds and we would be going almost due south after rounding Cape Don…..so perfect, time the current correctly and we will have wind with current. We had about 32 nm to get to Cape Don after leaving Black Point so we left at noon to be there around 4-5pm ish……with about 1/2 of the tide still flowing south….perfect……WRONG…… the winds were ENE but as soon as we rounded the Cape they switched back to SE…..on our port bow…..WTH…..at least they were somewhat calm….9-12kts, but with a 3.5 kt current, the wind kicked up a 2-4′ headsea for about 3 hours that certainly got our attention. But, as soon as the tide changed, the winds backed to NE…..so a little wind against tide again, but the winds had calmed to 5-10 kts so not much seas to contend with.
In any event, we had to keep slowing down to make it to the entrance to Cullen Bay Marina right at sunrise which we did just right. The lockmaster guided us onto the dock……but first, yes, Mystic Moon, we know you need fuel, yes, that’s right, we will get fuel first then let the pest clearance guys do their thing….well, of course, but sorry to tell you the fuel pump is broke…..but, come on in and we’ll get you sorted and into the marina. And, we did just that. Bevan, the pest clearance guy, came on the boat by around 8am and proceeded to dump some soapy pest killing liquid…..he told us the name but we both promptly forgot it…he put it in the Cummins, Yanmar, AC, and Gen strainers and had us run the units until the soap came out the thru hulls. We then had to let it sit for 10 hours!!!
Then it was Bloody Mary celebration time, a nap, calls to the watermaker and Yamaha guys, went in search of cheeseburger in paradise, another nap, shower, cocktails and then early to bed. Of course, there was plenty of internet time…..PK had 289 emails to go through….yikes!!!! So glad the market is back up and we missed all the Brexit market reaction!!!
We did spend the night on the pontoon, outside the locks as they kept hoping the fuel pump would be fixed. But alas, the magic was not found overnight so today we came through the locks and into our berth. Lockmaster asks…..so do you have any experience going through locks…..does going through the Panama Canal twice count…..ok, you are good to go…..move it out Mystic Moon:)))))
And here we sit…..a nice calm berth….a bit hot….close to 90 deg, but humidity is down……Kathy is doing 10 loads of laundry…..she did not want to use up the water the last few weeks as we never knew when the watermaker might shoot craps at any time.
Tomorrow we apply for our Indonesia social visa, start buying Indo rupiah, and the list goes on……boat projects, cleaning, et al. But, we do have the 5 day tour around Darwin coming up on Sunday…..let the road games begin again!!! We leave with the Sail Indonesia Rally for Kupang on West Timor on July 23!!
Here is the link to the Rally page if you want to know about it: http://www.sailindonesia.net/home/home.php
Hope all is well!!
Cheers,
John
Mystic Moon
REST MYSTIC REST!!!!
PS: We had some issues with our website but our son Josh got them all sorted and the website is back up. I just posted the last 3 blogs!!!
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