SUNDAY 16h September

Motored the whole way to Cid Harbour as we had to run the engine for at least 10 hours to see if the oil was going to repeat it’s previous behaviour. Once something goes wrong, then every new sound, your heart goes thump and you worry what it could be and so you are on tender hooks for the first hour and then as no smoke appears you relax a little.
Cid Harbour was magical, no wind torquise water, turtles popping up everywhere and nowhere to go and nothing to do except lunch and an afternoon of .zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Bliss. Went ashore to explore and find the spot 26 years ago where we built a fire and cooked a pork roast with Peanut butter sauce which was delicious. The whole area has changed become a National Park so you can’t light fires but can camp with table and chairs and long drop toots…..and lots of Goanna’s. A very
pleasant bay.

Fishing Notes: I don’t believe it but set up the line to jiggle for bait and then gave it to Nick who was jiggling for a few minutes then had to leave the line to do something and when he came back said I thing the line is caught on the dingy at which time the rod bent right over and took off. After 10 minute of running around the boat and playing with the fish he finally landed a 5kl silver trevally which he hadn’t even hooked but caught a line which the fish had originally been hooked on…..very tinny. Let the fish go but am now 7 behind Nick in the fishing department.

Saturday 15th Abel Point Marina (Airlie Beach)
Diesel Man couldn’t find anything wrong with the engine. Well at least nothing major. Pressure tested the cooling system which showed up a couple of leaks but these were sorted with a screwdriver applied to jubilee clips. So no head gasket or worse. Changed oil and filter again and will motor over to Cid Harbour for a couple of nights and then back here for another oil and filter change. So we live in hope.
As to the reason water got in to the oil this matter was debated long and hard at the Airlie Beach Yacht Club last night. Unfortunately it was a little too long and I can’t recall the verdict. But I think it has something to do with the fact that we’ve lowered the raw water supply hose when removing the eutectic heat exchange. This has brought it closer to water level and may have created a siphon. How’s that for a Hugo moment? So if you know a closet plumber (keep Darren out of the picture. He has a certain reputation in these parts) or shipwright please feel free to offer suggestions. Regardless of that we shall raise the pipe and get in the habit of closing the seacock to the raw water inlet in rolly anchorages.
The only other point of interest is that the average age of visitors to the Airlie Yacht Club must be over fifty. I make this assumption on the basis of the fact that at the sign in books they have the usual pen roped to the desk. They also have three pairs of spectacles. I asked the blonde receptionist if they also had hearing aids and incontinence pads. She said ‘certainly not’ with a cross look. I said then that’s discrimination. I think I lost her at this point.


Friday 14th Abel Point marina Airlie Beach.

Interesting day yesterday. Only had to come from Cid Harbour which is about 15nm but in order to do that you need a bit of breeze. Drifted in the general direction with the ebbing tide then got about 8 knots but on the nose and then finally it went a bit North and we got the kite up. Lasted about 45 minutes and then died completely. At this stage we were still a couple of miles out of Airlie. So I can now report that a 3.3 HP outboard will push a 7 ton boat along in calm conditions at 2.8 knots. Got ourselves to the harbour entrance and gingerly started the diesel which got us to our berth.
So we’re here until the engine gets a clean bill of health.
There are indeed worse places to be stuck.