Monday 20th - 21st May 2019 – Wallaby Group (Turtle Bay), Abrolhos Islands to Shelter Bay (Shark Bay)

Turtle Bay was a very rolly anchorage and we both didn’t sleep too well. I picked the closest in mooring which may have been a mistake as the mooring further out may have been a better option.

We departed Turtle Bay around 09:00 heading for Steep Point, the entrance to Shark Bay. As we pulled out of Turtle Bay a beautiful big cat called “Purnama” was coming in. We had a quick chat while passing and they said they will be heading for Shark Bay tomorrow, so I don’t think it will be long before we meet up again.

A mono hull was on the same course as us as we departed, but as there was some major squalls rolling in from the west, I motor sailed for the first hour to try to outrun them, so we left the mono hull in our wake.

Fast approaching squall

We almost managed to outrun the whole storm cell, just catching the northern edge where the wind came up to only about 15 knots, but the rain came down in buckets for about an hour. Rain was gushing down the main sail and Sirocco got to have a good shower, washing away all the salt and dirt.

Bucketing down

 It wasn’t cold; I got a bit wet running around trimming sails etc, but we zipped up the wind wood side of the cockpit and everything remained warm and dry.

For the fist five hours we have had a magnificent run completing about thirty miles on a down wind run with the wind speed ranging from eight to twelve knots and a boat speed ranging from five to ten knots. Sea state was fair, choppy with about a one-meter swell rolling on out aft port beam.

We are over steering quite a bit, so I increased the response time on the auto pilot to try and compensate which seems to have made an improvement, the down side means it will use more power.

Lunch today was left over lamb shanks from last nights dinner. We purchased a new vacuum bagger  and made heaps of vacuum sealed pre-coocked meals before leaving Perth to save having to cook during passages and in shitty weather.

This is the only way to go, whether you are out bush or out sailing, I used to do this on field trips while in Antarctica, just pull out your pre-cooked frozen vacuum packed lamb curry and boil it in a pot of snow for five minutes and in no time you are living like a king, woofing down a three course meal in minus thirty – too easy.

The wind the whole way was pretty much right behind us making it difficult to steer and prone to gybe, so I rigged up a gybe preventor for the main sail and made up a trimming line for the genoa and they both worked quite well but this additional equipment did make me a bit nervous should we experience any more squalls throughout the night.

We had a few more showers and the sky turned really black, but we never got any more squalls.

Shortly after the sun went down, it was so black without a star or moon to be seen. Suddenly I saw a faint orange glow out in the distance, but it was very hard to judge how far away it was.

At first I thought it must have been the light on a fishing buoy, and then suddenly I had a bad feeling that it could have been someone in the water who had fallen off a boat, so I started to flash my torch in the direction and got no response.

About ten minutes later the source of the light was revealed when a huge full moon tried to push its way out of the black storm clouds. Eventually as it raised high enough, it lit up the whole ocean and kept us company for the rest of the evening.

It was a very long night for me as Putu just sleeps all day and all night, so I am always single handed. Throughout the night we had three ships pass head on, one of them was over seven hundred feet long and passed within three nautical miles from us. It even changed course for us, and it felt good feeling the power of sail.

I track all shipping using my AIS and I also have my radar on at night. On both units I also set a guard zone, so they will alarm if a target enters a pre-set distance. This allowed me to get a couple of forty-minute sleeps, but I never really can sleep anyway as I have one eye open and I listed to all the sounds.

I also have my navigation system plumbed into the TV in the saloon so I can get in out of the cold and still keep an eye on things.

Sunrise near the Zuytdorp Cliffs

Conditions hardly changed all night and I only had to tack once in the twenty-four-hour passage. The wind and swell picked up a little just after day light as we approached the forbidding high Zuytdorp Cliffs, but we surfed along at speeds up to twelve knots at times till we eventually reached Steep Point, the most westerly part of mainland Australia and prepared Sirocco to enter the southern passage into Shark Bay.

Zuytdorp Cliffs

The south passage can be treacherous if a big swell is rolling so I took the time to eyeball it long enough before committing myself to enter. Once across the outer bar and into south passage the sea state calmed off and we had a short scenic cruise for a few miles before dropping the pick in two meters at Sheltered Bay for a well-earned rest.

Steep Point, the most westerly part of mainland Australia

Once we were securely anchored and I had Sirocco all ship shape, I went below for a lovely hot shower & shave and fell into deep sleep for a couple of hours.

I woke in time for lunch and then setup the generator to put some power back into the house battery bank which was getting very low.

Next job was to get the dingy in the water and all setup ready to go ashore for a walk. I was still petty knackered and working in slow motion. Putu was working on her first attempt of making bread (what bread we have left is starting to go moldy) and it was smelling pretty good.

I put the dingy in the water and then when I went to lift the outboard with the block & tackle, I discovered that we had left both sets of boat keys behind at home and I didn’t have a key to open the padlock securing the outboard.

For the next hour I tried swearing at it, I tried cutting it with bolt cutters and that just hurt my arms and hardly made a dint in it, then I tried knocking the pin out of the locking handles without successes. 

It was in a tight position so trying to cut it off with a hack saw was out of the question, so in the end I thought stuff it, and I cut through the plastic handle with a hack saw to release the padlock. This was a brand-new outboard that has never been used, Doh !!

I had a new outboard lock (different style) I purchased about eighteen months ago in a box with a heap of other “to do” bits and pieces tucked up in the forward port bow and before cutting off the remaining plastic handle to completely remove the padlock, I went looking to retrieve this new lock.

Sure enough, it was right where I left it eighteen months ago and bugger me there are two different types of keys on the key ring with it. Back then it obviously made perfect sense to leave the outboard padlock key with the new lock, but I had completely forgotten about it with the passage of time.

Anyway, I now had the key to remove the pad lock, minimal damage was done, I lowered the outboard onto the dingy and setup the dingy and installed my lovely new outboard barrel lock and I have the spare padlock to use to lock the dingy as required to any docks etc.

Just as I was packing up my tools and getting ready to go to the beach, we had visitors arrive. Cam & Billy (and their baby) from Jandu, who left Abrolhos the same time as us, (who we last saw getting engulfed in a big squall behind us), dropped in to say g’day.

They have been at the Abrolhos for the past five weeks and were on their way to the Montebello Islands. We had a nice chat and played with their lovely baby and then they headed off to the beach in one direction and we went to the beach in the other direction.

After a long walk on the beach and a chat to a few of the fishermen camped all along the beach, we headed back to Sirocco for dinner and a relaxing evening floating on a mill pond.

Track Sirocco’s progress

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Sirocco