The last 4 hours was a rough ride under engine with 20 kts on the noise. A small vessel with unidentified AIS went past just as we were approaching the King George River, but I couldn’t physically see it, and there was no information on the AIS. I assume it was probably a private yacht heading towards the Berkeley River.
We cautiously approached the river mouth at 08:55, 1.5 hours behind my planned schedule. We had done 245 nautical miles in 42 hours. High tide was 08:15 and we got to the first waypoint at 09:05. The shallowest it got was 2.5m on the strait in approach, 4.0m at way point 1 and 12.7m at way point 2 at 09:10.
It was a relief to cross the bar without any dramas. There is a reported rock in the middle of the river up ahead that we had to avoid, and after that we should be fine. We slowly cruised all the way upriver doing about 2.5 - 3 kts admiring the magnificent scenery. I will never get sick of this beautiful river.
Along the way, we passed two catamarans that were coming out and heading to Darwin tomorrow. I chatted on the radio with one of them for 10 minutes.
As soon as I stopped, fatigue kicked in and I almost immediately fell asleep. I woke around 4pm, it was still quite hot, but the wind had dropped to a lite breeze. While I was asleep, Claudia washed all the cloths, made brownies and cooked a lovely potato & mushroom bake for dinner.
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