Breezy down the coast, dodging tankers

[mike h]

Just sailed Breezy south from Bundaberg to Yamba, about 400 miles. Pretty eventful sail considering the short distance-Went through the sandy straights under Fraser Island-very scenic, but charts were blown overboard (in a plastic cover), and had to go upwind and upcurrent(2 kt current)-the sandy straights are about 60 miles of navigating through channel markers surrounded by shoal areas-pretty funny scene me hanging off the boat with a gaff trying to get the charts. After a couple attempts I was able to get them. After getting through, became aware of heavy trawler and big boat traffic. Had a small electical fire which I traced back to a bad electrician (myself), and beat into the wind, which luckily took me outside of the main shipping. In the next couple days, the wind shifted in my favor and I began approaching bringing me into the shipping lanes(had to divert 4 times on the trip). One instance of note was the last night of the trip, hove to 20 miles out in about 30 kts-very strong gusts over 40 easy. Noticed a boat coming right for me so I un-hove to and sailed out of his way. Decided just to sail around all night(sun was just setting)-The reason I was sitting around is because to enter the rivers in australia, one needs to wait a few hours after the turn of the tide as there are sandbars in the entrances that break on an ebb and there's usually about 2 or 3 hours of overflow after the tide change. So the plan was to enter at 5 in the morning-my latest chance until the following afternoon, yet still at daylight. About 9 pm I was up watching 4 boats in my view. I was intermittingly getting food down below ready-I was already tired from barely sleeping the night before and was not looking forward to staying up again all night. I noticed one boat that I had somehow missed or thought was on a different route. I came up and realized he was close-it was very dark and I could see his stbd. light and bow and stern lights(I thought it was one of the short containers and wasn't too concerned about the lights being close together. I came up and tried to get my eyes adusted and soon realized he was extremely close so I started to bear off and then realized he was a very long ship(He was literally almost on top of me). I threw the windvane to jibe and let go the stbd. sheet and went to the other side to pull in the port when I saw how close he was. I turned and let out all the furling on the jib and pulled in the sheet. As I was turned that way I realized the cockpit was now facing the container ship and I really thought he would hit me. I didn't turn around until the 30 kts hit the genoa and Breezy lunged forward. I looked back and looked up the hull of this ship, I could see how the hull flares out as it goes up and looked like an aircraft carrier. I was almost underneath the hull at the top and thought it might suck me up( I don't know if that's possible but it scared me). I was just yelling at Breezy Go! Go! It was nuts, I really had very little problem staying up after that and at about 430 cruised into the Clarence river into Yamba. I navigated up the river a bit to the marina there where I promptly went aground in thick mud as I put a green buoy to my left(they have their buoys the other way here)-I was too tired and just went back to instinct I guess. I was getting the anchor ready to pull myself off when I guy offered his help in his little boat and pulled me off. Felt pretty dumb, but luckily it was early in the morning and only a few people were fortunate enough to witness it. All's well that ends well.

[rtbates]

Good to hear from you.

Thanks for the report.

And thanks for the information on your Tinker inflatable. Pretty amassing little boat

[oldragbaggers]

Hi Mike,
I received your email this evening and tried to write back but the email kept bouncing back from the system administrator??
Hi Mike,
Thanks for the reply. I have forwarded it to my friend. He really cherished that boat for some years. He thought he would be retiring on her, but an ailing parent and other commitments changed his plans. He will be thrilled to hear of Breezy's exploits.
Happy sailing!!
Becky

[bobdugan]

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[Joe Myerson]

Hi Mike,
Thanks for keeping us 25Ders posted on what our boats can do.
Fair Winds,
--Joe Myerson
s/v Creme Brulee (Cape Dory 25D #80),
Squeteague Harbor, MA