We’re back! I think we managed to navigate the arrival our newest crew member, baby Ava and Covid-19 remarkably well. Yes, we are grandparents and we now look forward to family visits on The Bossa with an eager young one to share our travels with.
It seems so long ago that I was in the water with my cameras and at Lady Musgrave, but here we are again in 2021. Having said that, it doesn’t take long to feel like it was yesterday either.
Monkey Beach is a small bay on the western side of Great Keppel Island. It has a fringing reef that attracts day visitors from Yeppoon, along with us yachties who want a quick snorkel. In recent years this reef has looked a bit sad with algae growth,
Sometimes when you least expect it, long passages can be fun and full of surprises. We have crossed the “paddock” many times in The Bossa. It’s the stretch of water between Great Keppel Island and the Whitsundays. No mainland anchorages, all remote and most are uninhabited islands.
Last season we only managed to get as far north as the Whitsundays due to our late start with Covid restricting our annual migration to Queensland in 2020. This season we have made it to Magnetic Island and we are about to venture even further north via some outer reef stopovers.
Oh the strong SE trade winds! They have been relentless since arriving in the tropics. But, we did manage to sneak in a few days out at John Brewer Reef with a welcomed calm forecast recently.
Phone and internet at last! We have been enjoying the sights of Hinchinbrook Island for over a week now, primarily due to weather constraints, but there has also been an eagerness to enjoy and explore the natural beauty of this island.
I could call this post ‘Dumped at Dunk’ I suppose, but no, I’ll stick with Beaver Reef for the moment. The ‘Dumped at Dunk’ story … you’ll just have to wait!
What a game! What a game! What a game! What a great time we had in Cairns. Nearly two weeks of catching up with Leanne and Steve who now live in Cairns. We met these two five years ago on their Fusion cat Easy Tiger. Easy Tiger has a new owner but our friendship has… Read More »
What a wonderful 10-days we’ve had, all because of a perfect weather forecast – gentle northerlies! Yes, they take us south, but it also meant we could reef-hop south from Cairns to Magnetic Island rather than via the familiar mainland anchorages.
After a brief visit back to the mainland where we met up with Waterfront, we then both continued to hop down the outer reef via Britomart, Walker and Kelso Reefs.
The strong northerlies have been blowing forever and with daily thunderstorm warnings we decided to stay in the Port Of Airlie Marina for a few nights (no anchoring off Airlie in northerlies). We were also waiting on two packages, one being our new screecher which we had been missing big time since our old one… Read More »
We have visited Monkey Beach on Great Keppel Island many many times and I’ve snorkeled here most of those visits. But this time we scored the perfect anchorage. My ‘dream’ anchorage is one that lets me snorkel straight from The Bossa. There’s no need for Neville to hang about in the dinghy. He can return to the… Read More »
There has to be a last snorkel! Sitting at the Gladstone Marina for nearly a week, waiting for strong SE weather to pass through, we had plenty of time to plan a Lady Musgrave visit but I think we must have exhausted the alphabet with the number of plans we came up with. Tides, winds… Read More »
Another great sailing season has come to an end. We have been very fortunate getting to our boat again this year. We left Victoria back in July crossing the NSW and Qld borders, but little did we know Victoria and NSW would experience more Covid lockdowns and that there would be more border closures.