Trapped at Great Keppel Island

23-28 June 2016

We not sure what it is about Great Keppel Island but every time we come here with plans to stay a day or two it ends up much longer. We try to blame it on the wind not being right to continue on but really we just love the place so much we find it hard to drag ourselves away.

When we stumbled out of our bunk after a great night’s sleep in the calm of North West Island, some forty nautical miles east of the Keppel Islands, we were  greeted with an absolutely stunning morning of glassy water and breathless air. Rob quickly took the opportunity to point out to the two New South Wales crews anchored with us what a great State of Origin game it had been the previous night. His enthusiasm for the football didn’t seem shared by either Chances or Sea Whiskers this morning.

Anne on Chances took this great morning shot of Our Dreamtime and Sea Whiskers at North West Island

Our anchor chain dropping 9 metres then laying across the sand.

As tempting as it seemed to stay in the paradise of North West Islands, a moderate north westerly wind was predicted to spring up that afternoon to be followed by a strong south westerly change a day later. This would be a very uncomfortable and potentially unsafe place to be in those conditions. It was time to bite the bullet and motor across the windless water to Great Keppel Island for a couple of nights before continuing on up the coast.

Karen on the helm as we say goodbye to North West Island

 

We didn’t bother to raise any sail at all during the day as the trip across was about as boring as you could get. With our clean hull and Propspeed coated propeller working well together we were able to maintain six knots at just 1300rpm in the flat water which certainly helps limit fuel consumption. To help the time pass we both read our books while keeping an eye on the waters ahead. Rob also broke his boredom by cooking up a nice pizza for lunch in the BBQ and Karen felt inspired enough to bake some yummy banana bread for afternoon snacks.

It's all about the food on Our Dreamtime

Fresh baked banana bread.

As we crossed the main coastal shipping channel we again made our way through a huge area of brown sludge. We have come across large areas of this in our passages in Queensland coastal waters and the Gulf of Carpentaria. Some people argue that it’s just coral spawn but having lived in Townsville and the Whitsundays we’ve seen enough of that to know this is something else. The crud we motored through this time re-enforced our belief that what we encounter is foul ballast water pumped out by bulk carriers as they approach harbour to load up with coal. It’s awful.

This crap in the water is disgusting.

It was not a small patch of the crud that we motored through

The water was nice and clean again once we cleared the shipping channel. This is Barren Island east of GKI.

North West Island to Great Keppel Island - 43.2 Nautical Miles - 7 Hours 10 Minutes
Average Speed 6.0 Knots - Max Speed - 6.8

Our anchorage in 3 to 5 metres of clear water at Great Keppel Island

Fortunately the water was beautiful, clean and clear where we anchored near Svenson’s Beach on the northern side of Great Keppel Island.  Karen prepared a very nice rack of lamb and vegies which Rob cooked on the BBQ as we cracked a bottle of bubbles to salute the sunset.

We then spend the next few days simply enjoying the fantastic island that is Great Keppel. We did some exploring in the dinghy and put the crab pots down amongst the mangroves in the tidal creek. Karen sat on the beach and did some painting while Rob got stuck into the blog again. More books were read, great food cooked and eaten and a bottle or two of wine emptied.

 

The BBQ continues to get a workout on Our Dreamtime

 

Putting the crab pots down

Even inside the mangrove creek the Great Keppel water was crystal clear.

 

Saturday June 25 marked Karen's Father's birthday but also the 40th anniversary of the day her family launched G.F.V. Wahoo, the 36 ft game fishing boat that was to be Karen's home in the Whitsunday Islands for a number of years. We were able call Trevor with birthday wishes and some nostalgic recollections of their first voyage on Wahoo from  Brisbane up to her new home at Shute Harbour. The next morning Karen's Mum emailed us some great old photos including one from their stop at Great Keppel Island back in 1976.

 

Karen with her family on Wahoo's flybridge on launch day.

 

 

1976 - Karen and her brother Russell enjoying Svenson's Beach at GKI while Dad cleans the dinghy with Wahoo at anchor.

 

 

Late each afternoon we made our way ashore at Svensen’s Beach and gathered with other cruisers around the fire to meet new people, swap stories, enjoy a drink or four and of course, discuss the weather and sailing plans.

Karen and Anne from Chances at sundowners

Karen's spinnaker themed sundowner snacks

Each night delivered a great sunset

Cruisers around the Svensen's Beach fire for sundowners

It’s the sort of place where it’s very easy to convince yourself that although the weather tomorrow may be OK to head north it’s probably going to be better if we stay another day – or two. Yep! We love it here.

But enough is enough. The forecast looks pretty good so we will definitely leave tomorrow - probably - OK maybe.

Goodnight from Great Keppel Island.

If you'd like to find out more about Great Keppel Island you can read about our previous stops there at You can still get Wrecked at Great Keppel Island , Island Head Creek to Great Keppel Island and GKI to Pancake Creek.

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Storing Good wines afloat.

Back in our BS (Before Sailing) days when we lived in a house, worked and actually made money instead of just spend it, we collected some very nice Australian wines over the years. We even had a very suitable cool, dark place to cellar them under the house. When we made our plans to sail off into the sunset we began drinking our way through our cellar of ‘Good’ wines rather than taking the option of trying to keep it.

 

It was a tough job we’ll admit but someone had to do it. By the time we headed off through Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, what was left of our much diminished collection was put into storage at our daughter’s house. When we made a brief visit back to Australia before heading over to sail the Mediterranean, the stocks were further depleted. Hic!

A couple of years of Med sailing later we returned home to buy the boat we plan to sail for the rest of our lives. By the time we found the right boat and actually moved onto Our Dreamtime, our extensive wine collection had shrunk to only a handful of our ‘Very, Very Good’ wines. These then came on board with us and most were enjoyed along the way during our five month shakedown cruise through the Great Barrier Reef islands last year. It was only our two oldest and very best wines that survived the cruise. The vintage of these two bottles were 1963 and 1983 respectively.

On suitable occasions in the right anchorages the real glasses and 'good' wine have come out aboard Our Dreamtime.

Even in our house, when we cellared our very best wines we stored them in individual polystyrene foam post packs we had bought from the post office. These insulate the wine very well protecting them from exposure to light and limiting temperature change in Queensland’s humid, sub-tropical climate. They always worked well for us on land, so that’s the way we have stowed our best wines on board the boat.

 

Polystyrene foam post packs bought from the post office have been our 'very good' wines protective cocoon  for years.

Whenever we told people that we had quality wines of this age on board most shuddered and said we were mad, that it was not possible for top quality wine to survive on 42 foot yacht without spoiling. Well these bottles have been on board with us for two years now including our little jaunt up to the Whitsunday Islands and back.

Before departing on our current voyage, we enjoyed an awesome afternoon of excellent food, fine wine and great company at the home of a good friend, Neil Harding, from our before sailing days in business. To celebrate the catch up we finally cracked the bottle of 1963 Penfolds Kalimna Cabernet we'd been lovingly closeting since about 1998. It was the second last bottle of ‘Very, Very Good’ wine we had left from those days.

Neil supervising as Rob decants our 53 year old bottle of Penfolds

 

 

Karen and Neil preparing to enjoy our second last surviving 'very, very good' bottle of wine from our before sailing days.

Before we opened it Rob suggested it was an "S or S" bottle in that, at the grand old age of 53 years old, it would either be Sublime or Shit. We are delighted to report that even after its moves from house to house and then two years afloat, the $1.10 foam post pack had done its job. The wine was AWESOME!!!!!!!!!.

We had never tasted fifty year old wine before so it was a real experience and an eye opener as to how unbelievably good a truly well aged wine can become. We were also in awe of how skilled the Penfolds winemakers who produced this gem were. We believe this particular vintage won the very prestigious 1964 Jimmy Watson Trophy which was in fact Penfolds’ very first JW. We can assure the judges that it has matured in the bottle very nicely since then. Pity we only had one of them.

YES, very good wine can survive on a yacht, at least for a while, if it is well stowed and protected. We don’t begin to pretend it is as good for the wine as laying still on the shelf of a nice cool cellar, but you can take a special bottle or two with you when you sail away if you’re so inclined.

NO, we’re not telling you exactly what our last remaining ‘Very, Very Good’ bottle is other than to say it is another Penfolds. When will we drink it?  Karen’s upcoming 25+25 birthday celebration at Airlie Beach is a likely candidate for that honour.  In the meantime its back to our usual cheap Aussie reds we get from the discount liquor barn. Hic!

 

Essential provisions of a slightly cheaper variety are now the mainstay of Our Dreamtime's stocks

They simply get wrapped in old socks or cut-off baby's romper suits to prevent rattling where they're stowed under the soles.

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If you have only recently discovered our blog and would like to read how it all started, or work through our previous adventures, click the link to go back to our first blog entry. Stuff it. Let's just go sailing anyway.

 

We hope you enjoy reading the previous posts to catch up on our story.

More Reef Hopping to North West Island

22 June 2016

After our unbelievably calm evening anchored inside the lagoon at Fitzroy Reef, ten to twelve knots of westerly breeze sprang up during the early hours of the morning. By the time we arose, the previously glassed out water around us was covered in a small chop which, combined with the wind, put us off our plans of spending the day snorkelling more of this incredible reef.

We were far outside normal  phone service range so we downloaded the latest weather forecast via our new Iridium Go satellite communications. It indicated that this wind should swing more to the south west before dropping out late in the day with virtually windless conditions for the following day. A strong southerly change was on the way after that so we would need to be tucked away at Great Keppel Island by then. Oh the joy of getting up to date forecasts regardless of position.

It is very reassuring to be able to obtain current weather forecasts when out of normal internet range.

 

Chris and Sally from Sea Whiskers and Garry from Chances came by in their dinghies to take a look and we all came to the same conclusion. A hop to an anchorage located against the reef at North West Island would let us explore another area and put us thirty miles closer to Great Keppel. As it was already after nine and we were at the top of the tide, all crews then set about getting underway.

The high tide meant we had more depth under us through the narrow entrance but with a small chop disturbing the surface it also meant the reef was harder to see under the water. Fortunately we were close enough to the slack for there to be minimal current running. As the tide drops the majority of the water in the huge lagoon has to flow out this small gap in the reef generating a very strong current which makes leaving at the wrong time far more hazardous.  We simply retraced the GPS track from our entry and were soon on our way.

Here you can see our in and our GPS tracks through the reef entrance.

Our course would take us through the channel between Wistari Reef and Heron Island and on to North West Island. We had thought the wind angle would allow us to sail but Murphy’s law struck again as the wind dropped and rather than swing to the south west it went  north west, straight onto the bow.

Not the wind reading any sailor wants

 

The engine stayed on giving us a bumpy ride. We bore off just enough to put some wind in our main and stay sail which steadied the boat a lot making things more comfortable. By the time we needed to come back on course to enter the channel we were well in the protection of the reefs and the sea had flattened.

Approaching the channel between Heron Island and Wistari Reef

There is a small harbour on Heron Island excavated out of the coral but the resort controls it and does not permit access to private boats other than in an emergency. We would have loved to have made a stop and explored the world famous island but there isn’t really any suitable anchorage outside the reef. The wreck sitting high out of the water on the reef near the harbour is a stark reminder of what can happen if you miscalculate around here.

A reminder of what can go wrong around coral reefs

Leaving Heron Island behind

Wistari Reef to our port

We cleared the channel and continued on with the wind progressively dropping further. The largest coral cay island in the Capricorn/Mackay section of the Great Barrier Reef, North West Island is located on the western edge of a huge reef formation. It was sadly once the location of a turtle meat canning operation but is now a national park and a major hatchery for thousands of migrating sea birds. Our anchorage lay tucked in against the island’s fringing reef and is considered secure in south easterly winds of up to 30 knots.

Fitzroy Reef to North West Island - 33.2 Nautical Miles - 5 Hours 30 Minutes
Average Speed 5.9 Knots - Max Speed 7.4 Knots

North West Island lays within a huge reef system

Our anchorage tucked in against the fringing reef

 

We were expecting less than five knots from the south west and that’s what we got as we dropped our anchor seven metres into the clear sand.  Like our experience at Fitzroy Reef, by sundown the wind had dropped out entirely and we were treated to yet another magnificent, ever evolving colour show that lasted long after the sun had dipped below the horizon.

Anne on Chances  bow catching the sunset

The sky changed minute by minute



Anne took this panoramic from Chances with Our Dreamtime just in frame on the right



After the night sky finally went dark, we retired below to enjoy a nice prawn pasta that Karen whipped up. Tonight was the second game in the annual State of Origin rugby series that pits our beloved Queensland Maroons against the evil forces of the New South Wales Blues. Queensland had won the opening encounter of the three game series and success tonight would wrap up our 10th series win in the last eleven years.

 

 This far from the coast we found we had no phone or internet service so Rob was seriously considering calling our son via the Iridium Go Satellite system for progress reports. In an act of mad optimism he swung the TV out of its locker and switched it on 'just in case' we had any sort of reception. You can imagine our surprise when a crystal clear television picture appeared on the screen. As an anchorage, North West Island was certainly delivering tonight. Our Maroons then won a tight game to extend their winning ways and we went to bed as very happy Queenslanders.

Goodnight from North West Island

We love to receive comments on our blog from readers. If you do leave a comment and you also have a blog, please leave a link as well. We'd like to click over for a visit and leave you a comment too.

To stay right up to date with what we’re up to  and see lots more photos check out and 'like' our Dreamtime Sail Facebook page at DreamtimeSail
  

If you have only recently discovered our blog and would like to read how it all started, or work through our previous adventures, click the link to go back to our first blog entry. Stuff it. Let's just go sailing anyway.

 

We hope you enjoy reading the previous posts to catch up on our story.