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dennisail · 13-11-2010, 05:22

Next up. 5 days on bass straight with an engine that could run, but cant be started unless its an emergency due broken engine mounts that would rattle a hole though the hull. Thats ok. It is a sailing boat, but floating around in shipping lanes with no wind and electrical fires coming from the starter motor aren't good when you see white above white lights with red and green either side from a oncoming ship. Plus low power due to the secondary gen set and changer also almost catching on fire sparking its own flames between crew members who are all starting to get fed up with all the breakages and general state of the boat. But its not all bad. Just a few more days days drifting until cold beer

Also has anyone ever seen electrical probs so bad that they can almost eat a hole through the biggest available bugle anchor in a week from contact with the bow roller? I wonder how strong the chain is now?

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:17

Part FIVE.

We head off again and we had the wind from behind. It was light and we raised the spinniker. It was nice sailing for a while and we sailed close to the 12 Apostles. We didnt stop again until Eden but the views were extrodinary. Wilsons Promentory is surely one of the nicest places you can see from the water with nice weather. We were having spells of calm which we hated more than gales. The sails would bash around and make it hard to sleep and difficut to steer. So we used the motor. Somewhere after Port Welshpool the engine mounts all broke which necesitated us to drift until wind arrived for fear of severe damage when running the engine. After drifing into a shipping lane with a ship heading staight for me I tried to start the engine. It seemed seized which caused the starer motor to almost catch on fire. Cranking the engine by hand with a large spanner allwed us to turn it over eventualy. But a puff of wind got us out of the way of the ship. The wind lasted about an hour and we were drifing again for a day. We got some more light wind and we sailed past Gabo island where we saw Bricky. Here is a pic of him. Gabo isalnd is beautiful as are all the capes around here. It tooks us over a day to get from here to Eden. We saw seals, wales, dolhpins and plenty of sea birds.

We even caught a Muttonbird on our lure plus 7 barracuda on our trip so far but nothing worth eating. I lost the lot a few times so I rigged up a 120lb line plus a speargun rubber on a hand reel as a shock cord. When going around Wilsons Promentory the speargun rubber streched out to about 2m then snapped. I would love to know what we had on there!

We now sit in Eden. We got light wind until close to Boyds Tower. From there on we had enough and lashed the dink to the rear quarter (as discoused on another cruisers thread). To my surise we moved at 3.5K with the 3hp at 2/3 throttle. The water was like a mirror. Eden is a beautiful place and we are waiting on engine parts. I hired a car for a few days and we have been driving around the area. Everything is super expensive here but its such a nice place. We couldnt be in a better spot to rest for a few days. I might go down to the Green Cape lighthouse today.

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:27

Wilson's Promontory. I'm doing a pic at a time since I get some error of the forum.

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:30

Auto Pilot

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:35

Gabo Island

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:36

Bricky

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:40

Seal saying hello

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:42

Boyds Tower in a glass out. I drove there on Sat to take a look.

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:44

Eden Mooring Pier. We are rafted up to a cruiser. $5 a night is OK though.

dennisail · 13-11-2010, 15:46

Fisherman of Eden.

Bricky · 13-11-2010, 22:00

Sounds like theres not much more can go wrong.. hopefully thing will pick up for you. You have done better with the fishing than us, three days with a lure out the back for on e small couta we were starting to think there are no fish over here. Oh well we will keep trying if we ever leave Lakes Entrance. Weather still does not look that good for a while.
Kerren was rapt to see a pic of the boat on the water.
Eden is a great place always loved it.
Went to get fuel from the ice works near the jetty but he only had diesel and we needed unleaded...got a licence he said...yes...take my car to the servo in town was his response.
Where else would that happen?

Safe trip

Daryl & Kerren

dennisail · 14-11-2010, 00:01

When I get home I can send you the 5 full res pics I have of your boat Daryl. You didn't get one of us did you?

We still don't have any pics of us under sail.

We have had heaps of people drive us around and offer us cars. Its amazing. Port Adelaide sailing club offered us their club van. Craig from Deja Vu from the club drove me to get a spare winch handle at the last minute after we took our hire car back. This is the best sailing club I have ever been to. The people, prices and facilities were great.

At Robe we were promptly offered a lift to and from the supermarket and hardware store by lady working at the fish and chip shop.

At Warrnambool 2 minutes of signaling for a hitch scored us a lift with Hamish. He was a surgeon just into town that day starting work in a few days. He drove us around for over an hour to get engine parts and dropped us back off.

At eden. I walked into a scooter store and asked if they hired cars. The guy in there wasn't the most helpful guy and said he didn't even know of a car hire. But the woman he was serving promptly gave me a lift when I said I was a yacht. She drove me around to a couple of places and even waited to see if they had a car for me before she left.

So yeah. People have been excellent. I think its the small town attitude. I don't think people in the big cities would have been so eager to help. We tried to return the favor by helping some French backpackers who could hardly speak English do an oil change on their car they just purchased. After we figured out what they wanted we drove back to the boat and got some decent tools to stop them rounding off their sump plug with a shifter.

Bricky · 14-11-2010, 00:23

Sorry mate didn't get any pics of you, didn't think of it.
You are right about small town attitude thats why we have chosen to live in them for the last 25 years.

dennisail · 14-11-2010, 01:33

Just uploading a vid of sailing with the rail under and windows almost under. You can sail this boat like a submarine and look into the ocean through the cabin top windows.

I will try and get better vid of the windows going under.

When asked about the reefing system, we were told "what reefing system, when she goes she goes. We used to race it with the cabin windows underwater". The main that was on it only had one reefing point and was stretched pretty bad. So that explains a lot.