Cape Peron
We sailed out of Turtle Bay just after sunrise with a forecast of light winds, predominantly from the east – exactly the direction we were going – so it was likely to be iron sails for the 28nm.
Once we cleared Cape Levillian, it was straight out with the lure and about half an hour later off it went with a bang! After bringing the boat to a halt, it was time to get this fish in. Pete was a little unsure about what it was as it was strong and shaking its head quite a bit. Finally, we got it to the boat and it was a Giant Trevally, a big one at that and probably in the 6 to 8kg range. These fish are like horses, very strong, but not great eating. We had decided we wouldn’t keep it and whilst we were getting organised to remove the lure a bit of slackline allowed it to free itself and off it swam.
The rest of the passage was pretty uneventful and before long the red cliffs came into view and we were soon sidling up to our planned anchorage at the Cape. Glassy conditions greeted us and we were soon settled on the anchor, just 50 metres off the beach. We planned to spend the next week exploring this area and spending a bit more time fishing and diving.
We were the only ones around, apart from Gary the goat and his merry band. These goats were pretty funny – every morning they would walk down the beach and then spend the day perched up on the cliff in the protection of small overhangs. In the afternoon, they would come down onto the beach, before duly marching off up the dunes, only to return again the next morning.
Our anchorage was protected from the easterly winds, but was subject to a fairly strong tidal stream which could create issues if the wind had any north in it. North easterlies were planned, so we would just have to wait and see how things panned out. Well, true to its word, we had an issue – at 3am in the morning of course!! A howling easterly combined with a strong tide had moved us around quite a bit and now our anchor was dragging… fortunately it was dragging to the west, so whilst no immediate danger, we needed to pull the anchor and reset ourselves. Being a good skipper, Pete had scoped out the bay in the dinghy in the days previously and we knew that the ground was clear right up to the beach. So, with Nicky on the front bow armed with a torch, we pulled the anchor and slowly nudged our way towards the beach and also to the south, taking us into more sheltered waters.
After about twenty minutes of maneuvering, we had the anchor reset, and given it was now past 4am, we decided to just have a cuppa and a coffee and sit and wait to make sure the boat was ok. Typical boat life – all calm and then mayhem for a little while!!
The easterly continued to howl over the next few days. We got fed up with the tide pushing us around and also poor old Singularity was getting covered in red dust from the hill in front of us, so we decided we would move a couple of miles to the south, down near Bottle Bay. Up with the anchor again and we motored down to a great spot, just out from a small red cliff that runs along the beach.
Glassy days ensued and we were able to explore around the other side of the Cape, even managing to nail a few squid. We did some walking and exploring, catching up with our old goat mates who had moved over from the Cape.
The area was dotted with small rocky and coral areas, so we had some fun diving and spearing over the next few days. Ray and Jackie, on Solitaire, joined us after a week at Monkey Mia so we celebrated with a sundowner on the beach with the red cliffs as a backdrop and a glassy ocean out in front of us.
We now had a run of light wind days and we were keen to head north to Carnarvon, as we wanted to be at Warroora by June. Wednesday was forecast to be light with a stiff south easterly on Thursday, but we didn’t want to wait another day as the forecast on the other side was looking good for travel up the Quobba coast.
So, just before dawn, we hoisted the main and headed initially north west to avoid the Peron Flats and then onwards to Carnarvon.