Exmouth
By all reports is has been a bit of a strange season for the cruisers up north… a lot of northerly winds, a lot of no wind and this is where we find ourselves bright and early, as we motor out of the passage at Tantabiddi. The waters are calm and glassy and forecast to stay that way, so it looks like we are burning fuel the 13miles to North West Cape and then a similar distance south to the marina.
Lures are out, but no fish are biting despite the water being alive this morning, Baitfish everywhere, tuna smacking the surface and whales in every direction….but not on our lures. Pete is looking forward to getting to Exmouth to hit the tackle shop and replace some line, lures and hardware so we can get stuck into some decent fishing. He has a plan for a new handline which should be bulletproof when we are sailing, so a trip to the hardware store for some decent bungee cord is also in the plans.
The main excitement of the day happens when we get up level with the lighthouse at Cape Vlamingh and we get about 10 knots of wind. Woohoo… up with the Screecher and turn off the engines. The silence is heaven and, even better, we soon have a four knot current up out backsides pushing us towards the top of the Cape. We are making good time as we thread the needle between the Cape and North West Reef, which is breaking ominously about a mile away.
Before long we are pulling into the Exmouth marina. Our plan is to refuel and then head into the canals and find somewhere to ‘freecamp’ for the next few days. We tie off to the Kailas jetty only to find we can’t access the fuel bowser without an account or appointment, so Pete arms himself with the hose and gives Singularity a good old freshwater bath - something well needed after a month in the sun and salt.
We head into the canals where there are a lot of undeveloped blocks which have jetty facilities in front of them. It is an old cruisers trick to take advantage of these and we do the same - won’t be long and they will all be built out and we won’t be able to do this - but we take advantage in the meantime.
We had been chatting with David and Ciara Locke who were going to be in town, and with Lockey celebrating his 50th it looked like our timing was going to be spot on. Initially, we thought we could tie up right outside their house - only to discover that they were located behind the pedestrian bridge which spans the main canal - and therefore stops access for yachts or anything above about 6 metres. Never mind - a short dinghy ride down will put us on their jetty. Lockey was keen for us to come and surf and snorkel, but we knew we needed to get the number one job done - fix the bloody steering!
Whilst Nicky walked the 3 or so kilometres into town, Pete set about dismantling the steering. This took a bit of time and some contortionist skills, but he got it done and was able to identify what we needed. A couple of quick calls to Sydney and we soon had a part being dispatched. Now just fingers crossed it would actually arrive when they said … which was in 3 days time.
The next few days were the usual mixed bag of town visit - laundry, Nicky power walk, coffee, fishing tackle store (lures/hardware/line), surf shop (new surf hat/wax), hardware store (bungee cord/new filleting knife/torch battery), pick up our new portable fridge, Covid booster and flu jab, gas bottle refills, dinghy fuel and diesel for the boat, and, best of all, babysit Huey from Blue Yonder so Nic and Julia could get some jobs done!
It was a social time with a few catch ups (read beers and nibbles) with Nathan and Sacha Philips; boat inspection with Greg Trew and passing coffee with Sheena, Katie and tribe; Lockey’s 50th, Julia from Blue Yonder’s 39th birthday at Whalebone Brewery and the arrival of Nicky’s parents Ian and Jen on their annual northern hiatus.
Exmouth has a great visitors centre and we really enjoyed reading and looking at the history of Exmouth, as well as the amazing aquarium. Even saw a photo of Pete’s brother, Cam…doing what he does best - serving beers out the back of a police car after Cyclone Vance. We text Cam in our excitement and he explained that every so often he gets a text from friends/family who have seen it as they do the walk through the exhibition. We had planned to get some blog stuff done but the internet in Exmouth was so bad…. too many people trying to access we think. We walked into the library hoping that would be better but that was pretty bad too - so we just managed to do some computer updates and basic admin before throwing our hands in the air. Luckily, the main priority of downloading Pete’s “99 Spearo Recipes” cookbook which he had access to as part of a kick-starter campaign was a success. $50 well spent; the recipes are mouth watering!
(Footnote: We are now back at Tantabiddi on the western side of the cape. Pete has switched our Cel-Fi Go back to 3G and we finally have some good connection. Bring on Starlink!!)
The steering part arrived and Pete spent the best part of four hours cutting it to size and then carefully fitting and reassembling the steering system. All tidied up and followed by a quick dash out of the marina: 1. Check the steering and 2. Dump the holding tank!
We were itching to get back out on the water and away from the masses, but not before an afternoon sail and whale watch expedition with Nic’s mum and dad. We had a gorgeous afternoon - not a breath of wind of course, so no sailing, but we were able to get up close to a couple of humpbacks hanging in the Gulf. Great way to catch up and spend the afternoon.
All the provisioning and jobs were done and now we were heading back to Tantabiddi to await the arrival of Kalani and Marty who will be joining us for a week or so - something we were very excited about, having not seen either since we sailed out of Perth in April.
The wind finally cooperated and we had a great sail around to Tantabiddi with a nice breeze all the way on both sides of the Cape. We had organised one of the Parks and Wildlife moorings at Tantabiddi for a few nights - they are free - you just need to book. However, when we arrived, the wind versus tide was so severe the mooring buoy was hammering our boat, so we untied and went back to our old anchor spot to the north. Hopefully, the winds will be less tomorrow and we can jump on the mooring. For clarity, what happened is that we had 15+ knots of breeze blowing one way and about two knots of tidal current going the other way. This effectively means the tide is pushing the boat into the wind and the boat just gets pulled around the mooring ball, causing it to get pulled under the hull - at one point jamming itself between our rudder and sail drive. Not ideal, but a known issue here at Tantabiddi.
None of that matters however… as Kalani and Martin are arriving tomorrow :)