Heading to Indonesia!

Young Endeavor

Leaving Darwin, AU was an interesting experience. First, the WARC had to get all of the boats out of the marina and through the lock one at a time while the tide was high. We were scheduled to be in the lock at 0800 and we were. Once out of the lock and across the mud flats into the channel, we anchored to wait for the 1100 WARC Rally Start.

There was no wind for the Start. Gennakers collapsed

shortly after this shot was taken. Slowest Start ever!

The Start was at Stokes Hill Wharf, with the training ship Young Endeavor as the offshore mark. There was no wind – as in zero! We all tried to sail out of the harbor to give on onlookers a sight to behold, but it was painfully slow. Boats were changing sail plans on the fly. Even the lightest genakers would not stand. And so the motoring began…

We motored, we motor-sailed, and we sailed some. It was very slow 920 nm passage! It took us six days and we motored 44 hours of it. Needless to say, the Rally ordered extra fuel for delivery to all boats. While pleasant without any mal de mare for me, it was boring. I read three books and did a lot of cooking en route since it was nearly like being at anchor.

There was a nasty current against us most of the way!

Trillium’s great fishing team of Dennis and Sheila did not provide any food for the table either! I couldn’t understand why they kept using the same lures every day when nothing was biting them. What is the definition of insanity? At least no one had to clean a fish! We saw a couple of whales and a few dolphins came alongside to swim with Trillium.

On our last night at sea, a large web-footed bird with a long blue beak landed on the dorade on our aft deck.  It looked like some type of Booby.  He stayed quite a while until we invited him to move because he was crapping all over the teak. He flew around us several times and landed on the grill on the aft rail. Since we did not want that whitewashed, Dennis shooed him away again.

This time he took up residency on top of the MOM-8 and hid behind the antennae pole. I think he thought we couldn’t see him. Since his tail was pointed in the right direction, we let him stay there. He rode along until about 0300 the next day. Obviously, the bird was tired or not feeling well. Apparently, when it felt well enough, it took flight.

We did get to fly Big Blue some.

There is not much in the way of marine services there at the southwest end of Lombok. We are anchored off Gili Gebe and have to take water taxis to the mainland. Our feed water pump melted a capacitor and stopped working so we had to carefully manage our water usage en route. Everyone was happy to dive in the water once we anchored! It is a little $4 part, but it can sure shut you down fast. We found one in town and also bought a spare. All is well now.

You can see there is little wind so motor sailing was the way!

Now for the island fun to begin…