Colm, the kayak, Sydney

Happy St Patricks Day

Managed to get Whimsey onto a dock practically outside our new home for St Patrick's Day. Weather was changeable but had a lovely day all the same with friends and family over in the afternoon. Tried the Rocks in the evening, but so did everyone else so we gave up on the queues and headed into the city. Sunday was the big parade, lots of fun and floats. Ready for a bit of a rest now.

New Year 2012

Wishing all our family and friends a very jolly, peaceful and successful 2012.

Sean's next relocation project

Visiting Whimsey and found that there are new tenants.

Mum, dad and the relos were very cross with us when we came on board but sadly we need to relocate them as we are going up on the hard next week.

Time to antifoul, replace zincs and get an insurance survey. Meanwhile the crew are landlubbing.

Christmas in August in Marrickville

We had a lovely get together to celebrate Erin's half century and Christmas in August. Great friends came together to enjoy mulled wine, turkey, veggie sausage rolls and a juice bar.

Back in Sydney

Busy, busy, busy!!! We arrived back in Sydney on the 8th of March and have not stopped for breath since.

We spent a couple of days in Quarantine Bay, dinghied ashore to Manly and walked to get back our land legs. Then over the harbour to Glebe and the fish markets. It was a murky rainy day but through the rain we spotted old friends "The Road". As we hadn't seen the boat since 2001 in Curacao we had our fingers crossed and sure enough it was still our old friends Shirley and Taff and Rubbish the parrot.

The St Patrick's Day photos will follow.

Moving South

We set off from Southport on a sunny Saturday lunchtime expecting to motor for the next 72 hours then hop into the nearest port. Less than an hour after switching on the engine to pick up the anchor we were sailing in a lovely 15 knot breeze past the high rises and beaches of the Gold Coast.
By mid afternoon we had found the Eastern Australian current which added a couple of knots to our speed.
Monday afternoon we were heading in to Port Stephens. Just 2 miles off the entrance we caught a mid sized tuna. Fantastic trip!
Tuesday was hot breezes and high humidity. The water here is so clear that we had a dip which cooled us down nicely. The skies started to darken and, as we sat in the cockpit drying off, a squall came through the anchorage with gusts up to 50 knots. Cannot imagine what the cyclone was like with 150 knots!
Some interesting skies - the clouds below looked as if they were tumbling!

Next week will see us day hopping down the coast to Sydney.