Last blog while sailing

Currently 900 am on Sunday 7th ish of november, abeam ofport stephens on our way home after a fantastic 3 odd months. We left Coffs at 1100am yesterday and had a hair raising sail to here over night, gusting over 30 from the north, seas were large and the current was fast, plenty of rolling so much that the second tea pot of the trip went flying and smashed glass all over the floor. This part of the world always has rough seas, very steep and curling wave tops, I even got a few drops of salt water on my legs in the cockpit last nite!
Ship ships ships, what would you do without AIS, many are not under command, two all round red lights, and as such you could sail quite close to them, something impossible without knowing that they are just drifting.

Not even a moment passed after discussing dinner when the familiar sound of 'fish' came from the rod, this time we furled the headsail and went abeam to the wind, dinner was a nice tuna! Yum. Sashimi for entree then the rest was green curried Marions style.

ETA into Davis marina is now 900 pm tonight, we lost a bit of time as we travelled extra distance by only one gybing it, or should I say one granny, if you don't know what that means then use it to strike up a conversation with a sailor.
Pics of tuna and the speedo over 10

Check out this kite

You can spend $3000 on a new spinnaker or even more on a fancy parasailor (a sexy type of spinnaker), or or you can do what the guys I met at Coffs have done and that is to buy a surplus parachute from the military for $60, check out the results. I'm getting one. Also as they are made of silk you can re stitch them into French knickers!

http://saltygardener.com/2011/08/02/parachute-trials-in-platypus-bay/

Last leg

Tomorrow we hard off for the final 220 miles to Sydney, sounds a long way but after the trips we have done it is only 30 hours, Scott is coming back up and David Elliott will provide commentary and constant chatter. Talking about constant chatter, the local bellingin radio station I mentioned previously is online, listen to it and you will be hooked, locals are the presenters and hey all have their quirks which makes great listening, also their music choice is Fantastic
Www.2bbb.net.au
Jobs today were oil and filter change, easy peasy, more varnishing and I finally fixed the water tank gauge. You know when you start one job and then you see another, you start that, then go to get a tool and you end you finishing what you started yesterday, usually there are three jobs on the go at once.
The water gauge has two guides and a twisted centre rod that moves the dial as it floats up and down, the whole lot was encrusted in scale like a pommy tap. Two hours later wire brushing and sanding it works perfectly. Pic below along with the oil change, note the little pump that sucks the oil out, then it pumps the new oil back in, way cool!
Also cool is the car I saw in the car park, check out pic

Coffs Harbour day 3

After waiting out the southerly and three meter swell, I am now waiting for crew to arrive on Saturday, thus am back on the job list again. Lots of varnishing to do, toe rails, hand rails, eyebrows, locker jambs, the list is endless. I'm using marine cetol, not quite the traditional varnish as it gives a stained finish. The advantages are that it is much longer lasting and no sanding is required between coats, at $75 a tin it would want to be good. Oil change is on the agenda as have over 200 engine hours since the last one in Gladstone. The engine takes 20 liters, new oil is easy the trick though is to get a container large enough to get rid of the old oil, I received strange looks as I rummaged in the bins behind the restaurant strip in Coffs trying to find a empty cooking oil drum. While I mentioned it, the Coffs restaurants are fantastic, Indian, Thai, and plenty of other spicy delights, check out the menu of where I'm eating tonite, goat curry!

I'm moored right by the fuel dock, check out the pic of the new Riveria it is on it's way to Canada! How did anyone sell an Aussie boat to Canada? The guy must be a supersalesman, surely any motor boat in the US has to be cheaper with the currency and the general crappy state of the US market. Not only that, Riv's are built for the Aussie climate, I think it snows in Canada.
Coffs has a great radio station BBB, I had to down tools and listen to a lecture that they were reloading from Helen caldicot, more nuclear scaremongering, I would believe her above any politican on matters nuclear, I recommend you listen to what she had to say, in summary, cancel your skiing trip to Japan.
http://www.helencaldicott.com/