With a good night sleep at anchor and only a 30mile motor sail ahead of us, we had a leisurely breakfast before we set off. As we set sail I tried to sneak off for 30mins and read my book for the first time(whoop!). As I settled into the saloon with that look on my face of ‘nobody interrupt me I’m relaxing’; I heard a noise…….

Maybe this was the universe’s idea of teaching me a lesson for trying to relax on the job…..maybe it was just a coincidence. With the mechanical bilge pump now playing up by switching itself on sporadically, we tried to teach it a lesson by jamming the handle into the off position. Boy was that a mistake. As the pump tried it’s hardest to turn itself back on again it started to burn itself out with more smoke and sparks. With other bilge pumps on board we decided the safest option at this stage was to unbolt the pump to remove the belts that attached it to the engine. Our earlier worries of water ingress through the prop shaft seal had subsided as the replacement seal we put on seemed to be doing it’s job(phew!)

As we motored on up to Thursday Island which is the Northern most port of Australia, there was a buzz of excitement having come so far over the last few days. There was less of a buzz of excitement when I mentioned we’d have to deploy our giant tender yet again. The guise of ‘team building exercise’ seemed to be wearing thin on a few of my crew who tried their hardest to find a cheap water taxi service in the area. Their efforts were futile though and just to punish them I dropped them off on the border patrol jetty where they were stuck there for 30mins till I realised they were in the wrong place(kidding, it was a mistake I swear….).

After finding a much calmer jetty to offload all the crew including Silver Fern we were ready to checkout the sights of the island. With only a few hours up our sleeve at this point some of us headed to the Northern most pub in Australia for a pint(be rude not to right?). We decided we’d return the next day so we could have a proper walk around the island and check out the Cultural Centre. With the tide and wind becoming increasingly stronger we decide to move over to Horn Island for the night to find a much calmer anchorage. My Aussie induction continued as we returned to the boat to find a swarm of flies buzzing around the boat. As I tried in vain to swat them away Baz explained to me that this was the Great Aussie Salute!

That night Sandie was determined to have a go at fishing and see if she could learn any skills from our keen fisherman Baz. As she dropped her hook down baited with chicken I was intending to use for dinner the next night(that was tomorrow’s problem) she almost instantly got a bite! As she wrestled with the rod in excitement she pulled up a catfish which we let go as I’m heard they’re not very good for eating. It was my turn next and having only caught blue cod mainly in NZ I was surprised at the fight this catfish was putting up. Wanting to offload the rod to someone else halfway through reeling it in, I had no sympathisers and had to land the thing myself. Now there’s no photo evidence of this but I’m sure it was the largest catfish of all! Thankfully it jumped off the hook just as we pulled it in so I didn’t have to deal with it.

The next day was spent walking around the island, checking out the Cultural Centre and having one last pub meal before our next long passage across the top. With the anchorage off Thursday Island still proving to be quite rough in the wind and tide we motored over to Horn Island for yet another team building exercise of getting the tender back on board. We departed Horn Island around 4pm. Next stop was 350 miles to Gove!

See you on the other side :)

Jess