We arrived to Hobart in the morning, after sailing past Bruny Island (no, we did not see the penguins, they were too far away). We wanted to get there as soon as possible, to be able to get help with the generator and the outboard that wouldn’t start. It’s much easier to do on a Friday than during the weekends.

The two sister boats next to each other by Elisabeth’s Pier

The crew headed out to their adventures. Mike and Daniel drove to Port Arthur for a few hours, to see the historic convict site, with its ruins of the 19th century penal settlement. It’s a beautiful drive and a very interesting place. Beth, April, Bruce and Patrick went for MONA - the museum of old and new art, with quirky and provoking artwork. Kevin took a hike to Mount Wellington, to see Hobart from above. Me, Ken and Sharon stayed on board. Ken had some work to be done, and so did we!

Kevin reporting from the top of Mt Wellington

Bruce, April, Patrick and Beth had found a new wind gauge for Silver Fern in MONA

We gave the boat a good cleaning top to bottom, which she very much deserved after the long passage. The outboard went to a repair workshop, that fixed it by cleaning out the carburetor - apparently it was fouled by contaminated fuel. Sharon got a phone call, and Cam the Generator Man came to have a look at the generator. He worked a miracle, fixing the generator with the parts that he had, so we got it working. This was an unexpected bonus on the stopover to get it fixed, and that was some good news to send to David.

I got up the mast for a rig check, to make sure that the running backstay did not get too overtensioned and do any damage to the mast. It looked okay.

We dried all the damp cushions in the sun, which was surprisingly hot for being this far South. And the electrical winch button got a temporary cover of Swedish design. Now, we don’t need to worry about accidentally pushing it again.

New winch button cover, waterproof and foolproof (hopefully)

The mast track had to be reinforced by a few more screws, as it had come off the mast in one place. We also repositioned the reefing lines, to prevent the damage on the mast track from happening again.

The main had some damage that had to be repaired, so we washed off the salt, cleaned it with acetone, and used sticky patches. We did this together with Ross, who was joining us on board in Hobart. He will be doing Sydney to Hobart on Silver Fern, and was originally join ing Salt Lines for this leg. But since Kevin was going to do Sydney to Hobart on Sailt Lines, they decided to swap places so they could get familiar with the boats they would race on.

We did the laundry together with Salt Lines, in a very cute laundromat café. As the clothes from both of the boats were mixed, and were dried all together, it gave the crew a possibility to choose fancier underwear that they had before the laundry.

Back to the crime scene - dinner at Custom’s House!

We had a lovely dinner in Custom’s House, which is a go-to spot after the finish of every Sydney to Hobart. After eating, talking and sharing stories between the boats we headed back to our bunks for some quality sleep. However this night too, me and Sharon were woken up by the alarms for low voltage.

We figured we could just start the generator. But it did not work! Apparently, the oil pressure was too low. Sharon filled up the oil and it seemed to have fixed the problem. All along our repair jobs at night, we’d keep in touch with David, so he was not getting much sleep either. It was like he was sailing with us, well except the actual sailing. Thank you David!

On Sunday I did a bit of provisioning, getting fresh fruit, bread and some more yoghurt. On the way to the shop, there was a big market! Fresh vegetables, honey, coffee, gin, all the local produce, anything and everything you would imagine. I got some Tassie jerky for myself, April got a jacket, Beth bought some Tasmanian wool socks, Patrick went for some tea from a local company and Ken got a hand-crafted knife.

Everything from international food to flowers, or from jewellery to local whiskies.

I did not see any smoking dogs at the market, which means that they were able to read the sign and follow the instructions.

Don’t miss out on scallops when in Hobart

The market was comparable to Taste of Tasmania that takes place around December-January, just as boats arrive to Hobart after RSHYR. But this was larger, more intimate, more colorful - and for free.

Some last sight-seeing for the crew, and we were back on board. The mission was to refuel and then head off towards Bass Strait again, to time the passage with the weather. There was quite a bit of wind, which made it tricky to depart from the dock, but at last we managed to do that. Local ducks were there to help us. They were lousy at line handling, but at least they gave a lot of moral support by being cute.