All our intentions to leave Scawfell for Brampton Island on Saturday went pear shaped overnight – yep, 25-30 kt winds yet again came howling through in the early morning and continued most of the day. These were not forecast at all and Echo Beach rocked, swayed violently 180 degrees and the anchor and snubber grinded in disgust. Leanne was up and on watch from 2 am – no point sleeping and it was in fact quite scary! Of course Graham, after many expletives and declaring that 2 days of great weather for 2 weeks of crap just wasn’t worth it, believed sticking his head under a pillow and ignoring the noise and potential anchor issues was the best option.
When first light finally came, we were dumbfounded and anxious – we couldn’t get any internet or phone coverage at all to check the latest forecast , we were tired and angry at this crazy weather (to the point of exclamations from skipper that we would just put the boat in a marina as soon as possible and go to Europe for the rest of our break). We yelled at ‘Murphy’ and issued all sorts of unrepeatables and were basically rendered immobile by it all.... We were afraid to up anchor and move to another part of the anchorage as we had a lot of chain out, it did all sorts of strange things during the night and if it got snagged or we had hassles pulling it up in this wind – well, it wouldn’t be a pretty sight. Mid afternoon the wind seemed to reduce a little so we did in fact move, after a few anchor lifting attempts (yep, it did get stuck!). The decision was a blessing – as was an easing of the wind as the new spot was better protected and at least we could venture outside – all in time for sunset drinks which at this stage were well deserved. Skipper of course elected to catch dinner for the third day in a row and as the sun set, he pulled in 2 good sized brassy trevally – by now the wind had dropped and it was back to a pleasant evening – the fish were well enjoyed before an early night after, quite frankly, a very low morale day!
We woke the next morning to a cool but sunny day with 10-15 kt wind and left Scawfell Island after breakfast – a place that has some of the best memories but also one of the worse so far – and made our way to Keswick and St Bees Islands first. (these are the islands that ‘disappeared into cloud, fog and rain a few days earlier). They are quite pretty and Keswick has some current and future development which is easy to see coming to fruition in a few decades time. Going through the pass wasn’t really practical with strong winds on the nose and a strong current – so we kept going to Brampton Island where we had planned to stay the night. Anchoring in mid afternoon and having a swim (after chasing the black tip reef shark away), we declared it a glorious anchorage and yes, with the weather approaching ideal conditions, we decided we were staying as planned!
We went to the jetty to go ashore for a quick look late in the afternoon. I must report with smug satisfaction the ‘true to form’ 30 minutes of wasted time with overly complex solutions to what should have been a simple attempt to secure the dinghy to the jetty. This skipper caught the painter (rope) around a jetty pole, and we had ‘laurel and hardy’ attempts to dislodge it – all to no avail. We are now on the jetty with dinghy stuck in an inaccessible spot metres below and with an outgoing tide running – remember we have 5 metre tides here, so it was not going to get any better. So when all else fails, the skipper had to strip off and dive from the jetty into the water and free the painter. I have never seen him swim so fast as he did to that dinghy. Leanne of course is used to all this by now, walks off cursing with pleas to learn from past errors, then returns to ensure at least some of the farce is captured on film! Skipper blames ‘Murphy’.
Monday (today) was perfect – calm, warm, sunny. We had decided to do the walk to the lookouts on the top of the island, eventually meeting up with Kerryn and John from Estoterica (who we had met and spent time with in Island Head Creek and Rossyln Bay) and Di and Derryn from Tasmania. The walk is a good solid climb with 360 views to die for.
We were all keen to understand the fate of the resort and while being initially chastised when we returned from the walk by the sole caretaker/security guy (Chris) for the resort, we then enjoyed a great discussion and brief tour offered by Chris. It such a shame the resort is not being used – it is truly one of the most naturally blessed spots with aspect, protection, sandy beaches, tidal sandy spits to adjoining Carlisle Island, bushwalks, and a short distance from a growing Mackay district.
We then had a great swim around the tidal sand spits out between Brampton and Carlisle Islands in crystal clear, warm waters – it looked like we were swimming in the middle of the ocean.
Graham then decided to try and catch dinner again – and yes, he succeeded with 2 parrotfish (Leanne’s words are simply ‘they are so pretty – do we really have to eat them???’) and a scarlet breasted maori wrasse. Following a very diligent and lengthy check of all available fish books and resources, Skipper declared that yes, there were good to take, and they were superb to eat!
There was no time to prepare them though as we were already late for drinks on ‘Estoterica’ where we enjoyed a fantastic sunset (almost dinner) drinks with Kerryn and John, Di and Derryn and a local Mackay couple Ray and Eve who retired about 30 years ago when Ray was 46. The latter own their second Swan yacht (a Swan 44) and have done 150,000 nautical miles of sailing each. Their motto – ‘do it now or you are leaving it too late’. They have crossed the equator 5 times. Many tales and ‘yarns’ were shared until we finally retired back to our boat to enjoy our freshly caught BBQ fish.
Brampton is a lovely anchorage and a gorgeous island, and we have had great weather to enjoy it in. We now plan to move on to Goldsmith Island tomorrow.