Adventures of Tropicali
| Vessel Name: | Tropicali |
| Vessel Make/Model: | DEW 33 |
| Hailing Port: | Tin Can Bay |
| Crew: | Stuart Pryor and Dianne Pryor |
| About: | From Poona, Queensland they go to sea. There is nothing half so much worth doing as simply messing around in boats |
15 October 2017
The last post...☹️☹️☹️
They say all good things come to an end, and after 105 days of our first venture north on Tropicali, we are now back in Tin Can Bay wondering where the last few months have gone and how the trip has affected us.
12 October 2017
Home waters again !
Over the last two days, we have milked the continuing run of northerlies from Bundaberg to our home port of Tin Can Bay. We have been incredibly lucky to have ridden this northerly flow from the Whitsundays all the way home over a two week run.
09 October 2017
1770 to Bundaberg
Just love 1770, it's on the must do again list. Yes, it's shallow, but it is a pretty place to sit in Round Hill Creek, especially at night. No wonder Captain Cook took the Endeavour in there. It must have been a LOT deeper in 1770!
08 October 2017
Day 100 - Town of 1770
Hard to believe, but it is 100 days since we left Poona, and sadly, we are rapidly heading back home, with a stop in Bundaberg likely for the next two days.
06 October 2017
Back through the Narrows again
It seems like only 2 weeks ago we were travelling north through the Narrows, but as we are now at day 98 of the trip, I guess it was quite some time ago.
04 October 2017
Back to sea again
After having Tropicali at Rosslyn Bay Harbour for 9 days, 4 of which were while we travelled to Sydney to farewell son Chris off to the UK, and 2 more waiting for the soggy weather to clear, we made a break today for Great Keppel.
Careening
This is an easy task in a catamaran, with the daggerboard up, rudder up, we can get her to float in just 500mm of water, which means you can stand up and walk around the boat.
We backed her into the beach just south of Hill Inlet (see previous post), put out a kedge ( back anchor) and dragged her in close. Despite it not being stinger seasons, we still put on our stinger suits, armed with stiff brushes and scouring pads, walked around and cleaned her as best we could. It must have worked a treat, she felt like leaping out of the water on opening the throttles to motor 2 miles down to Whitehaven Beach to spend the night.
Now for the funny side, in order to get the back anchor out, I opened the front port hatch and removed the two large orange garbage bags so that I could get the anchor out. I left these on the front trampolines while we donned our two black stinger suits and climbed into the water to careen the boat. After finishing, we swam ashore with stinger suits removed, walked up to the sand dunes at Hill Inlet for a peek inside and scope out the entry channel.
On our return walk, we noticed a police RIB with radar dome and aerials, parked up next to Tropicali. Now, the nearest water Police are based at Airlie, at least 45 mins away for a fast vessel. They appeared fixated on us as we approached, but as we pulled up the back anchor, waved and took off.
Whitehaven needs an air traffic controller...there is so much air traffic. We now think that some pilot has thought two people in the water with black suits, large orange bags on the front deck, looked suspicious and radioed an alert to the water police. I think by the time the saw us approach the boat, they would have checked us out, including having our images from drivers licence, address, age...etc and decided we did not fit the criminal profile. All taxpayers should feel reassured !?.
 |
 |
