Whitsundays to Bowen
27 May 2011 | Bowen
Ken
We have not been able to update the Blog because the anchorages in the Whitsundays are sheltered with high hills around. While these are good and safe anchorages it means that radio communication is often difficult or not available at all, which has been the case most of the time. We arrived at Bowen harbour yesterday to meet up with Janice’s brother Greg and his wife Allison which has been lovely. As I write Janice is using Greg’s car to pick up some supplies, while I have topped up our water supplies for the next leg of our trip and done some passage planning, setting way points in the GPS, checking the chart and tides.
We are hopeful that the weather will be better than it has been, because we have had to spend a good deal of time sheltering from strong winds, but it looks good for now!
The Whitsunday passage was quite beautiful with lush green islands rising up from water that is turquoise and often clear. This no doubt accounts for the many people who come, hire boats and sail the area. Janice and I had fun climbing up a small waterfall in Nara Inlet to have a shower in the ice cold water. There we were about 30 feet up the side of a sloping cliff having a shower, with people motoring past down below having a good look at us; just as well we had our swimmers on! The Inlet is rather like a small fiord, long and narrow, but had abundance of white cockatoos, one of which visited the boats looking for food, was happy to be hand fed and even sit on the shoulder of one person. To think that this was a wild bird was quite incredible.
To leave this area of sailing we passed through Gloucester Passage (between the mainland and Gloucester Island), and anchored for the night. Going ashore we visited a small but very hospitable and lovely resort called “Montys”. Not only were we able to have a shower, which was long overdue, but sat at looking over white sand drinking a cold beer for me and a glass of wine for Janice. To anyone visiting the area, it is well worth the visit.
From here we will head for Townsville. There are some overnight anchorages, roughly 10 to 12 hours sail apart from Bowen, but they do not seem like places to stop and have a look around. So we will simply keep sailing over the next few days.
Cedric continues to have interesting adventures and for those wanting to know more please have a look at the photo galleries. We may or may not have time to update his most recent adventures later today.h