After several weeks of more terrestrial adventures, we are sailing again! This weekend is a long weekend in Oz - their equivalent of Labor Day, which they call Eight Hour Day Day. We took advantage of the long weekend, and a forecast of northwest winds until Sunday, to leave this morning (Friday) with the goal of making the grandeur and history of Port Arthur on Saturday morning.

We hoped to anchor in Moorina Cove on Bruny Island this afternoon, and do the Cape Queen Elizabeth hike. This was not to be. For a second time, we found d Moorina Cove to be too choppy and surf-y to consider leaving the boat at anchor for a hike, despite the offshore westerly breeze. So we turned around and set a course for Cape Raoul and Port Arthur.

Unfortunately, the breeze evaporated and we were soon rolling about in the steep ground swell from the southern ocean. We had to turn on the engine to hope to make our anchorage by dark. At least we were treated to an amazing dolphin show as pod after pod of bottle nose dolphins leapt and cartwheeled through the air, sometimes right next to the boat. This went on for an hour while the albatross wheeled about us and flocks of mutton birds dove. There must e good fishing!

By sunset, we were rounding the spiky cliffs of Cape Raoul as we entered Port Arthur. We anchored on the calm of Safety Cove at the mouth of the port. Little roll here, though the sound of the surf on the beach just a couple of hundred feet away is omnipresent