Passion for Cruising

Last year some Seawind 1160 owners got together to race in the Hogs Breath Multihull Week at Airlie Beach in the Whitsundays. We offloaded wine beer and stuff onto Xtsea which promptly went down about 4 inches on the waterline! Truest Passion of course sat up 4, and with her John Penfold {UK Halsey} Pentax sails we had a great race week, winning the first race by 4 minutes.
Nanette then decided to sail on to Cairns with Stuart on Truest Passion, and XTsea was left behind in Mackay. In Cairns we picked up Richard, Stuarts son and his wife Irene, who had flown out from Edinburgh to cruise to Lizard Island. We stayed 6 weeks! Snorkelling, walking and partying, in that order.
Instead of going back to Mackay, Nanette continued aboard Truest Passion, and soon after put XTsea on the market!
We sailed south to Mooloolaba, where we hauled out and did extensive maintenance, modifications and preparation work for the "Trip of a Lifetime", yes we were going to cruise to Darwin in 2008 and join the Rally "Sail Indonesia", but after that Malaysia and Thailand, then maybe the Andaman Islands (India) and who knows after that! Why not, we are both having a ball. It is a dream that we have both held for many years. SO DO IT. It truly feels good.
After Mooloolaba, we spent a few weeks in Southport finishing odd jobs and collecting the NEW carbon matrix sails from John Penfold {UK Halsey Sydney} These sails are lighter and stronger, and a beautiful shape with no sewn seams, but a special laminated fabric with continuous carbon tapes, see photos.
We left Southport on Monday 28th April on our Northerly trip, picking up 2 friends from Mooloolaba to come as far as Bundaberg, a very pleasant trip.
After Bundy it was press on, and Mackay and Cairns are now behind us as we sit at Lizard Island.
The leg from Cairns was very fast with 20 t0 25 kt winds and then 25 to 30 SE. The new reefing genoa working superbly, and in the heavier wind we carried 1 reef in the main and first reef in the genoa, and then took in the 2nd in that sail. Our top speed was15.3 knots and our average speed from Cape Bedford to Lizard was 10.3 knots
WE are now at Lizard with 8 or9 other multihulls and monos who are all on the Rally.
We are meeting people from all Nations, including Ozkan from Turkey in his 26ft mono, circumnavigating from Turkey. Of all the entrants from around the world there are approx 26 multihulls, we look forward to meeting them all.
We have already covered 1011 nautical miles or 1870klms!! But we are halfway to Darwin!!!!