From Great Keppel Island we sailed to Hummocky Island with relative ease, and anchored off the back of the island to get protection from the light north east winds. We had a leisurely dinner and a couple of hours of rest until 2200, at which time we raised the anchor again, set the sails, and set a course for Fitzroy Reef. Given our deliberately late start and the calm conditions, it was an easy ‘overnighter’, which had us arriving at the Reef at 0900 in clear, sunny conditions, just the right time for a good visual of the coral and the tricky entry.

Fitzroy Reef is a big lagoon, completely surrounded by coral, all but for a narrow channel entrance. There’s no island but you can see the reef (and anchored boats) from a reasonable distance. We were surprised at how narrow the channel was, but negotiated its twists and turns (there are some fixed and some floating markers) with no trouble, and found the lagoon beyond to be flat with plenty of anchoring room and very few problematic ‘bommies’. There were three boats when we arrived and six by the end of the day.

We had a wonderful day snorkelling over the coral, swimming and exploring the lagoon. We trialled Graeme’s homemade hookah for diving, and although I was dubious, it turned out to work pretty well. Dive operators used to frequent the reef, but no longer, possibly due to distance and fuel costs, so we few cruising boats had the place to ourselves. There’s something amazing about being in the middle of a flat lake-like lagoon with the white boom of waves breaking on the reef all around, and no land anywhere in sight. We passed a calm, uneventful night and left by 0900 the next morning. There was an interesting current affecting the channel, causing some stand-up waves. The Skipper had to ‘crab walk’ the boat sideways a bit to negotiate the twists and turns, and then we noticed there was a bommie right in the middle of the final floating markers. Turns out they ‘move’ with strong currents, so we had to go around a bommie that wasn’t supposed to be there.

We thought it was a twenty mile trip to Lady Musgrave, but it turned out to be a little longer, and only saw us arriving at the Island at around 1300 hours. The entrance to Lady Musgrave is much more straight-forward than Fitzroy Reef, and the island is a popular place for campers and tourist boats. There were about 14 boats (the majority catamarans) already anchored when we arrived, and more came in during the day.

Wind of Change had arrived earlier that morning and we anchored up near them. Brett and his newly acquired crew member, Jen, came over later for a drink. We found out Avante had been leaving as Windy arrived. Interestingly, of the 19 boats on the rally, we have kept in regular touch with quite a number, and as I write this, Windy, Haven III, Avante, Southern Belle and now Allusive are all making their way south. Windy and Avante are nearly ‘home’, while Haven III and Southern Belle are also bound for Sydney. Allusive, with Andy and Kelli from Quintessa aboard as crew helping John, is heading for Tassie.

After anchoring, we went for a swim and snorkel in the coral garden, where Graeme and I both had lasting turtle encounters. The sealife here are very familiar with people (or perhaps are fed?) so they approach you and almost allow you to touch them. I found myself swimming in a shimmering cloud of black and pearl-white fish. Just wonderful!

After our snorkel, we went ashore and repeated the walk we’d done in 2007. Lady Musgrave is a coral island with an abundance of nesting white-capped noddy terns. These birds build their nests out of the leaves of the pisonia trees and roost by the thousands. They say it’s lucky to get pooped on by a bird. Well, wasn’t I the ‘lucky’ one that day, scoring three direct hits as we walked along the track overhung with nest-laden branches. Graeme only scored one, and they missed Jamie altogether! Looking ahead, it sometimes appeared to be raining under the trees! Fortunately I was able to plunge into the water at the end of the walk, and wash the stuff out of my hair. Ewww. I’m throwing away my four-leaf clover. And my lucky rock.