Down the coast to Sydney

We had a great sail for 4 days and nights down the coast from Brisbane until we hit some strong weather coming from the south and decided to duck into Lake MacQuarie to wait it out. We were just 60 miles north of Sydney and had a nice 4 day rest there meeting locals, walking around town and watching races.

The sailing south along the Australian coast is flukey sailing....there are currents and eddies. Sometimes we hit the southerly current going 2-3 knots and flew and sometimes the wind would come from every direction at some time during the day with lumpy seas to motor into. We had to use the engine about 1/3 the time. It was all quite scenic and the coast was far more covered with mountains and cliffs than we expected. The whole coast is quite shallow for several miles out so the swell is not bad.

We arrived in Sydney on Monday, Dec. 8th, in rain and 25 to 30 knots of wind and anchored right at the famous Opera House in Farm Cove which is more impressive than in photos. This place is very well designed! We just left the dinghy at the pier, ignoring...or conviently overseeing a sign that said "no vessels without permission"...we thought they meant really big boats and not little dinghys!!! Anyway they left it along for several hours while we walked all over town and also got tickets for performances.

We only stayed one night at this anchorage. Lots of ferries zoomed past and sightseeing boats drove all around us while we had sundowners. It was so rocky with the swell from their wakes that we kept spilling our coffee!!!

We changed to another anchorage and then got a nice surprize....an email from the Australian Island Packet Dealer who saw us anchor, looked us up on the net and sent an email for us to call him. We had anchored right in his condo's bay and he swam over to visit with a cooler of beer and invited us to dinner. That's Aussie spirit!!! This is gonna be a great place to visit.

We will soon leave this bay called "The Glebe" to go to Cammeray Marina to our mooring for a month to get settled in. We have work to get done on the boat and routine doctors to see. All part of our time in port.

We Spend 2 Weeks in Brisbane

After we sailed from Bundaberg we headed south for Brisbane and expected to spend several days with friends in Mooloolaba on our way but it didn't work out that way. We had to head overnight directly to our marina at Manly which is near Brisbane, Australia, because a big storm system was heading north from New South Wales along the coast. We got docked just a few hours before several days of colorful, wet, loud weather hit the coast causing millions in damage. Worst storm in 30 years!!!

The weather here had been dreadfully dry for ages but since we have been here we have seen more lightning than the whole 4+ years we have owned the boat!!!! We have had rain numbering in feet instead of inches!!! Rivers are swelling above flood stage and mosquitos are swarming. We had pea sized hail that sounded like bullets and we were concerned for our solar panels!!

We finally got a chance to take the train into the city and Brisbane is young and bustling. What an attractive downtown with a huge arcade of many streets and shops and street entertainment. We just weren't used to cities and the noise knocked us over! By the end of the day it was sensory overdose....too many lights and sounds. Guess we got used to quiet islands!

Manly is just a short train ride to downtown Brisbane and we visited there several times. "Brissy" is one of the fastest growing cities in the world and very up to date.

Brisbane City, Anzac Square, A Memorial Park

Here we are after having just run for a ferry on a day in Brisbane with the other cruisers friends from Fast Forward and Catimini in the group photo below.

We really covered the whole city. We ate, drank and caught up on our recent passages and future plans.

It was great to see Brisbane and get a bunch of shopping done especially with the good Australian dollar exchange rate now. We had a toned down Thanksgiving on the boat with Thai Chicken and cranberry sauce and missed family, of course.

Now we are on our way sailing south along the coast to Sydney. We expect to anchor each night enjoying the coastal sights unless the weather window is really good and then we will shoot straight through and go the whole 400 miles!! We look forward to Christmas in Sydney and plan to meet friends there and take our time seeing the sights. We are staying on a mooring in Cammeray Marina just outside downtown.

Here in Australia we have a modem like a cell phone with instant internet access and we are really enjoying the First World priviledges again with instant connections!!!

Wishing everyone safe and blessed holidays....

Lynn and Chuck on Cyan

Arrived in Australia

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There is a new page on New Caledonia that's just been posted. Checkhere

We took the Port to Port Rally from Koumac, New Caledonia to Bundaberg, Australia arriving Oct 29. We had a brief stop for 4 days at a wonderful sand bar in the middle of the Coral Sea called Chesterfield Reef with 7 other cruiser friends in the rally.
Koumac was a particularly fun visit. The rally folks organized excursions to working mines, and an abandoned mining village, ancient caves, wine tastings and a pig roast before we left to sail west. Lynn celebrated her birthday on the 16th along with Mike on Kokamo who had the very same birthday, tasting French wines, cheeses and pates. What a tough life!!!

After all the vessels arrived the 4 days of parties began in "Bundy". There were games and prizes and Chuck bid $3 on a nice yellow hat got toad #1 who won the race and we won 2 days and nights at a B&B on the beach and, what's best, 2 days rental car to do shopping for provisioning...yeah!!! He also won the stuffed toad in the picture.

On election day they came to interview us because they were looking for some Americans who were watching the election closely and since we had internet connection, we were. The next day we were in the papers with a nice picture. That was a nice welcome since we'd only been in Australia a week!!! Here is a shot of the paper.
We expect to leave Bundaberg and sail south to Brisbane area about mid month taking in some nice stops along the way. We are heading to Sydney for Christmas. The fireworks on the bridge there on New Years Day is supposed to be spectacular and we have a dock reserved.
More Later.....Chuck and Lynn on CYAN

New Caledonia

In Honor of the Forces who by their Presence During the Pacific Wave

From March 1942 to February 1946 Insured the

Freedom of New Caledonia

Her People are Deeply Grateful

We arrived in Noumea September 20th and were lucky to find a place in the marina with sketchy internet. This is the place, where in 1943, Lynn's Dad and her uncle Bud were stationed during WWII and they got the message that she was born on October 16th. Yes, she will get Social Security this year. We promised Uncle Bud some pictures so here they are:

These shots are around Anse Vata, or Vata Cove which is southwest of Noumea.








It's too bad the day was cool and cloudy or

we could have taken shots of the

TOPLESS DOLLIES ON THE BEACH!!!

We visited the museum and aquarium

Next we plan to provision at the wonderful French waterfront market and head up the west coast and down the east coast of New Caledonia to make a circumnavigation of the island. Most of it will be inside the reef which protects us from the ocean swell. This will take about 3 weeks and then we check out for Australia.

Vanuatu Visit

In August we sailed to Vanuatu where many of the Survivor TV shows were films.We spent about 10 days in Port Vila, the biggest town in Vanuatu. It's an attractive and enjoyable place. It had quite a presence in World War 11 with many Navy persons and Michner's "Tales of the South Pacific" took place north of here in Luganville. It's fun to try and speak the Pidgin English. CYAN blong nambawan. “Cyan is number one!” Yes nambawan is one word.

This country is about the most "third world" and primative we have been to yet. They have lots of old world superstitions, volcanos erupting, waterfalls, cannibalism until 1969, weird cults that worship WW II soldiers, few clothes, sharks, sea snakes and many other edgy things to watch out for. They are warm and inviting folks but quite simple their cultures and art. Until recently in the 1900s there were loads of different island cultures and languages in the 80 islands. They fought and ate each other and any white folks thinking about settling around. It was hard on the missionaries but they finally had an impact. The more remote islands still share their customs and dancing with cruising visitors. We spent 9 days around the islands north of Port Vila but had to head back when we got a great weather break.
We missed the famous volcano on the island of Tanna but we can’t do everything if the weather doesn’t work out. Malaria is an issue and we are taking meds that make it hard to sleep but ward off the critters in the mosquitos' bite!!! Chuck went on some scuba dives and saw even more unique sealife. He was ecstatic about his dive on the Cooledge, a WW II wreck in Luganville.

On his birthday, Chuck caught this 60" mahimahi that we shared with 2 other cruising boats and one whole half was given to feed 6 local families.
We plan to take off about mid September to visit New Caledonia and we are provisioning now. Shopping is good here in Vila and duty-free booze is cheap so we are making room to take a bunch to Australia.

Pictures of Fiji

Go to our website for more photos and info

Lynn And Chuck on CYAN

Vanua Balavu, continued

Bavatu Harbor

This is one of the most beautiful anchorages and quite an interesting visit. After anchoring way back, right between the small island at the south of the large cove/harbor and the cliffs to the west, we came ashore at the boat landing and found the longest and most well built wooden staircase we'd ever seen. This must have been 15 stories high; we should have counted! There is a large coconut plantation covering most of the eastern side. We'd met Tony, in Lakemba. He owns the plantation and the 85' charter vessel, Tau. He gave us a letter of introduction that we presented to Fane, who is his plantation manager. At the staircase top we found the coconut plantation and tiny village of 5 houses, a "sometime" store and an open air church for the workers. Fane gave us a tour of 2 lovely homes with astounding views of the harbor, we bought coconut oil and walked back by the cows, and horses along the road to the landing instead of the tall staircase. We left gifts for the villagers and bought 4 amazing lobsters for $50 from Fane's husband so he could get a new diving mask and spear fish on the reef for his village. We'd offered him Chuck's spare mask but it was too large for him.

For anchoring in Banavu Harbor, we would recommend the eastern anchorage instead of the southern one due to lack of breeze and a few bugs. We do mention that behind the small island at the south, is a nice set of coral heads to snorkel at mid-tide.

To prepare to leave by Qilaqila Pass we moved to the larger U shaped cove behind the innermost range marker. There was some current and we set the anchor right in the middle between the big rock on the north of the eastern cut and the center island. The current took us over towards the island and out of the bumps of the waves. It was plenty deep right up to the steep rocks and we ended us spending several days waiting for the right weather. We found the best snorkeling right at the eastern cut at mid-tide and at a tiny beach beyond. Saw beautiful fish and interesting formations.

Cove anchorage 17deg 09.839S 179deg 02.094W

Info on leaving and entering by Qilaqila Pass:

There were 3 markers for this pass on the charts but we only found one at the inside and it was bent over, a white top just barely visible at high tide.

Approach, lining up range markers 17deg 09.502S 179deg 02.948W
Mid-pass Waypoint 17deg 09.361S 179deg 03.384W
Clear, at end of pass Waypoint 17deg 09.228S 179deg 03.908W

The last waypoint is a line up point to enter this pass if coming from the rest of Fiji and the range markers are very evident. We had no problem but we were at full tide in the morning with some overcast and didn't see the southern reef as well as well as we saw the waves on the reef on the northern side.

Our Navionics Gold software was still off by .4 mile in the whole area of Vanua Balavu .

On our return to main area of Fiji we tried to stop at a recommended anchorage called Nanuku Levu, a tiny set of 2 islets on a long N/S reef. The patch of shallow sand was just too close to the western reef and the chop was just too lumpy. We then tried to make it to Laucala by sunset but there was no pass marker as our chart indicated. We decided to heave-to in the 7 mile long bay just south of Budd Reef for the night. We should have motor-sailed in order to have an alternative and took it as a lesson. The next morning we motored sailed the brief 8 miles to the east side of Taviuni where we anchored about 1 mile south of the airport runway.

As a summary, our visit to the Lau Group was one of the best sailing experiences we have ever had and we would encourage cruisers to make this a part of their Fiji visit.

Lynn and Chuck on CYAN

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