Sail to Lady Musgrave Island

Saturday 5^th May 2012

Sail to Lady Musgrave Island
24’40.681 S – 152’24.278 E
Cold and dark

0500hrs - The Port & STB markers out of the Burnett River

It is 0500h when we pull up anchor to leave the Burnett River for our all day sail out to Lady Musgrave Island, a coral sand cay and reef some 50 nautical miles (1oo ks) from Port Bundaberg.

I wake up okay and am ready for the trip; I do take two of the Stemetil tablets that the Doc has prescribed for my seasickness.

I get seasick these days, since going through menopause, when leaving a marina to go to sea, when leaving a still waters anchorage to go to sea, when we bob around on the sea due to sloppy seas and slow going and when in a beach surge (rolly) anchorage. I still love my life and I still love my sailing so I revert to the tablets. I have tries Travel Calm as well and do find that these work too but the Doc says try Stemetil and I have found that I need to take two tablet not one for them to do anything but still get the heady feeling. I will keep trying or I will go back to the Travel Calm. They all make me feel tired.

As we leave the land behind the sun is rising in front. We are motor sailing with the genoa out; the winds begins to pick so we try pulling the mainsail up. I turn AR into the 18knt wind which also turns us into the sloppy seas; a 1.7 SE swell and a 1mt SW wind waves. I hold the helm as steady as I can, increasing the revs to keep a bit of speed up but the conditions are not good and the sail is getting caught in the lazy jacks (lazy jacks are the lines that keep the sail bag up). MrJ chucks it in and puts the mainsail away; we are running with the genoa again which is a better idea anyway with the wind creeping behind AR.

Sunrise on the sea

I have radioed into VMR 488 Bundaberg to log our position, our destination and out ETA at Lady Musgrave. I am wondering If Neriki has left Pancake Ck or even if they are going to Musgrave at all. I haven’t heard them on the airway this morning but maybe they do not use the VMR / Coast Guard services, a lot of boats do not.

MrJ has a little nap before lunch; we have Lady Musgrave Island insight, and I get my 40 winks after lunch. By this time we are on the western side of the island and I call up the VMR to tell them. I am not able to get out to VMR; I can hear them but they are not receiving me. I try several channels with no luck. Finally a Canadian boat, Sea Mist that is still out there behind us relays the message through for me. I see Neriki already going into the lagoon.

Lady Musgrave Island

MrJ steers AR round the northern side of the islands and along the outside of the reef to the lagoon entrance which is well marked, even though one of the STB marker has been bent over to a 90* angle. It is near slack tide on low water and the water is not rushing out. The reef is well out of the water; the channel in is easily seen and navigated but I still stand watch on the bow with my polarised sunnies on just in case and there is always the lookout for bommies once inside. Inside now, we head for a nice little spot to drop the anchor somewhere next to Neriki; I am still on the bow scanning for those underwater bommies and this allows me a great viewing place to see the island and the whole surrounding reef out of the water with large waves breaking and crashing all along.

Once we have found our spot we drop the covers, open the hatches and drop the dinghy to go over to greet our friends Ric and Shelly on Neriki who we have not seen since last cruising season. ;o) By this time the other boat Sea Mist has made their entrance and is looking for their spot.

Over on Neriki, big hugs all round and lots of excited greeting. Shelly cracks a bottle of white wine and the boys have a beer; there is so much talking, there is so much news to catch up on. The afternoon leads into sundown and nightfall. Shelly and I destroy her galley putting a miscellaneous pasta dish together. You know what I mean – anything that we can put in we do. It turned our really yummy; washed down with some more wine and coffee. The evenings are cooler now and MrJ and I had to borough a couple of Neriki’s jackets to keep us warm. Such lovely and friendly people are Ric and Shelly, just like a lot of other boaties out there that we have met.