Wind ESE 15 – 20     70 nautical miles

Another early start except John had layn awake some part of the night worrying that we didn’t have enough fuel to push south against the wind. He decided he needed fuel so went ashore with 4 jerrys or jugs as the yanks call them and attempted to get a lift to Nelly bay where the fuel station was. Not much hope, so he paid a hippy in a campervan $50 to drive him the 8 kms . They ended up going to a servo at Picnic Bay 10kms instead, as the one at Nelly Bay wasn’t open.

John arrived back at 7:30 and we refilled the diesel tanks. Paul on Moor R & R had a bag of Schmackos on board for Morgan so a mid water transfer ensued with the landing net and John motoring up to the back of Moor R & R. Paul and I transferred the goodies and Morgan was one happy pooch. Thanks Uncle Paul.

Photos courtesy of Kath

The day started reasonably well and we averaged 7 knts for a while , however we had to steer a course between 60 and 80 to use the wind. This was taking us far away from the land and it seemed we would be all day zig zaging and not making much progress south.

O’vive was taking a beating as we bashed across and into the waves, the wind instrument gave up on us and told us we had winds speeds of 250 to 300. I don’t think so. The direction pointer couldn’t seem to reflect the correct direction at all. At least we had the wind vane on top of the mast.

It seemed to take us forever to clear Cape Bowling Green and get enough angle to sail down to Upstart, each wave we bashed into the boat shuddered and objects inside jumped and rolled. The strap that holds the clew of the mainsail and outhaul to the boom snapped with a great bang so John and I climbed onto the rolling roof and effected repairs with a spare rope.

It was the worst day we had had so far this sailing season.  The oncoming swell was topped with white caps sending spray over the bows and up to the cockpit.

We arrived at Upstart at 5:30 feeling very weary so we reheated the remains of the irish stew.