Year 2 –28 January 2024 -Exploring Sydney

We woke to another scorcher of a day or so we thought or hoped. I had not heard from the electrician so I rang him. He said he did not have the log and will chase this up. He said he will let me know when he can come. This was annoying but we had the day ahead of us. We had breakfast in the cockpit which was nice and then headed ashore to drop off the washing and to do some provisioning.

I filled up the dinghy with fuel and had to bail it out somewhat to get rid of the rain from yesterday when we got soaked. It was extremely hot as we walked into Rose Bay and dropped off the washing. The supermarket surprisingly was cool and for once a bit of a relief from the weather.

We came back to Stormbird and packed everything away. We then caught the bus to Rushcutters Bay which has a large marina and a chandlery. It was extremely hot walking the last bit and found the chandlery which was quite good. They did not have the syphon tubes but ordered them in and they should be here tomorrow. Trevor bought himself another shirt.

We then went to the Cruising Club of Australia which was quite an upmarket club and we had a drink there. They organise the famous Sydney to Hobart race. We decided to go to the Boathouse in Rose Bay for lunch as thunderstorms were expected from 6.00pm in the evening. We caught the bus back and had a very nice lunch overlooking the water at The Boathouse which we had been to once before. We could see some dark clouds around and decided to leave. We should have had another bottle of wine as before long the heavens opened and we tried to shelter under the trees but it only partially helped. We therefore trudged back to the dinghy and came back to Stormbird drenched for the second time in two days.

We had a cup of tea and changed and the wind increased to the extent that we decided to haul the dinghy up in the davits and to put down the solar panels. We sat inside and heard the wind howl around us up to about 40kts and we swung around a bit and luckily the anchor held.

We read and amused ourselves and then had cheese and biscuits as a light supper. It had been a mixed day weather wise but we had done what we needed to do and were safe and sound.  

The picture of the day is the outlook toward the city in the windy damp weather to confirm it is not all sun and plain sailing.      

Need/Opportunity Year Two

I am in need of more crew from April to September so if of interest do email me at  hine.nick9@gmail.com  

In year two I will be going from New Zealand to Sydney and hen up the Eastern Australian Coast, Indonesia and then through Bali, Singapore and on to Thailand to end year two about the end of November 2025.

The blog will continue as we continue the journey. If you have any comments or suggestions about the blog then do email me on hine.nick9@gmail.com