Year 2 Friday 11th April 2025 – Gladstone Marina -Guest Blog
David wrote
Woke about 0630. I assumed Paul was in bed (But I later found out he had gone for a walk around the Spinnaker Park run). I decided to go for a 6km run. I was interested in what lay the other side of the marina, this is lit with colourful lights of night. It proved a lovely run, ending up on a coastal run, then through Khoodghn Guparl (meaning Seawater Bush).
We decided to stay in the marina due to the weather. Weather forecasts showing little change and the Marina confirmed 30+ kts offshore and with king tides which provides little protection in the lagoons of the cays and islands. Some island ferries have been cancelled.
I therefore decided and suggested to Paul to have a training day. Paul is eager to stay on board and would like to do the Whitsunday Islands and I thought it would be useful for Nick if Paul was more up to speed with the operation of the boat. So after a cereal breakfast I spent between 1000 and 1400 going through the boat and sailing procedures, by demonstrating the process including creating dummy situations, letting out the boom etc, then asking Paul to repeat that process including the importance of synchronising the loading and easing of the main and preventer. We also covered the operation of the running backstays, the preventer, knots, operation of the main and traveller by hand, by electric winch and using the winch handle. I also covered the operation of the main, Staysail and Genoa including how to furl them by hand using the emergency winch handles. I also ran through the chart plotter explaining basic use and showing him what various items on the chart meant, such as colours between contour lines where and what a contour line was, AIS and vector lines of vessels and explaining Nick has these set to show where a vessel will end up if it stayed on course in 1 hour. Also, what the various line, track and recommend track lines were and meant. I also demonstrated the safe handling of winches and how to operate a sheet etc under load.
Tomorrow I thought I would look and the sheet operations, mooring lines and the dingy davit operation, Might even poodle around the marina in the dingy to get used to it myself. I plan to cook steak, roasted veg and sweet potato wedges for dinner tonight.
Dinner went well. Paul said better or as good as a restaurant!!
I think Pancake creek may be an inshore option for Monday.