Friday
14th June
Latitude – 12 degrees S
Longitude – 136 degrees
This photo is all I have for you thus
far.
The sparkling blue Arafura Sea.
This indicates that we have crossed the Gulf
and are safe and well in a sheltering bay, surrounded by lots of other boats, none
of which had their riding lights on when we came in last night… They are very
lucky that we didn’t crash into them –we had our owl-eyes open very wide in the
dark dark night.
Did I find the opportunity to write a
witty, pithy report, as we crossed the Gulf?
Well no… As soon as the sun set, so did I. Literally.
I spent the first night feeling general malaise, ditto the following day
I was able to drag myself through my allotted tasks, but by the second night it
was all just GHASTLY. I won’t go into
any details, too boring, too, as I said ghastly.
I am deeply disappointed; have done so
well so far, have even been able to read while under way! Why oh why does this happen, on overnight
passages? We couldn’t have had better
conditions. We had a light zephyr of a
breeze, just enough to help us, with the headsail. And the sea was never bigger than 1.5
metres. The stars shone brightly, there
was a prettier than pretty sickle moon.
And…all I could do was endure.
Poor Pete. He was very kind but there wasn’t anything he
could do. I managed to do most of my 3-hour
shifts at the helm, with the occasional hour when he just had to take over while
I lay, inert, on the couch. I did try to
pull my (rapidly decreasing) weight but by midnight last night, was beyond anything
useful. I did get up and use my owl eyes
as we approved the Gove Peninsula, but that is about it.
We got to bed just after 4am and rarely
has bed been so welcome.
This is what we are doing, at 11am:
Happy Pete with a Man’s Breakfast:
Me, with weak black tea…am a bit
surprised that I am managing to smile, even this much.
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