CLIENT: Sydney to Brisbane Public Voyage
VOYAGE NUMBER: 20190110
FROM: Sydney To: Manly
DATE: 13 January 2019
POSITION: Coffs Harbour
REPORT BY: Blue Watch
Starting off in the middle of the night, our shift was 4am to 8am. It was quite different to any other watches we had done before, as we were guided by the stars and distant building lights rather than the sun. Looking above, we could see the Southern Cross as well as many other constellations. In the water beneath us, unique animals glowed as the movement of the water passed across them, the contrast of the speckled aqua against the inky black was incredibly beautiful. Patrolling the deck in the dark was quite a different experience, not being able to see anything, apart from the blanket of stars above.
Driving the boat was incredibly different at night as you couldn’t utilise the land marks, we had to solely rely on the compass, the stars and town lights to navigate. After what seemed like an eternity of frozen feet and darkness, the first rays of light peeked over the Tasman Sea in the east, illuminating the bank of clouds above. The smells of Hugh’s tantalising pancakes wafted out of the galley, up on deck, making each and every one of our mouths water. After a fabulous breakfast the next watch group took over so we could crash on the bunks, the deck… or just anywhere we happened to find.
Despite napping for half the day, Blue Watch had been busy. Kersh – the infamous Blue watch leader – sat with us on deck, helping us to brush up on our knot tying skills. Throughout the voyage we’d been having a knot tying competition between the different watch groups. Each day we would compete in tying different knots to win points on the leader board. Today was the bowline knot. Obviously Blue watch was the superior watch at knot tying. Our bowlines were so out of this world that we beat the other two watches by almost half, winning the round with a whopping time of 1 minute and 10 seconds! Harry, our Bosun’s Mate for the day, took off with a flying start, building up the energy among the rest of the team. Elliot, Tom and Chris carried on the pace, each tying perfect bowlines. Nathan and Tayla picked up the pace and energy yet again, handing over to Frances, the Bosun for the day bringing the team home to an epic victory, with speed and precision. Blue Watch are obviously, by far the most talented at tying knots aboard the ship, tying faultless 10/10 knots leaving the other watches far behind us in the whitewash. … Even though Blue Watch aren’t actually winning the overall competition.
Evening soon followed, pulling into Coffs Harbour with all hands on deck everyone’s seamless synchrony in lowering the sails impressed everyone in the marina. Much needed functioning hot showers awaited us (especially for the boys, some of whom still haven’t showered the entire voyage). Nearly everyone was eager to get off the boat and walk around on dry land, most of whom went walking around the nearby shops. Once everyone was back on the boat, most of us played cards until lights out. The end of a perfect day, for Blue Watch anyway.