Sailing into 2010!

Time flies when your having fun, here we are into the 3rd day of the new year! Whats happened since Pittwater? well New Years Eve was a hoot! We were anchored up in Smiths Creek, up near Cottage Point. Bruce and Sue once again played host to a tasty dinner. Also joining us were, Lynn and Andrew from Mischief and Andrews wonderful sister & brother Patrina(hope Ive spelt that right?)from London, and Nigel (aka Simon) from Brisbane. After dinner we rowed to Rob & Katrina's new boat with a crowd of other folk from the CCC, this resulted in more guitar playing and singing, sorry I was soooo drunk and nearly dieing from dehydration and heat exhaustion, Rob I really would have liked to continue playing but. Hope to catch up with you all in a couple of months, when we sail north from Tassie.

New years day was right off for me, my plan was to leave Smith Creeks at about 8am and sail to Cronulla, but see above. We ended up leaving at 11.30am and by the time we motored out to Barrenjoey, I needed another lie down. We grabbed a mooring and I slept all afternoon. (no more bloody drink for this boy)

Fast forward to the 2nd, we left bright and early for the planned sail to Cronulla. Flukey winds and not wanting to to start the motor, left us floundering off Sydney Heads when the sky went black, and I mean black!!! We were hit with a massive downpour that was soooo heavy you could only see about 50 mtrs in front of you. If it wasn't for the compass and the chart plotter, I would not have known where I was.
Jen says it was one of the weirdest experience's she has ever had, its really hard to explain what it was like. The attached pic does not do it justice. We ended going into the harbour and anchoring in Rose Bay. We decided that the harbour view was to our liking and have decided to stay a few days before continuing south.(now thats a great thing about this cruising stuff)

We are now berthed at the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (from here on in known as CYCA)for 2 days. I decided I needed a shower or my clothes were leaving me in protest over the smell, getting laundry done, going shopping and taking my faulty laptop power supply back to Jaycar. I got lost on arrival and went down the wrong finger at the marina, and I had to bid a hasty retreat.
Now reversing a full keeled yacht is no easy feat, because there is very little control. Adding to the pressure of performance anxiety, were the bevvy of well heeled spectators.(crew of Ichi Ban nursing a broken mast and Play Station 3)As usual they all seemed to appear on deck just as I realized I had to turn around. Now tell me you don't believe in miracles, but Crazy Lady sensing my fear and the impending doom, spun around in a boat length, leaving both me and the CYCA members, including all the marina's armchair admirals gob smacked. I waved to them all as I casually motored to the correct pen, with a renewed confidence. Now Crazy Lady sits proud amongst all the multi million dollar yachts.

Pics: Couple of Crazy Lady at CYCA and downpour.

Heading South Tuesday!

Glenn