We left at 0700 and after 45 nm of sailing and motorsailing in light winds, we dropped anchor in Upstart Bay about 1500. We were forced to hand steer all day as the autopilot compass has decided to play up. Our heading was oscillating around the compass and we were glad this fault happened now rather than half way across the Coral Sea to the Louisiades.
Monday, 2 July 2012 - Cape Upstart to Magnetic Island
66 nm today in a 15-20 knot SE that eased slowly throughout the day. This was the opposite to what was predicted - the weather men have been having a hard time of it lately. No electronic compass again so more hand steering. This was better today as we had the spinnaker up for most of the day. We eventually started the motors about 6nm from Horseshoe Bay and dropped anchor at 1800.
We spent Tuesday at Horseshoe Bay in beautiful weather (again, despite the forecast). Warren tried crabbing and fishing with no luck.
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| Moonrise over Horseshoe Bay |
Wednesday, 4 July 2012 - Breakwater Marina
A short sail and motor to the marina where we refilled the fuel tanks for the first time this trip. 115 litres in total used so far on our trip at an average consumption of 1.7L per engine per hour. We are very happy with this as we usually motor with one engine, only using 2 engines when going into and out of anchorages and marinas. Our 320 litres therefore gives us a theoretical 188 hours motoring (or 940 nm).
Barry from Navcomm has put a new circuit board in the SPX10 autopilot and reconnected the AIS which Raymarine could find no fault with. Worked fine when Barry tested of course.
Thursday we had to recalibrate the electronic compass which went well but surprise, surprise the AIS is still not perfect. We'll have to see how it goes over the next few weeks. Print this post
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