TripSailor.com® Sailing Blogs

We have changed our blog host as the original host was hacked into and is closing down. Here we summarise our journey so far.

Having bought Rebel in Pittwater Australia in May 2006, after many delays we finally flew from South Africa in November 2007 and stepped on board. We spent a month and a half fixing various things, such as the wind instruments, which the birds decided would make a delicious expensive snack….  Xmas 2007 was spent with family in New Zealand, after which we flew back to Pittwater to sort out the newly serviced life raft that had self-inflated between the shrouds, etc.

Eventually in March we headed north, stopping off in Newcastle, Port Stephens, Fosters, Byron Bay, Laurieton, and the Clarence. We spent a month cruising the Clarence with other yachties and left Rebel in Yamba while we returned to SA in June.  

From the Clarence we headed up to Queensland, the Great Sandy Straights (with the obligatory running aground!), Fraser Island, Mooloolaba, Bundaberg, Lady Musgrave Island, the Keppel Islands. Then we crash gybed and broke the boom. Fortunately Rebel seems to sail as fast with just the genoa, so we took our time getting to Airlie Beach where we eventually had the boom replaced. However, this took over a month and stopped us from heading further north as originally planned. Fortunately Chris and Gilli on Westwind were in Airlie Beach for a while, as were Rachael and Adam on Cabellero.

Late October we headed south, revisting many places on route and meeting the odd storm head on. It was great to get back to Pittwater and drop anchor where a year before we had been green enough to spend some three months in a marina. Then into Sydney Harbour and the Super Yacht Marina (not to be recommended but we left it too late to book anything else) for Xmas, where Ian’s daughter joined us from Durban for three weeks.

Late January 2009 we hoisted our sails for Tasmania. Our first stop was Port Hacking, where we were silly enough to be for Australia Day. Wow, never seen so many boats of all descriptions crammed together in such a small area. Luckily the wind behaved itself but been there, done that and will avoid a repeat! We arrived in Eden early in February – the last major sheltering spot before crossing the Bass Straights. There, with some seven or so other boats, we spent about 10 days waiting for the right weather. Finally on Valentine’s Day the Eden team left at dawn. After sailing through a fairly uneventful night Rebel made Eddystone Point on the north east corner of Tasmania by dusk the following day. Whew! one less thing to worry about. We then bay hopped down to the Tasman Pensinular and before heading to Hobart joined Chris and Gilli of Westwind in exploring part of the d’Entrecasteaux Channel. This is beautiful cruising ground with pristine scenary and COLD weather, even in February!

March this year saw us tied up in Constitution Dock in Hobart. As Ian had not been feeling well for roughly a month we decided to spend the winter in Tasmania and took a berth in Kings Pier Marina. To cut a long story short, Ian’s ill health was eventually diagnosed as endocarditis, and necessitated open heart surgery to replace his mitral valve, followed a week later with a pacemaker. After five and a half weeks in hospital he was eventually discharged on 8 August and we moved into a studio flat to help his recuperation. He, the new bionic man, is recovering well with all subsequent post-op tests fine. The current plan is to stay in the studio until mid November and then move back on board.

So, for the next few months the blog is going to be about our travels on land.  Just hope the spiders are not getting too comfortable in our sails and that the birds stay away from the wind instruments.