Who needs Wasabi when we have Service like this?

Passing Exmouth now and preparing to leave Australian waters. Sailing at 6 knots with fantastic following 20 knot winds from the SE, perhaps not quite fast enough to met our elected time at the next rally latitude 20 degrees. It is a rally though, not a race - but see, look at us, we are 3rd (for the moment)!
All well and slipping into the lovely routine of life at sea on a perfect ocean with fresh fish, classy service and fine company.

On the rhumb line to Bali

We are offshore 30miles west of Gnarloo, beautiful day sailing. Alone now - the last yacht in the fleet we saw was Tradewinds V that took off in the following winds this morning. It is 15 feet longer than us.

Caught tuna and mackeral yesterday. Ate sashimi but the caterer hadn't bought wasabi. The two stowaways are fitting in nicely and they don't eat much.

We missed our second target latitude by 2hrs 44mins, so now have to average 6.6 knots to make the next. We are now 50 kilometers offshore, on the rhumb line to bali with less than 1000nm to go.

video lunch

Geoff has just discovered that the tin opener does not work. It will have to be fresh vegetable curry for dinner.

Underway

Seranading Sandy

How quickly we slip into a routine!  Now that all the sickies have got their sea legs, we have quickly settled into a routine of reading, cooking, eating, music, sleeping and trying to guess which yachts belong to the sails visible on the horizon.

And we even do a little bit of sailing now and then, although luckily Sandale is quite good at looking after herself most of the time!

After a spectacular sunrise we enjoyed a nice Easterly for most of the morning, which kept us moving at >6 knots, before dying out to leave us wallowing in the growing swell.  We are now hoping to turn the engine off quite soon, when the sea breeze arrives to do its thing....Marty says the statistics show Geraldton never has calm days at this time of year, so it shouldn’t be problem!!

As we approached Geraldton we were passed by Marco Polo and Farrucca, and then heralded by our first pod of dolphins who came close by to see how we are doing.  We were also heralded by a huge bulk carrier ship as we past Geraldton, reminding us why we should always keep watch!

All very routine really!

Passing traffic

Janet cooking up a storm

Lunch on the run

Morning of Day 3

Winds are no longer beating Sandale on the nose. Travelling at 5-6 knots with nearby companion boats Marco Polo, Farruca and Scaramouche hugging the shore with us as we approach Geraldton. The Cat Ice-cube pulled in to Jurien yesterday with radio trouble and our friendly rival Farr-lap has headed further out to sea.

Yesterday was full of sea sickness for most. 

'....all well, well a little sick, except of course the relentless Maff who bounds about as if this is an adventure. So much food, didn't eat last night or this morning'  reports Navigator Marty.

Sandale's Crew Before They Became Sea-sick

Day 2 status reports that 3 of the 5 crew are very sea-sick - which ones?!

At the Start Line

The start gun fired at 12 noon. Windswept farewell crowd at North Mole were all grateful they weren't on board!

Farewells and Stowaways

Indonesian girls couldn't resist the urge to share crewing on Sandale as she departed on her way to Bali. Gamalan orchestra, gongs and hip horrays waved Sandale off as she left Fremantle Sail Club - 11am Saturday 23rd April.

off we go!

At last! Thelast fewweeks, then the last few days, then the sleeplass last night. What have we forgotten?
Great sendoff, thanks to everyone at Fremantle Sailing club. Wind could be a bit more comfortable, currently NW at 15 knots, so a perfect headwind and waves to bounce off. We are currently passing Rotto, and our first mutiny, fancy missing the chance of a fresh coffee.

Dancing Girls Arrive To See Us Off

The crew and private dancers

We are now truly ready to depart, having danced with the Indonesian beauties at the F2B Gala Farewell Dinner, and have made arrangements to meet up with them again in 2 weeks when we get to Bali. 

Geoff also got the business card of his 'friend' the Director General of the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, in case we need any assistance at any point of our journey!  All good!!

Fan dance

Last supper

Maff and Jen

June and Geoff

Strategic Planning

Final planning in action

Since all successful missions start with effective planning, and all effective planning takes place in an environment conducive to clear thinking, we have had to find a nice quiet place to plan our trip to Bali and beyond.

After significant research we have determiend that Gino's on the Fremantle cuppucino strip is the ideal place for strategic planning.  We would therefor like to thank our sponsors at Gino's, and remind them that if our plan unravels we will be coming after them!

Nearly Ready

One last screw should do it!

Final preparations are in hand...not only is Sandale looking a little lower in the water than usual, weighed down with essential provisions, she has also been modified and equipped with the all the go fast gear!

It started with solar panels and mobile phone aerials, moved onto new cupboards, shelves and crockery, and now we even have satellite connectivity!!  Long gone are the days when you went to sea saying goodbye to your loved ones, wondering when (and if!) you would even speak with them again! 

With our new sat phone you can contact us by phone, text or email anytime of the day or night...you can track us by satellite on Google Maps...and you will know where we are even before we know where we are.  But then again, we've also got GPS chartplotters, EPIRB's, Mobilarms and even paper charts...so there's no excuse for us not knowing where we are either.

And you thought we were going to have a peaceful relaxing time out there on the wide blue oceans?!!

It seems our last and final barrier to heading for the horizon will be completing customs clearance and immigration, and then we will really be allowed to go.  I'm still wondering though why the beauracracy wants to process us at 6.00am on Saturday morning?!!

Anyway, the Rally starts at 12.00 noon Saturday, and if you want to share in the fun come and see us off at the Fremantle Sailing Club, or wave to us from North Mole as cross the start line.

Sat phone and email now connected

heavy around the waterline?

Like me at Xmas time, Sandale is beginning to feel a little heavy around the water line. Over a tonne of water and fuel and then food with still the fresh fruit to buy. We have been hiding it in places easy to forget. The boat is a giant treasure hunt. What fun we'll have!

Come to Fremantle Sailing Club on Saturday to see us off. At 9am they will have an indonesian fiesta, dancing girls, food. All the boats will be alongside so there is a reasonably good chance for you to stow away.

Geoff took some friends to Fish Hook Bay last weekend, the last hurrah of summer.

Maff (who is good) finally got the Sat phone email working.

bring on the dancing girls

Today we put the race stickers on.

What a busy week. As well as getting our own boat ready for our adventure we farewelled our friend Roz Savage- http://www.rozsavage.com/ - who is rowing to a top secret location on the other side of the Indian Ocean. Yes, rowing! Top secret because she is worried about  pirates. We carried the channel ten and seven film crews and a few others as Roz rowed, well, it would be nice to say off into the sunset but it was early morning and we wanted to get back for coffee.
Lucky she left, really, because she is a campaigner for cleaner oceans and less rubbish and she hates plastic shopping bags. Our boat is now basically full of plastic shopping bags full of plastic wrapped containers of manufactured food. Not a fresh vegi in sight. Scurvy? What's that?
Next week we are looking forward to the official departure dinner complete with Indonesian Dancing girls, hence the title. Departure Sat 23rd at noon.
 
  

navigation

Sorry to all of you who spend relentless sleepless times waiting for the next Sandale update, but we have been busy, well, twilight sailing. Now, we are aware that these are laid back affairs and that trying too hard is frowned upon by true yachties, but we have been winning! It was a bit of a mystery as to how, as we were never first over the line, but we now know why.
After the race there is a BBQ in the clubhouse. The president of the race committee walks around the gathered throng with a bottle of wine to present to the winning skipper. Trouble is, mid week, getting dark early, bit cooler, whatever, most now go straight home. So we, being the die hard BBQers that we are, happily recieve the winner's bottle as the committee member sprints past on their way to the exit. Ahh winning- it is just as simple as turning up!
Just turning up at Bali (and, hopefully, winning) will be the end result of successful navigation and in that regard we resemble the old joke. Each day at mid-day a train arrives in some small wild west town, and exactly at noon blows the whistle. One day the train driver and the Mayor are chatting, and the Mayor tells the driver that he is always amazed at how accurate the trains clock is, so much so that he uses the noontime whistle blow to set the town hall clock.
'Well,' says the train driver, 'I set the train by that clock because it is the only one to be accurate along the entire line.'
We now have the SPOT that tracks the boat and uploads positions to google maps every ten minutes. So if we get lost, we can look ourselves up on google and update our position that will then be refreshed via SPOT to google and we can look ourselves up and know where we are and then.....
It's all a bit circular.
But seriously, navigation requires not only to know where you are, but where you are going. And is not that just like life?
Note that knowing where you have been is of historical interest only. It is like photographs. Pointless. No photographs today.