Tropical paridise

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Year One
Date: 3/10/2008 07:30
Weather: Lovely
Location: Lady Musgrave 23'54 17S, 152'24 17E
Author: Peter

When you picture a tropical lagoon what do you envisage? More on that later.

We left Cape Capricorn on Sunday with a perfect 12knot northerly but as we had forecasts again of southerlies over 25knots for the next few days we headed for Pancake Creek (24'00 63S, 151"44 24E) another 35nm further south. We arrived early in the afternoon but were surprised to find another 15 boats already at anchor and another 5 still on their way. It felt like school holidays back in the Whitsundays although this anchorage was much smaller. As we arrived at low tide and Pancake Creek is a shallow narrow river we stayed in the outer anchorage for the night. We had a little bit of a rolly time for about one and a half hours either side of high tide when the water gets high enough to cross the sand spit at the entrance. The following morning as predicted the southerlies returned and while all the other boats now used the high tide to get further up the river to the other more protected anchorage, we remained as the swell now rotated to the south giving us a calm anchorage and we wanted to get away as soon as the weather permitted. (and no, no pancakes were harmed in the making of this story)

We remained here until Wednesday morning when we planned to take advantage of the last of the south easterlies to reach the 35nm out to Lady Musgrave. Pity the weather forecast was a little wrong as the trip ended up being a 48 nm work with current assistance. We still arrived as planned with the sun high in the sky and entered our first coral cay. The lagoons entrance seems tiny near low tide, especially with a cross wind and once inside you wind your way through the coral bommies to the anchorage. The entrance was a little nervracking but once inside with the sun high the bommies were easily spotted against the pure white sands of the bottom.

Although we have only been here now for a day and a half it has been fantastic. If you ever get the chance to come here either on your own boat or via the high speed cat, you must do it. Although I have been a little disappointed with some of our cruising up here I am most definitely not with Lady Musgrave. When I pictured tropical paradise this was pretty much it. We are currently anchored inside a tropical lagoon situated 35nm off shore at the southern end of the great barrier reef and it is picture postcard perfect (just wait for the photo's). the lagoon is surrounded by a coral reef in the shape of a capital D and is approximately 1nm in length. In its south western corner is a little 10 square kilometre island. The water is so clear that although we are anchored in 8m of water the bottom looks like it is just there even with wind blowing on the surface.

Yesterday morning we went exploring the island which at this time of year is covered with sleek grey terns (sheer waters). Entering the tree line is like something out of the movie "the birds" with terns everywhere. They seem to fill trees and they cover the ground in big groups, including the pathways. When we first got there Kylie spent the first 10 mins huddled in close to me and walking slightly slouched for fear of being swooped (I think she must have had a bad magpie experience somewhere) but although they sometimes flew around us no swooping occurred and she eventually calmed down, to a degree. We made our way across the island to its far shore where there were plenty of school holiday campers before walking around the sun bleached white shores of the island back around to the duck. Whilst on our walk there were turtles everywhere in the shallows just off the beach. At any one time it was easy to see at least 9 turtles no matter which way you looked. On the most part they seemed ok with our presence although I think some of them were a little pre occupied with each others company.

On our arrival back at the duck we discovered the tourist boat had arrived so we decided to avoid the crowd and head back to Jura, where Kylie decided she would like to spend the afternoon reading while I went back for a snorkel. As I entered the water off the beach I was surrounded by full grown adult loggerhead and green sea turtles. The design in our saloon table is based on green sea turtles. At first they were a little skittish but as I just floated there they soon became accustomed to my presence and they just floated along with me although a little too close for the camera to get them fully in shot.

I spent the next half an hour with them before swimming out a little to the coral and clearer water not stirred up by the waves at the shore. Once out it was like swimming in someone's pool, you could just see so far, and the fish life is just amazing. I have never seen so many different fish in my life. It is so much better than any aquarium, and this is how I imagined the GBR to be. To see fish I have never seen before is just great, including a gorgeous Moorish Idol (Scar from finding nemo), orange socket surgeon fish, smooth flutemouth, and many more along with one very large ugly and spiky octopus.