Sancutary Cove boat show

Went off to the boat show today just to see what was there.  Actually there was a few jobs which were successfully completed but we also saw this fantastic table in a Lagoon 620. Now that would be cool! (Dad?).

The (early) haulout at Coomera

When we got back on the boat at the beginning of May we had this naive idea that we would be able to just fill up and head north.  Didn't quite happen like that.

Two new engine batteries, saildrive shafts needed to have a sprayweld(?) to build up the metal and then get machined again, new seals, new water pump, new alternator pulley and belt, just to name a few of the jobs.  Roger came out one day and helped us with the antifoul painting, now that we've spent the entire weekend polishing we really should have asked him to come back for another day and help with that too.  Next time!

Anyway, another bunch of money spent but a full on week of lots of hours and we're back where we belong on the water.  We're anchored just on the inside of South Stradbroke Island listening to the surf on the other side, hardly a breath of wind and just watched the sunset.  Life is back to normal :)

Autumn on the Gold Coast

Not a cloud in the sky, hardly a breath of wind.  Just sitting here listening to the leaf blowers and some road traffic.  Because it's mid week there's no water traffic.  Very nice spot to sit. :)

Solar working properly again at last

I've finally been able to replace 4 of the 6 panels that were damaged last year in the hail storm.  Means in addition to the fridge running all day and charging notebooks and phones and a little bit of hot water we've also added about 80 amp hour.  Not bad at all.

Paradise

Dinner & dishes done. Time to relax.

Synchronising data on a (power) budget

I've been trying for ages to work out how I can keep our documents synchronized on Belindas notebook and mine (and a copy at home just in case) without using something like Dropbox. The main reason I don't like using Dropbox is that if Belinda makes a change to a document it must first send the document out to the internet and then it will notify my computer and if Belindas notebook is on at the same time as mine it will sync locally.
We've been using BTSync (uses bit torrent protocol to keep your own data in sync) and it can work on windows, linux, android, apple, etc. I've looked at all sorts of notebook, NAS, etc and was going to use an old netbook computer but it suddenly hit me today.
The lowest power machine I've got is an Android phone.
Here's the solution. For internet access (and local wifi) we either use my phone tethered (Optus $2 per day prepaid which includes 500MB of data per day) or a Telstra 3G wifi hotspot which gives us 8GB per month. The Android phone running BTSync will automatically switch between whichever wifi is available and is always going to be a local connection without going near the internet.
Because this copy of the data is always available it means that if Belinda is online without me or I'm online without Belinda then it will always keep in sync with the Android meaning the 800MB of data we have wills always sync locally without going out to the internet.
Hmm, just read that back to myself and maybe I'll do a picture later. Anyway, I've proved the concept and when I go back to Canberra at the end of the month I'll bring back the Samsung Galaxy S2 with a cracked screen and have a 32GB micros SD card in it.

And we're back in Queensland

So at the end of January we went back to Canberra. Needed to be back there by mid Feb for my 50th birthday which went off fantastically, Laceys birthday at the end of Feb and I also did about 7 weeks work. We ended up staying in Canberra until the 14th of April when we drove to the Riverland in SA for Callie and Steves wedding and then drove back again. Couple of nights in Canberra and then back up here.
We stayed 4 nights with Belindas dad and waited out the wet weather before getting back on the boat yesterday. Probably a bit naive of us but it would've been nice to get back on the boat after 3 months and just get moving. No such luck.
We were hoping to get up to Bundaberg by the end of May and haul out there for a quick clean and antifoul before heading to the Whitsundays for winter.
As it turns out we have a new list of jobs and we'll need to do those before we even leave the Gold Coast. 200mm of rain in 24 hours seems to find every leaky window and we've finally sorted some of the electrical problems. Not one problem but multiple problems. Two dodgy engine batteries AND a dodgy voltage sensitive relay at the same time. When I've fixed those we'll see what else there is.

Green Island, Moreton Bay

No pictures of Green Island (not a lot to see really) and we only stayed the one night.  It's only a mile or so south of St Helena and we were sheltering from an Easterly.  Got up early in the morning and went over to Manly to re-provision.  There's no public jetty there however the fuel dock is open at 0800 and when we'd finished filling the guy let us stay in one of the berths for a couple of hours while we did the shopping.  Also took the opportunity to fill the water.

Hmm, struggling with the idea of dates in the blog.  Should I leave the date automatic which shows when I wrote it or should I manually change it back to the date when it occurred?
Anyway, we stayed the night of the 8th, went to Manly on the 9th and I'm writing this on the 18th.

Grr, just went and looked and it didn't make sense at all with the dates.  I've now decided that I'll just have to keep it more up to date or live with the dates looking a bit weird.

St Helena Island - Moreton Bay

On the 6th Jan we left Dockside again with an outgoing tide.  Much nicer as we had reached the mouth of the river in just over 2 hours (about an hour faster than a few days before).  Turned right into a 15 - 20 knot head wind and decided that we'd only go as far as St Helena Island which is only about 3 miles.  Anchored in the shelter of the island for a couple of nights.  Brisbane dock in the distance makes the cranes look like giraffes.

On the 8th Jan we went on to the island to look around and discovered it used be a prison between 1865 and 1932.  It's all national park and you can walk around some bits but needed to book a guided tour for other parts of the island.  Unfortunately neither of us took a phone hence no photos and we couldn't even ring up and find out more details about the guided tours.

The New Year

We flew back from Canberra on the 30th December with Glenn and Necia and spent new years eve at dockside. It was pretty warm so my xmas present from Belinda (water pistol) got a workout with the neighbours on the dock.

We passed on going to Southbank on new years eve and instead took the ferry over on new years day and had a swim and a beer over there with slightly less of a crowd.

On the 2nd left the dock and went into an 15 kt easterly across Moreton Bay over to the sand hills (between 'Big' Sand Hills and 'Little' Sand Hills) at the south end of Moreton Island.  We stayed there a couple of nights and managed a short picnic on a sand bank during low tide.  While we were there I used an ex foliating glove and cleaned off some of the brown Brisbane river slime.  Pretty happy that we only have a couple of barnacles after 6 months.

On the 4th we sailed up to Tangalooma and I managed 7.5 kts of boat speed with one reef in the main and a full head sail running at right angles to the same 15 kts easterly.  Happy with that too!

Only spent an hour or so at Tangalooma while we got some ice and then moved to the top end of Lucinda Bay just south of Tangalooma to stay for the night.  Very protected from the easterly.

On the 5th we headed back in to the river and up to Dockside again so Glenn and Necia would be able to make their flight the next day.