A new neighbour?

The sun was over the yardarm and we were enjoying a drink on the verandah when a rubber-duckie came up the river. He waved, we waved, and he came ashore!

It turned out to be the 64-year-old sailor Brian Metcalfe who, a couple of weeks ago, had spent an excruciating night stranded off Batemans Bay suffering from hypothermia and medication withdrawal. [Read more].

Brian lives permanently on a 24ft TRITON 721, and is anchored - indefinitely, it seems - in the Bay off Square Head. Now that he has explored the upper reaches, he wants to move upriver.

An example of a TRITON 721 but not Brian's
Welcome to the Nelligen Yacht Club, Brian!
Wear our yacht club t-shirt with pride!

Ahoy there, AMBER LADY!

Click on image for another patch
I've rowed out to AMBER LADY to inspect the patches - and they are looking good!

After all the rowing, I had to have a coffee-and-cake break while I ran the engine for ten minutes or so.

Click here for a close-up of the book's cover

Nick, I left you this book to expand your mental horizon as we sit around the infinity edge pool at the Banjar Hills Retreat in Bali.

I also left some housekeeping material to keep the boat clean:

Travelling North - at a snail's pace

CHARON at the 1972 Sydney Boat Show
Richard and Wendy's CHARON is currently tucked up at a jetty alongside the Wangi Wangi Workers Club at Lake Macquarie where it is blowing a gale.

They took the train down to Sydney to visit the Boat Show. There they were given an old photo of CHARON when she was the centrepiece of the 1972 boat show.



P.S. Wendy, Padma has just finished reading Rosamunde Pilcher's Winter Solstice and highly recommends it!

If it fits, wear it!

New lifejacket rules to improve boating safety and reduce deaths from drowning will come into effect from 1 November 2010.

Under the rules, people will be required to wear lifejackets at times of heightened risk.

The reforms are the result of a NSW Maritime discussion paper on the issue, which generated a strong response from the boating community with a record 3615 submissions.

The new rules for wearing lifejackets include:

By children less than 12 years of age when:
- in a vessel less than 4.8 metres;
- when in an open area of a vessel less than 8 metres in length that is underway;

By all boaters in a vessel less than 4.8 metres in the following heightened risk situations:
- at night;
- on open (ocean) waters;
- on alpine waters; and
- when boating alone;

At times of ‘Skipper Judgement and Direction’ in ‘heightened risk’ situations such as when the weather worsens or the boat breaks down;

When water-skiing or wakeboarding;

When operating a canoe or kayak on:
- enclosed waters, when more than 100 metres from shore; and
- ocean waters.

There will be a 12-month advisory period while boaters get used to the new rules, where NSW Maritime will only penalise repeat offenders.

Another fourth Greek letter

Steve Leonard, the originator of the Deltacraft range of boats, with fellow boat builder John Gale are setting out to recreate the Deltacraft Islander in a 2010 guise. They are presently building the moulds and hope to be in production by Christmas 2010.

The new boat is a metre longer than the old ones and fitted with a rear gate and a lovely shape to the transom with an full-width moulded landing platform. Accommodation includes a larger shower/toilet cabin, larger modernised galley, 50mm (2 inches) more headroom taking it to nearly 1.9 mtrs, around 6' 3". The cockpit is huge, seating 8 and sleeping 2, with 3 sleeping in the cabin all on full-length bunks.

A new deep full-length keel with ballast stiffens the boat up enormously and designed hull alterations make the new boat the best ever. With the Volvo 3-cylinder engine driving a 4-blade propeller, the fuel usage is expected to be only 1.5 litres per hour at hull speed. For its weight and size, this makes it a most economical boat to run, thus the most eco-friendly.

Priced at $59,900, it is a lot of boat for the money. Trade-in Deltas welcomed.

For more details, email Steve at steve@deltacraft.com.au or visit the website of the Delta Islander Club.

Cheers from CHARON

According to their latest blog, CHARON and her crew are still in the Pitt Water/Broken Bay area. However, fellow yachties gave them a spare chart of the Whitsundays which may induce them to set sail for warmer climes soon.

They may cross paths with TEKANI II who has had her new name emblazoned on her mainsail-sock and is now ready to head back to her home port Cairns.

Tekani II

In December last year I wrote this blog about my 82-year-old mate Brian Darcey from Cairns who was about to set sail in an ocean-going yacht which he had bought in Zealand.

There were some last-minute problems with that particular boat. Brian has since bought this South Coast 36 ketch which he renamed Tekani II (after the island of the same name in Papua New Guinea where his old mate Graeme Carson used to lived).

He spent the last couple of weeks at Mooloolaba Marina where he familiarised himself with his new boat and is now ready to set sail for new horizons.

Good luck and fair winds, Brian!