Sailing Around Australia; The Art of Doing Nothing

16/1/201 Location; Tied on to service jetty, Bandy Creek boat harbour, Esperance Western Australia

Since leaving Mandurah on our Sailing Around Australia Adventure aboard Easy Tiger, many people

that we have met ask me the same question “what do you do all day?” or “don’t you get bored?”

To be honest, I haven’t even had time to sit and think about it. Prior to setting sail Leanne and I had jobs with a fair deal of responsibility and pressure. Leanne was doing sales and quoting at Spencer Signs and my job was Port Hedland Supervisor at a transport company. I was responsible for coordinating and supervising more than 70 employees and over 20 million dollars worth of assets. As second in charge, for 2 weeks out of 3 that I was on site I was on call 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It was not unusual to get between 6 to a dozen phone calls during the night and normal hours were 5 in the morning until 6 or 7 pm.

In between leaving that job and our departure from Mandurah marina, I did feel a sort of displacement and I did wonder whether I had become irrelevant.

My phone went to ringing about once a week, not every 5 minutes and the only decisions I had to make were what to have for lunch or what to do each day. The idea that I might get a little bored was actually quite appealing.

Now that we are 2 months into our sailing adventure, I have found that there are still many decisions to be made. Just that they are different types of decisions with different types of ramifications. As well, a certain amount of routine is necessary. Whether we are in a remote anchorage or we are in a harbour near a town, we do have a routine to complete each day and many decisions still need to be made.

For example here in Esperance, we are moored to the service jetty at the Bandy Creek boat harbour, in amongst the fishing boats. The Bandy Creek Boat harbour is about 6 to 10 kilometres out of town. Brian and Maree on Urchin are here with us, while Brian and Eva on Zofia are moored at the Yacht club within easy walking distance to town.

This meant that the first item on the agenda yesterday was to organise a hire car, so that the many trips to town and back we will require can be done with the least hassle, cost or obligation.

Then it was into town for a small food shop, a visit to 2 dive and fishing shops to buy a replacement fishing rod and filleting knives while looking at air tanks and dive systems for anchor retrieval, followed by the cafe for morning tea with Brian and Eva and visiting the slipway owner’s property (He’s a fellow catamaran owner) for an expertly brewed coffee. After that it was stowing all purchased goods, purchasing fish from one of the shark fishing boats, divvying up, vacuum packing and stowing the fresh fish into our freezer. Time was also spent chatting with a local guy who is rebuilding a wrecked catamaran, while scrubbing bird poo and other dirt spots off our front deck. By then it was evening, Leanne and Maree cooked up a meal, I cleaned and tidied the boat and we hosted 8 for dinner and drinks that went till 11pm. Not bad for a “recovery” day at the harbour.

If we are on anchor somewhere like the beautiful Two Peoples Bay, we need to constantly keep an eye on the weather. We need to decide if the boat should be re anchored somewhere different to hide from changing weather conditions. We need to constantly check that the anchor is holding. We need to keep an eye on our resources such as electricity, where we need to decide whether to put the generator on, or to move the boom in order to maximize the charge received from our solar panels. Also we need to keep up supply of fresh water.

As we found in Bremer Bay, it can take a large part of the day to replenish the fresh water supply on the boat, especially if this is done with the assistance of B2. That’s because you have the obligatory visit to the bakery to combine with the water collection. We use half a dozen jerry cans, that must be taken by dinghy to shore, carried to the water source, filled, then back to the dinghy, back to the boat and poured into the water tanks on board. Then if the boat tanks are not full, a second round has to be done and then a round to refill the jerry cans, which are stowed full in the locker on board as an emergency supply. We try to do this wherever we find a good (and close by) supply of fresh water, as we don’t really know the where or when the next adequate supply will be.

Also, if we are on anchor, the simple act of getting to shore can be a twenty minute activity by the time we get our dinghy prepared, untied and pulled up on to the beach.

No matter where we are, Leanne and I like to go for a long walk each day and have had the odd “game” of Frisbee with the Urchin crew, which is a good way of getting exercise and blowing out the rust.

Interestingly, I am finding the “down time” is when we are sailing, such as our 18hours trip from Hopetoun to Esperance. Once we get the sails up and set our course we are then passengers, letting the autopilot, the sails and the boat do the work. During daylight sailing I do like to constantly adjust with the sails to see if we can maximize the performance of Easy Tiger within the available wind. We then have keep a look out for other boats or other obstacles, watch the instruments, the wind direction and strength, while making sure we follow our planned course.

During a nighttime sail, we bring the sails down to between half and 3 quarters to just maintain steady, safe progress. This is when we totally rely on instruments only as we can’t see ahead of us in the dark. There is the odd hazard marker light or the lights of the other boats, but these are only moderate comfort because the distances are very hard to judge.

The other night Leanne did the first shift of three hours, then I did six hours up until 1.00am. During this time that it was a battle to keep awake and alert. I tried plenty of mental games, plus some Pink Floyd full bore on the Ipod, then I had some racing action during being overtaken (under yellow flag conditions, protest lodged) by our 2 sailing companions. That was just enough stimulation to get me through until Leanne came on for her 4 hour shift.

During Leanne’s turn at Skipper, I was trying to get to sleep while lying in a bunk that resembled riding a galloping pony, surrounded by the weird and wonderful noises of the ocean slapping and bumping on the hull.

At 4 .am I came back and did the next 4 hours. While seriously fatigued I managed some superior navigation tactics that saw us arriving into Esperance in a dead heat with Zofia.

We made our way over to the small boat harbour and by the time we got tied on, booked in and had our sailing gear packed away, the locals had lined up for a chat and look at the 2 boats. After that was sorted it was well after midday and Leanne and I fell into bed for the afternoon, sick with fatigue.

At the moment the Bandy Creek Boat harbour seems like it will be home for a week or more, as we recover from the three weeks of bobbing up and down on the anchorages we have stayed at.

We will restock, replenish and renew all on board here at Esperance, so that will keep us quite busy. As will collecting the mail and a few items that we have had sent to the Esperance post office, cleaning the boat and readying ourselves for the big one, the trip across the great Australian Bight. There is also emailing and bill paying (that never goes away).

It might also be nice to find some time to actually have a look around Esperance. This town is truly beautiful, has the whitest beaches in Australia and the proudest locals.

Of course there is keeping up with this blog, which I hear many of you enjoy. I am greatful for the nice feedback.

I certainly hope somewhere in the next week, before we plan to set off again, I can find some time to practice the art of doing nothing.