As we sailed into the state of Queensland
it felt as if we had crossed the finish line
to a monster month long marathon.
We had put everything on the line to get to this point,
first quitting my job, spending our savings on a new yacht Tucana
and then sailing it from Melbourne to the Gold Coast in just four weeks.
It was an enormous task for two amateur sailors.
And to be honest it was a miracle we had even managed to get so far with these covid outbreaks
shutting down Australian state borders. So just how long could this good luck of ours last for?
We're usually trying to stay clear of marinas because of the expense but our steering cables
need replacing urgently. So we've pulled into Boat Works on the Gold Coast.
This place seriously goes on and on. It is like a theme park for boaties.
It's the largest shipyard in the Southern Hemisphere.
There are so many laundry facilities through here and ensuite so showers, bathrooms,
air-conditioned rooms, car hires available. These are all included in the cost of $70 a night.
As soon as we arrived we hired one of their complimentary cars and hit the ground running.
We had only been in the state for four hours when the phone rang.
So we just had a call. Maritime Safety Queensland have showed up.
It's because we came in from New South Wales. They're looking for a little Greek lady about yay high.
This is how the phone call went down.
We'll be back in 16 minutes the GPS is saying will you be around for a bit?
Yeh, and I messaged all the details, emailed the details to Paul at MSQ arrivals.
Sure that's no ways mate.
John then came up with an idea.
While i'm driving back, I can get my partner to just go through my phone and send those like email those on to you now
just to save a bit of time.
Yeah that's fine. Can you do this?
He seemed friendly! Yeah.
And so we re-emailed them all our documentation we had sent authorities days ago before we had even entered the state.
I even told them it would be at the Boat Works.
So it just goes to show that they're checking pretty much every single person that comes through
into the state. Maybe. From New South Wales.
John's a bit nervous.
No I'm not.
We spent a full 14 days isolated away from Sydney
and today is the 15th day so there's no denying that we have done the right thing.
And so access was granted. We felt like we had had some sort of Steven Bradbury win.
John's celebrated by treating himself to those new steering cables
and I... haven't had my hair done since January. I'm so sorry I have been
wearing a beanie as you guys know for like two days straight and Nikki has to work with this.
You didn't even say anything about my hair.
Do you like it? Looks Great.
What do you guys think? Should I go pink? Anyway let us know.
For now Tucana needs a transformation herself. The rego stickers are embarrassing
and her backside has been bare ever since John got carried away polishing her while on the
hard stand a few weeks back and removed her name.
So this morning I designed and purchased some new decals so other boaties can recognize her
and her rego clearly in case we're in an emergency. They at least will know her name
and details but as I found out there's an art to the application process.
What we're going to do with this decal is stick these two pieces on the side of the boat.
Then line up the sticker where you want it.
I feel like if i don't get this straight every time we walk past the boat we're gonna hate it.
Tape the top edge and then using scissors cut along each character.
Just remember to breathe.
I'm now revealing the back of the sticker.
Voila! Straight characters just how they appear horizontally on their sticker.
Looks really good. Does it?
Come over here and say in front of the camera.
It looks really good.
Can you believe they wanted $150 to do this. It's ridiculous. We pretty much just made money.
I think you should pay me $150 for doing this.
What about all the work I was doing while you're getting your hair done?
So we're just trying to get the Tucana decals perfect here
on the back of the boat but the problem is we can't get a perspective because there's nothing
behind us. So John's just running over to the other pontoon to see what it looks like.
She has her name back!
I think we need to address the elephant in the room.
I did you really talk about yourself like that.. haha.
Show us your fingers John... what.. no your other hand.
Shouldn't use shifters to tighten up nuts. You should use spanners.
While John was working on the steering system his hand slipped. It was so gory.
Look away if you have a soft stomach in, three, two, one.
So tell us what happened and how many stitches did you need to get uh five stitches.
I need to clean my nails. Was it painful?
No not really. They put aesthetic in it.
So it was alright. And how did I do as a nurse?
Very well. I was horrible.
I almost fainted. I actually had to sit right there, with my legs up in the air because I felt like i was going to be sick.
Showering is going to be difficult tonight. Oh you got a light for the bathroom!
Can you just stop. You've injured yourself let's just not do boat work for a day or two.
You can't help yourself. This is not a waterproof one, but I figure
we'll just see how long it lasts because there's nothing else with a switch, that's a touch one.
You are a workaholic.
But he did it! Our steering was fixed and it was time to keep etching north.
We can't wait to take Tucana to the Great Barrier Reef.
But first we have to get out of this marina.
So I think the main channel the deepest way people are telling us is to take the 'W' out towards Redland Bay around...
Are we concerned we'll hit the bottom at all?
Yeah that's why we're trying to time it for high tide.
So our options are we leave tonight and arrive on the highest of the high tides at Jacobs Well or
we leave in the morning and arrive on a 1.4 metre high tide
and there's no moon tonight either. No.
I think we should go tonight. It's also two hours less sailing we have to do tomorrow to get north.
Because, one, if we go tonight we don't have to pay another night's accommodation here at Boat Works
which is $70.
Two, the tide is higher than what it will be tomorrow morning
which is better because obviously last night we only had 10 centimeters under the keel and
we've never done any night sort of passages like that before so it'd be a good experience.
Well if we're gonna go tonight, we need to fill the water up. I haven't packed the main away.
We've got 3 hours right? Yeah. 3 hours.
It was time to get cracking. Time was ticking so...
Every time we have a free washing machine to use at these marinas
it's like let's wash everything.
So I'm about to have my last shower here before we go.
So tonight we're leaving Boat Works for Jacob's Well. We have to navigate our way through the
broad water otherwise we'll never get out of here with our 2.2 meter draft.
So that's the worst part, and we got through! Well.. for today. We bloody did it though!
Tucana looked more like a laundry the next morning but we
made it. The washing never had time to dry. Breakfast is served. We woke up to
the anchor alarm. The anchor alarms was because I set it really small like a small radius.
We didn't drag. It was the first time that we ever put the anchor down on Tucana by ourselves and we are
going to lift the anchor for the first time as well.
I'll also need a quick crash course because I've never done this before.
I guess I should probably wear shoes if I'm putting the anchor up hey?
When the anchor is at the water level like just in the water. Stop there so that it's not swinging so it's directly down.
Yeah. John also showed me how to use the deck wash so if there's mud on the anchor we can wash it off.
You've got to push that in pull it out this is a fresh water switch.
Well that didn't go too badly. There was one point where the anchor was sort of up
against the boat and I didn't know that's when John was like, "how's the anchor going?"
and I looked down and it was against the fiberglass. So we'll have to have a little sneaky look at that
later but this is a learning experience. This is the first time that I've ever done it by myself
so next time i'll be a little bit more observant. It's a little overwhelming
sometimes learning all these new things, but you never stop learning do you.
Back we're all begun hey! Not far from Peel Island just around the
top of Macleay. The very spot we first jumped on a friend's trailer sailor around six years ago.
Who would have thought we'd one day have our own and actually learn the ropes ourselves.
Can you see it tensioning that one? That one pulls it up.
I wonder how much speed you will get from this?
Dead down wind. This is called wing on wing. Is it? Yeah.
Have you ever done this before? No, never, first time.
We wanted some advice so who better to ask than our rigger and respected veteran ocean racer
Ian Barney Walker who's competed in three Volvo round the world yacht races.
Hey Barn! Does it look right to you mate? It's the first time I've ever done it
Should I have something that goes forward of the pole or or is that alright like that?
I'll come up and show you. I don't even know if I'm allowed to be up here Barn's.
We've got a preventer, so i should be okay. But yeah it's on this lifeline unfortunately.
Anyway what do you think.
We then found an issue with the spinnaker pole. What do you mean?
See the rivets are missing. There's one rivet there and one rivet on the
top that are missing. That could just slide out that way. Oh that's not great.
Okay well, I'm going to go back in case one of us falls off and then there's only one of us here and then
I'll fall in and then no one will be at the helm and then the boat will just sail into the sunset without us.
In Moreton Bay we're very much protected from the roaring sea.
Yeah so at the moment it's showing just on the eastern side of Moreton Island it's showing two to three meters and then
a little further out three to five meters swell. Which is why we took the inside route.
I cannot believe it's three to five meters swell right now. I think it's better to be in here at the moment.
This was the way to go!
Tonight we're anchoring off Bribie Island north of Brisbane home to around 20,000 people,
many national parks and surf beaches.
On our way there we found ourselves in a sticky situation with another vessel.
I just don't feel comfortable about this.
A potential collision course scenario. Yeah, see he's on a port tack.
We're just waiting because we think we have right-of-way.
Almost about to make this person's face out I think. Yeah they're definitely looking at us. John
this is a little bit awkward and embarrassing. Oh my god, we're getting so close it's ridiculous.
I'll just be like sorry mate i'm busy looking up the rules.
Are you actually? We actually were looking up the rules and
as it turned out, as John had assured me earlier, we were the stand-on vessel.
Do you reckon they could hear me if I screamed and say beautiful boat?
If you're watching you have a beautiful boat.
It's kind of like when I'm driving the car and I
let someone go in front of me, when there's no giveway, when you have right of way,
when I have right of way. You don't know whether to go or not. They hesitate so then after you waving them through
they hesitate because they know that you've got right away.
Yeah but i'm just trying to be a nice person. Yeah I know and you are a nice person.
Irrespective of the anti-collision rules at the end of the day it's a joint responsibility to avoid a collision.
Coming up next week...
we finally hook a fish but I really stuffed up.
Oh no and it's a big bloody fish.
Okay that was a bloody disaster.
Before we start exploring some breathtaking spots up the Queensland Coast.
I was about to say, you were wearing the same clothes as yesterday
but then I'd be hypocrite because I'm wearing the same clothes as yesterday.