22 June
Pearl Bay to Hexham Island
The wind blew up last night,
around 20-25 knots, making a racket. The two other boats in the bay had left before sunrise. I’m feeling a little nervous about lifting
the anchor in these sorts of winds, but it comes up without any hassle. Remarkably, the wind just outside the
anchorage is at least 10 knots lighter than it is inside. Don’t know why we didn’t just anchor “anywhere
else”!
Tonight we have a choice of a few island
groups just north of the Danger Area. We
select Hexham Island, about 35 miles north of Pearl Bay, largely based on the
very positive comments it gets in the pilot book as to its beauty.
We motor sailed again today, this
time with a poled out headsail rather than the spinnaker, until the wind
dropped off even further and we were left with the engine pushing us along with
the mainsail rather hopefully set almost close hauled, even though the true
wind was behind us. Most importantly, I
guess, is that the tidal stream has been running with us every day, adding up
to a knot to our speed.
Today is the winter solstice. Technically the sun reached its most
northerly point at about 2am AEST. In
northern America that’s recognised as the start of their summer, and
correspondingly they’d treat is as the start of our southern winter. I suppose there’d be no argument back in
Sydney about winter having hit, but I think it’s been cancelled up here.
We reached Hexham Island just
after 3pm. It is like something out of a
postcard from paradise. The small gem of
a sandy beach is framed each side by black rock formations: on one side the
rock is broken up into vertical columns, on the other it is carved into a
series of almost cathedral-like spires. We
have the entire island to ourselves. In
fact we haven’t seen another boat all day.
Spencer and I were left simply grinning at each other with this place. With time now on our side we’ll spend two
nights here.
We put the dinghy into the water and head ashore to have a quick look along the beach. Then it's time to get back to the boat for dinner.
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| Approaching Hexham Island |
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| A couple of early photos from ashore |
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