Hooray....QuickStar made it to Australia

Yahoo….QuickStar sailed in to Coff’s Harbour yesterday around lunchtime with a tired, but happy crew.  Since I have been here for the week, I arranged everything with customs and immigration, as well as reserving a berth in the crowded marina.  I got to know the customs officer (Mick) quite well, so he allowed QuickStar to come right in and tie up rather than having to anchor out and wait for them. (he even helped with the lines as they were docking, which is a definite first for a customs officer).  

Very cool for me to watch from the top of Muttonbird Island, as QuickStar made landfall.  They had an added bonus of seeing humpback  whales and dolphins as they were nearing Coff's Harbour

 

Australia is quite strict about their quarantine procedures, so the officer took off all fruit, vegetables, meat, nuts, and seeds (including unopened popcorn).  Sadly for Barb, she had been collecting seeds and nuts from around the world to make in to a necklace once her world tour is completed. These were taken away.   For some reason he didn’t take her sour dough bread starter which she has been using for over five years. All in all he took off over 15 kilograms of supplies.

Flying the Australian flag and removing the yellow quarantine flag

I have had a fabulous week here.  Just love Coff’s Harbour.  The weather has been hot and sunny, which is a little unseasonable, as it is still winter here.  It has been great to see so many people – old and young - out and about at all the parks, walkways and beaches.   Everyone has been really friendly, even though whenever I talk to the locals, I am asked to repeat myself– which I do much more slowly.  I guess I have a strong Canadian accent, eh?

Lots of signs about the "half-men" here, but so far haven't seen a live one, ha,ha

 Very grateful for these warnings to help us cross the street with cars

 driving on the "wrong" side

 I can't get over the great number and variety of birds.  When I remark about this to the locals, many of them say "they are just noisy".  I love the birds singing.

 The beaches and walkways are endless.  They have a 78 kilometre coastal walk/bike path here.  Would love to do it, but can't walk that far right now.

 

Coff's Creek - a lovely 9 kilometre circle walk

 

It’s been a relaxing week in my little cottage, getting lots of projects done in the mornings and then heading out for long walks in the afternoon.  At the end of the day I’ve been enjoying the solar-heated hot tub and I am the only one using it since the guests in the other 6 cottages think it is freezing!  

 

We’ll have this cottage for two more nights because it is so popular I had to book right away when Peter thought he would be arriving later.  He had been in touch with me daily and admitted that they had a prop shaft leak, which might have resulted in not being able to use the motor.  There was no wind for the last 4 days of the crossing, so this would have meant bobbing out in the ocean for an unforeseen amount of time.  I was quite concerned about this, but he insisted that it wasn’t that serious and he asked Barb not to put this problem in the blog as he didn’t want people worried (especially his Mom).   Now that he is here safe and sound he  told me that they also had a problem with the gennaker, so they were unable to use that sail and could only motor sail with the main sail.  Other than these two glitches, and the fact that they had to motor for 4 solid days, they had a good crossing.  

Peter said he couldn’t have had a better crew.  No one got sea-sick nor did they miss any of their watches.  Barbara also did the daily blog update, which was quite impressive since her first language is German.  As an added bonus, they did all the cooking and cleaning and were great company.  I snuck a cake mix on board and Barbara baked it for Peter’s Australia birthday (since we are a day ahead here, he got to celebrate for two days).   Last night for Peter’s Canadian birthday, and to celebrate a successful crossing, we took the crew out for dinner.  It is always great fun to rehash the crossing.  Both Barbara and David were going on and on about what a great, safe, patient Captain that Peter was.  All in all a memorable birthday for him. (Unfortunately, my camera battery died, so I didn't get our final night celebration photos).

We’re not sure what our plans are now.  Peter has to fix the damage once the marine stores open on Monday.  For the weekend, we will be watching the offshore racing championship, which sounds pretty interesting.  Tomorrow is Father’s Day here in Australia, so another excuse for a celebration!

 

Until next Friday……Enjoy the last long weekend of summer!

P.S. You know it's hard for me to do a blog post without a sunrise or a sunset.  This was the morning I flew out of Brisbane airport to Coff's Harbour.