Cocos: I
Cocos: I
This and the Bali to Cocos passage log will be my only posts from Cocos.
The anchorage is off Direction Island and the Internet on Home Island, to which there is a ferry only once a week on Thursdays, and I will be at sea next Thursday.
I expect to sail on August 11 or 12, assuming the wind ever eases enough so I can raise my anchor. It should take about a month to reach Durban, so the next post may be in the second week in September. Earlier if I have to put in at Mauritius.
Depending on your hemisphere, I hope you are having a good summer or winter.
August 3
Cocos Islands: Sunday
This a very pretty place. Sunny this afternoon with just trade wind clouds, but windy.
After continuing to try unsuccessfully to reach Customs on the radio, I wondered if I was transmitting and so put out a call on Channel 16 asking anyone who heard me to respond. A man did on a boat that I passed on my way in. He said he had not been able to reach Customs either, so presumably they don’t work here on Sunday. With binoculars I can see that he, too, has a yellow “Q” flag flying.
Direction Island runs east/west and has a white sand beach in front of palm trees. Now at low tide the reef is exposed between it and Home Island to the south with a long line of surf breaking on it. The lagoon is two shades of turquoise, depending on depth of water, and brown over patches of coral. I can also see West Island five miles away and South Island seven miles distant.
Among the trees near the east end of Direction Island is a picnic table. At the west end is a pole with a navigation light. The only other manmade object visible is a wind generator on Home Island and the marker buoys in the lagoon.
If you have a dream of a tropical atoll, this is it.
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I’ve partially changed the cabin to harbor mode, moving all the stuff from the v-berth back to the quarterberths so I can sleep forward on sheets.
In doing so, I inventoried my provisions. I could use more crackers and spirits or wine. I have read that alcohol is duty free here. Getting to and from Home Island is going to be an adventure. Hopefully less windy days ahead, though it would be a row with the wind on the beam both going and returning.
The Fremantle Sailing Club directions say there is “limited water” on Direction Island. I have enough drinking water, but it would be nice if I could fill my solar shower bag and have a fresh water shower. Bathed in salt water in the cockpit a while ago.
I’ve changed to local time, which is 6 ½ hours ahead of GMT. 2:40 p.m. now. Unsurprisingly my computers and iPod do not have Cocos Islands in their data base, so I set them for Rangoon, which is also GMT +6.5 hours.
August 4
Cocos: Monday
Still windy here, though at first light no rain clouds. Blowing 19 knots. I say that with precision because the masthead wind unit resumed transmitting yesterday. I noticed the reading on another display while checking depth once we were at anchor. Perhaps it gets seasick and can’t function except in harbors. Or maybe it doesn’t charge properly while sailing west, which is most of this circumnavigation.
There are now six boats at anchor. Three of us arrived yesterday. The last was a red-hulled French boat with a couple and two small children that was anchored near me in Darwin, though not one of the ones anchored too near.
They arrived in late afternoon and had a hard time anchoring. It looked as though they are using a CQR, which is a good anchor, and the bottom is mostly white sand with good holding. He is one of the few to use, as I do, a manual windlass. He raised and lowered four or five times before they finally got settled. Fortunately in relatively shallow water: I’m in one of the deeper places with 25’ at high tide. I think they may have been backing down on the anchor without enough scope out. In this wind, you really don’t need to back down at all. The wind will set the anchor for you.
I’ll wait until 8:00 before trying to reach Customs. I expect the other boat will be calling them, too. Should at least be able to pump up the dinghy and row to Direction Island today.
1:00 p.m. Made contact with Customs, which is handled here by the police, at 8:30, and they came to clear all three boats that arrived yesterday about two hours later. In the meantime, the Quarantine inspection was only a series of questions asked by another official on the radio. All this couldn’t have been easier.
However, the wind has continued at twenty knots, and I haven’t even bothered to pump up the dinghy. Learned from the police that the current runs at up to six knots between here and Home Island, so I won’t be trying to row. If I ever do get the dinghy in the water, I’ll see if I can hitch a ride with the crew of another boat to Home Island. If not, there is a once a week ferry service on Thursday. Going over at 8:20 a.m. and returning at 2:00 p.m.. That should be more than enough to Internet, shop and have lunch.
Do wish the wind would relent. At sea I would have welcomed 20 knots from astern, which would have meant 160 and 170 mile days. But here it is a nuisance. The police commented on it, and it sufficiently impressed me while I was on deck handling their lines that I veered another 50’ of chain after they left, going from my usual 3-1 scope, here 75’, which was holding, to 5 to 1 for an added sense of security.
I did report to them my pirate encounter that they said they would pass it on to the Australian Navy.
Other than the clearance, I’ve spent the day much as I do at sea: listening to music and reading. Also have oiled the table, which I put up for the officials, and part of the cabin sole on which it rests when secured to the mast and seldom gets oiled.
There is a rain water catchment tank on Direction Island, so if I ever get there I should be able to fill the solar shower bag.
2:30 p.m. Would like to go ashore, but it isn’t going to happen today, even though it is only a hundred yards away. I probably could make it and back, but even though the barometer has risen and the day is mostly sunny, there are continued brief passing showers.
The police left me a map that shows trails on the island, a place to dispose of trash, and a platform at a reputedly excellent snorkeling spot called rather ominously The Rip. Maybe tomorrow.
I keep both the condo in Evanston and my mooring in Opua as permanent waypoints in the chartplotter. I don’t know if these are straight line or great circle distances. The mooring is 4428 nautical miles distant. The condo a phenomenal 10253, essentially the other side of the Earth. A waypoint just east of Mauritius, with Port Louis, the point of entry, another thirty miles, is 2299. And Durban 3820.
Unless problems arise at sea that compel me to stop at Mauritius, I am sailing directly to Durban.
August 5
Cocos: Tuesday
I moved the dinghy into the cockpit when I rearranged the cabin on arrival, but haven’t pumped it up yet. No point in having it flying around the stern.
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Had a minor but useful victory this morning.
The propeller shaft stuffing box leak has been dramatically worse since our arrival here, so I removed everything from the port quarterberth and tried once again to tighten it. As I have mentioned before, this has been made difficult by a diesel mechanic who relocated the salt water filter directly over the stuffing box. It seemed to me impossible without removing the filter and various hoses, which didn’t want to be removed.
I worked for almost two futile hours before I finally succeeded. This is something that if you had good access and room to move your hands and tools would take two minutes.
In any event the leak has stopped.
I also drilled a hole in the adjustment bracket for the alternator fan belt, which has to be retightened every time I run the engine, and put a split pin through the hole. I think this will keep the alternator from shifting with vibration. We’ll see.
With everything removed from the port quarterberth, including the cushion, I cleaned various areas that seldom are reached.
While I was working the wind dropped to 17 and 18 knots, giving me hope, but has returned to 25. The barometer has risen a millibar and is in the normal range. A hazy trade wind sky. Wish I could get ashore.
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Sunset. Didn’t get ashore. Wind has averaged 24 or 25 knots all day. I just came below after sitting on deck with a glass of tonic--no rum or gin, which are running short--where I was buffeted by gusts up to 27 knots. I’ve had the instrument system on all day and have consistently had wind information. THE HAWKE OF TUONELA is facing east, as she was in Bali Marina, where the wind unit also worked. I will not be surprised if when we sail west it stops. I’ll be slightly irritated, but not surprised.
I took down the dodger and polished its stainless steel support frame, and then took a salt water bath. Only requires two buckets of water in port. One to wash; one to rinse. I considered pumping up the dinghy and swimming from it, but the wind was too strong. It’s been blowing like this for three days now. This is a pretty place, but I might as well have stayed at sea.
August 6
It felt as though the wind moderated during the night, but has increased again at first light to over twenty knots. 20 to 21 now at 6:15. I’m going to pump up the dinghy today and, if at all possible, try to get ashore sometime today.
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Raised cover to engine compartment. Dry.
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I have reached land! Or sand.
Early afternoon now. I went in about 10:30.
I pumped up the dinghy earlier. Dug out my dinghy anchor, just in case I started to be carried out to sea. Also took my handheld VHF with me. It is waterproof. As is the point and shoot Pentax camera I took along.
The wind is definitely less strong than yesterday, probably averaging 20 to 22 knots, with no reading I have seen higher than 25, and more brief dips to 18 and 19. The last reading I saw before I left was 21, and the first when I returned an hour and a half later was 22.
I wore my bathing suit, and will when I row in tomorrow morning to catch the ferry, unless the wind truly abates. I rowed in across the wind and current and managed to make a slight bit to windward. It was only necessary that I not lose too much to leeward. When I cast off from THE HAWKE OF TUONELA and started rowing was a moment of truth.
The distance is not great--only a hundred yards or so--and did not take long. Once in shallow water I was able to row to windward along the shore, but soon stopped and walked, towing the dingy behind me, until I was past the jetty, where I pulled the dinghy a few feet up the beach and tied it to a palm tree.
I walked along the beach to The Rip at the east end of the island. I hadn’t brought along my snorkeling gear. Couldn’t have gone in the water there today anyway. The Rip was living up to its name. The tide here is less than a meter today, so the current must come from water being pushed over the reef by the wind. A lot of water was moving through The Rip very rapidly.
I followed one of the trails to a lookout point on the ocean side of the island, where big surf was breaking, then back to the main picnic area, where I filled my solar shower bag from the catchment tanks--there are two linked together--which carry warnings against drinking the water even after boiling.
Along the way I passed through an area of dead and damaged palm trees. At first I thought from a cyclone, but some blackened stumps suggest it might have been a fire.
Having walked the dinghy well to windward of THE HAWKE OF TUONELA, the return was easy. I was blown home and had only to be certain I kept in line with the boat and wasn’t carried past it.
If the wind ever moderates, it would be nice to go swimming; but at least I’ve gone walking.
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This will be my last entry before, hopefully, posting this at Home Island tomorrow.
Cocos is many sailors’ favorite anchorage in the entire world. Joshua Slocum called it a paradise and careened his boat here, something he would not be permitted under present rules. For me because of the wind, Cocos remains unrealized. Perhaps I will get to experience and enjoy it before I leave next week.
Sunday, August 3, 2008 to Wednesday, August 6, 2008