Cape Bowling Green

Wednesday 5^th August 2015

After a comfortable night at Cape Upstart, we head out in about 12 knots of breeze from the South, forecast to drop later this morning. Ruby decided to set their Gennaker, which turned out to be a very good decision, ours is deep in the spare cabin and the foredeck is covered by the dinghy so we didn’t bother.

Ruby with gennaker up

We had a good sail for the first few hours but in the end gave up as the wind dropped and motor sailed the rest of the way.

Our destination today is Cape Bowling Green (affectionately known as Cape “Rolling” Green), but with little breeze we are hopeful that it will be reasonably comfortable.

As you approach Cape Bowling Green from the South, you pass over a number of sand banks, and as usual I had a lure out the back in anticipation of catching something. The drag went off on the reel as we passed over one of the banks, and the line was stripping off the real at great speed. Carole was down below, so I was madly trying to stop the boat and get working on the reel before I ran out of line. The line did run right out but fortunately the knot was good.

For the next 15-20 minutes I slowly reeled the line in with a big fish on it. Sadly it turned out to be a mackerel tuna, but at least we will have plenty of bait for some time. Getting it onboard was a challenge with Carole eventually getting a net under it.

When we anchored at Cape Bowling Green, I filleted it and cut it up into bait size pieces, divided it up into several bags and put it in the freezer.

I put a bait over the side on a large hook and immediately caught a small shark. The next bait caught another one. My third attempt ended up with my 80lb breaking strain line and wire trace being chopped off completely. I don’t think we will go for a swim.

We had a roast dinner on board Mica with Mark and Janet and Geoff and Jenny, and at that stage the boats motion was very comfortable.

Unfortunately the wind came up overnight and that changed the situation significantly. The boats we all head to wind and bucking violently most of the night. At least all of the anchors held. It is unlikely we will stop here again. The idea of anchoring behind a sand spit that is only about a metre above sea level doesn’t offer a lot of shelter.

We anchored behind the "Cape", a not very protective sand spit

A Lovely sunset lulled us into believing it would be a comfortable night