Happy Valentines Day!!!! and day 7 in Hobart.

This was a maintenance and get ready to leave Hobart day so I am not going to bother you with trivial blathering and instead I am going to sing!  Only Kidding! But I will keep it short.

Today I went to town, posted some things to family and  did the victualing.  I do like that word,  it means ‘to supply with food provisions’.  So really I did the food shopping, stocking up on things for the next couple of weeks.    This included using the cryovac machine to bag and suck air out of the chicken and beef I bought.   I previously found a butcher who did this for us at $1 a bag and the meat lasted beautifully for 3 weeks in the refrigerator on Nashira.   Since then I have purchased my own machine for $70 at Target and will see if the meat lasts as long.

Evan picked up some hose and other bits and fixed the raw water intake pipe so it no longer leaks and has removed the salt water pump that was connected to the intake pipe.  He is fantastic with fixing things.  We will give it a good test tomorrow when we head to Kettering.   We are planning to take Nashira out of the water at Kettering to fix up a ball valve that has broken.  We should be set to carry on sailing after that.

We did a spring clean of Nashira and some friends stopped by for a visit.

That’s it,  that’s all we did today.

Day 21 – Officially 3 weeks on the water

We said some more goodbyes this morning, good grief I am officially a social butterfly!  I must say though we have met some terrific people that I do hope we meet again.

And with that……..we are OFF!  finally on our way.

Goodbye Hobart and Mt Wellington – Thank you for putting on the Wooden Boat Festival for us.

Crossing Bass Strait and getting to Hobart for the festival were our initial goals and we really had to push to make it.   Now we get to relax and explore.   We are waiting for a good weather window to dash across to Port Davey and Bathurst Harbour yet we are not stressed because there is so much to see on the East coast of Tassie that we can bide our time.

So today we are sailing down to Kettering,  its not very far, about 2.5 hours and we have lots of wind.   We are heading South then South West and we have a honking North, North Easterly 30 knot breeze on our tail so no motoring just beautiful sailing. We got up to 9.1 knots we were flying! (on one wave anyway!)

We head into the channel just West of North Bruny island and Jibe our way to Kettering.  At Kettering there are hundreds of boats anchored and berthed at the marina.    It is very protected from the wind which has now dropped off to a light breeze as we get closer.   It is really pretty here.

Evan rang the marina this morning and has organised to have Nashira lifted out of the water at 3pm to fix the ball valve and check the hull to see how the Micron 66 antifouling is holding up.  We did the antifouling in November last year and used a new more expensive, better for the environment, harder ablative anti-fouling paint.  Or so the marketing material said.

We tied up along the marina and headed off to find the office.

 

This place is so clean and quiet.  I am looking forward to using their laundry facilities as they look brand new!   I am very happy I did not carry our laundry to a laundromat in Hobart.  This is actually closer and cheaper than Hobart.  A well stocked chandlery is here at the marina as well just in case we run into problems with the repairs.

  
[Laundry and Evan Happy shopping at Marina Chandlery]

Also as a side note it is quite warm this afternoon.  The sun is stingy hot and we had to shed coats and jumpers very quickly.  Nice for a change.  (Note to self,  the temperatures at Port Davey have been about 10 degrees C – or about 50 degrees F – Cold)

At about 3:45 they are ready for us to bring Nashira over to the crane to be lifted.   Evan backs in like a real pro now and the straps are slid into place and up Nashira goes.   Jerry the operator and commander of the hard deck has a wicked sense of humour gives Evan a hard time getting a ladder put up on Nashira so he can climb up and do the needed work.   People are really relaxed here,  nothing is too hard, just chilled and happy to help.   Very different from Sydney pace and stress.

  
Nashira’s bottom still looks good and Evan was able to get the ball valve fixed quite quickly.  Also replaced plastic screws that were on the prop anode with stainless screws and cleaned the water intake holes getting rid of any creature shells that were starting to form.

We were told to eat dinner at the Oyster Cove Inn when we finish but advised to go early as the operator is quirky and his behaviour resembles Basil of Fawlty Towers.  i.e.  “Sorry, there is 9 in your party?  the table only fits 8,  the other person can sit over there”  or “it’s awfully quiet so I’m closing early”   So I decided to ring and book a table and not provoke any Basil behaviour.

The food was fantastic!  We ate ourselves silly with entrees, main and dessert.  We had a window seat,  just check out the view.

[Salmon steaks and Morrocan Lamb]

The staff were friendly although they were busy and we ended up waiting about 30 minutes to get anyone to take our desert order.   Maybe it was a sign we should not have dessert!  We persevered and won out in the end.    Still not sure if that is good or bad.

As soon as we stepped out of the Inn the wind hit and the wind chill was COLD.  We were going to go for a walk and even have showers but stuff that.  We made a beeline to Nashira where we are warmly sitting now.   We can shower in the morning.

xoxoxoxo

Kelly & Evan