Oct 13 & 14, 2015
With the last of the chores done and all items on my burgeoning lists crossed off, I looked at the clock – phew, it was 1740! This was not a moment too soon for some momentary relaxation before leaving port at around 2100 on October 13.
Our slick new bridge under a sunset sky.
As the crew gathered and after we bade our goodbyes to Micah and then Liz, Dale’s wife, at 2150 we dropped our lines and quietly slipped out of the Fremantle Fishing Boat Harbour savouring the bright lights of the quayside restaurants before the red/green port disco marking the local channels. Off to bed I stumbled, tired and ready for sleep after the last 8 weeks of preparation.
‘Mich, 10 minutes…’ was my awakening call. Donning my night watch attire, (soft, comfortable clothing) I was met with all the new screens on the bridge. A veritable plethora of information is available and I was excited to get back into the grove of night watches.
A black, black inky night gave way to a soft pink dawn. Calm seas were gently pelted by occasional passing squalls keeping the air cool and the vista grey. Soon, in the afternoon, the sun broke through the clouds and the Indian Ocean glowed a bright blue. The highlight of the day was sitting in the wheelhouse on my afternoon watch adding to the list of observed humpback whale pods streaming down the coast on a mission and just enjoying being there. ‘This is what it is all about’ I quipped to Curt. The whales we were seeing are hungry and the fridge door is open, they are on the move southward. A few stops on the way south from the Kimberley may distract them, being the Dampier Archipelago, Exmouth, Shark Bay and the Perth-Rottnest region as well as Geographe Bay and Augusta, even Albany but really they are on the way to the Antarctic to feed for the summer.
These are the bright and breezy WA waves we are accustomed to!
Most of the day I felt as though I had left Skipper (our dog) on the jetty or somewhere by mistake. I even mistook the cream cushions in the main salon for him, over and over again. While contemplating my choice of either spaghettini or fusilli to cook for dinner, from within the pantry I heard barking. Barking? What? Immediately, I raced out and up the stairs into the wheelhouse, ‘What have you got?’ I muttered. With flurries of hilarity, I realised one thing worse than a trained dog that barks at dolphins, is the owner that responds to her husband “barking” at a whale on the bow! Have we totally lost it? Yep, I think so! Grabbing my camera and while standing on deck in the lovely breeze, I couldn’t stop laughing at the situation, meanwhile a cow and calf humpback whale were breaching their way down the coast. Even funnier, Curt did this again and I came running from stirring a pot in the galley, to see what manner of dolphins he had this time! Ah, Pavlov has struck the humans on board!
So happy to be at sea and at days’ end we had more than 20 pods of humpback whales recorded on a mission heading south.
Enjoy a good laugh,
Mich
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