Day 8 Port Douglas-Bali

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The day started off really well.  I was on the 06:00-12:00 watch and for the first 4 or 5hrs conditions were really nice, 10kts on the nose with a small swell.  Then it all went back to normal and by midday it was blowing 30kts and the sea state was unpleasant.  

Around lunchtime we had an encounter with an Aussie fishing trawler who came within 600m of us out in the middle of nowhere and he was within a cats whisker of being on the right side of the No Fishing area



I did have a plan B in mind and that was to duck into the long chain of islands called Wessel Islands.  We ended up in a really nice bay called Burston Bay on the northern Wessel Island.

Just as we were rounding the corner into the bay with the 3D forward facing sonar on we get a call from an Australian Boarder Force aircraft.  The questions were - what is your port of registration, last port of call, next port of call, all answered and off they went after doing 3 fly by's!  Funnily enough I told David I was surprised we hadn't been buzzed by them before now and then there they were!

Once they had gone we drove into the bay, water was so calm and anchored in 6m of water with virtually no wind.  So nice after the last couple of days.

I decided to put the GoPro down to have a look at the props and rudders to make sure all was good and would you believe all was good!  No ropes or nets.

Plan is to depart early in the morning, head south and between the islands which apparently have a pretty strong ripe tide - should be entertaining, and head for Darwin 420nm away.  Should be there sometime on Tuesday afternoon.


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