Over the weekend I had the opportunity to take an overnight offshore sailing course in Sydney. I decided to do it both as a way to get out on the water as well as to brush up on my skills. During the trip we had some good parts and some bad parts. The bad part was the lack of wind (5-10kts) and low seas (1-2m) which didn't really give me much of an adventure on the open ocean...
Now for the good stuff (which was everything else)...Mild wind/seas were the result of a high pressure system which meant sunshine and 70+ degree weather. Not bad to be able to sail in the dead of winter in shorts/t-shirt. We headed out on a 40ft. Beneteau which gave me some good experience on a bigger boat. The instruction was a great success, I had a chance to iron out some bad habits that Kevin and I had inevitably picked up over the last few years in SF. I learned some new things about navigation, especially at night, as a bonus we were able to see meteors, an offshore lighning storm and glowing bioluminescent plankton. The plankton were incredible to see glowing as the boat churned up water (click here to see a youtube video - ours wasn't quite this dramatic but looked similar) We also moored overnight, so I picked up some new tips for mooring/cooking/cleaning, etc. Coincidentally, the bay that we moored in was at the head of the hawkesbury river about 2 miles away from where we took a trip on the Riverboat Postman.
The highlights came on Sunday during the ride home. After waking up in the middle of a nature reserve with a waterfall at the end of the bay, we took care of some anchoring practice then headed back out to the ocean. We had breathtaking sights of the headlands, spotted a pod of dolphins in the distance, and eventually the spout of a humpback whale ahead. After disappearing for about 5 minutes the whale resurfaced directly behind the boat and only about 20 meters away. For the next 15 minutes, the whale followed us through several course changes as we tried to get out of the way (video below). Luckily no collisions, but an amazing up close experience. Overall a great weekend and can't wait to get out again soon.
Jul 21, 2009 at 12:01 AM Sounds like a rewarding trip and the video is great! You must be getting used to the metric system as you referred to the whale being 20 meters away (whatever that means).
Jul 29, 2009 at 6:10 AM Amazing!! Love the video.