Helping Hand

Sunday 27th July

We have just finished our rendezvous with Wizard, who was dismasted you may recall. It's now 10.00 on Sunday 27th and we are back under full main and full genoa. The wind has dropped and we are only making 6 to7 knots at the moment.

It is very hard to see another yacht with no mast or sails, it just disappears between the waves - and there only small waves - 1.5 metre. Can you visualise the difficulty of seeing someone in the water? And this was in full daylight. Val spotted them first, and despite our reciprocal courses and knowing where each of us was positioned we almost passed without seeing anything. Wizard, like any sailing boat that has no mast, is a sorry sight to behold, and Val took lots of photos for them and for our records too. Useful to show during talks about sailing.

The transfer was easy. Wizard dropped over a pontoon cut away from their rubber dinghy with a 4 metre rope tied to it and a fender on the end of that. Darryn lifted the whole lot on board and tied five 20L cans of diesel on, along with a bottle of Irish Whiskey for medicinal purposes of course (well, delayed shock) and a packet of jelly chews that his wife had given him. Once all was secure everything was thrown back into the water and Wizard motored over and picked them up. They seemed very pleased to get the sweets!

Once all was done we turned into the wind and rehoisted the sails and then left them behind as they are only motoring at 5 knots to conserve fuel. We have 1 can left, a full engine tank and we refilled the generator tank yesterday. Once we get through today's sail we should be in motoring range of Cairns. We are now on target to arrive on the morning of the 31st. We sailed slowly all night so as not to overshoot Wizard and have to turn back. We ended up 8 miles due north of their position so not too bad a guess on speeds.