The gods smiled on us at last and made all the other storms that were around last night go around us. Not complaining! Surprisingly we both slept very well and woke up to a lovely morning.
We left Blaksleys after breakfast heading to Russell Is where we could do some re-provisioning and wander around civilisation of sorts again for a while. Winds were from the south-south-east and high tide at 12.20. Most of our route was directly south, so we did a bit of tacking, but with pleasant winds and a flooding tide it was another good sail.
At this southern end of Moreton Bay there are lots of islands and even more sand banks with narrow passages between them. Ideal conditions for a trailer sailer because if you run aground you just wind up the keel. And no, we didn’t run aground!
After anchoring -very carefully- we went ashore.
A permanent population of around 2500 live on Russell, so it has a reasonable little shopping area with an IGA. It’s serviced by a regular passenger ferry, about half-hourly, and a barge which transports cars and their passengers. There’s a small primary school, but the children go to Victoria Point on the mainland for high school.
Steve noticed that a woman on the trailer sailer forum we follow lives on the Island and invited fellow trailer sailors to drop in to see her. We rang and spent a pleasant couple of hours with her and her daughter. She’s an artist and has a pretty amazing collection of, well, everything really. Her daughter is in year 11 and is being home-schooled. She told me she’s been sailing Moreton Bay for years and learnt to sail here. She assured me there are two types of Moreton Bay sailors – those who unintentionally spend a night on a sandbank and those who lie and say they haven’t. LOT’S of sandbanks!
We picked up a few more groceries, some water and sat at the cafe for a while before heading back to the boat. Little Takka, our Takacat tender, has been fabulous. Lots of fun zipping around in it.
Sundowners with some bubbles (mineral water!) and hors d’oeuvres was a fine ending to a lovely day – calm waters and the sun setting over the adjacent island off our stern – perfect. A very calm night anticipated.
