Looking for other Mac owners in Australia

[kadet]

Was out off Redcliffe on the 28th was a nice day, except the little thunderstorm that hit us when we got back to the boat ramp in the evening. Early morning was a light 5-10knt south easterly with a north easterly afternoon sea breeze at about 10-15knt even had the spinnaker up in the morning. Thunderstorm kicked up a 20-25knt westerly which made hooking the dock interesting to say the least and the tear down of the boat on the trailer a bit moist but it was gone in an hour or so . Southern Bay sounds like it might have been a bit sh!te Could see very dark clouds off over towards Mud but they came no closer, BOM radar also showed big thunderstorm over towards Narrangbah that went towards Bribie. Only went for the day sail as I could see that the weather was going to be bad over the weekend. Sadly after being caught out in a 35knt blow when I first got the boat, I just don't go if the weather is marginal any more. 3-5 meter waves and the boat steering all over the place for hours on end, not a fun day, and with a southerly the northern bay has a long fetch for them to build up.

Here is a pic I took whilst out on the 28th bit different to what you got.

[Mac26Mpaul]

Sounds good, na, the 28th was fine, just had the wind on the nose (as always seems to be the case with us) and that would have given us dead calm in Horshoe bay but of course, it decided to change course 180 degrees or so once we got there. Still wasnt bad, just a little bumpy, but the missus sometimes just gets seasick in hardly anything. The next day was when it piped up a bit, and I reckon the Northern bay would have been messy then.

Our only bit of sailing in the whole 5 days

Yes, 3.5 metres would not be fun in this boat, or any other trailer sailer or small boat for that matter. Thats when living on the Southern bay/Gold Coast is handy Mind you, was a pretty bumpy ride heading for the Southport Broadwater on the 30th...

[KookaSnook]

Good to hear experiences of your sailing adventures Paul and Kadet...

It definitely was an exciting and great week of sailing for us here is an overview of events:

DAY 1 - Xmas Day: We left Horizon Shores and anchored off my mothers street at Paradise Point so we could take her out to Xmas lunch. After lunch took a boat full of relatives off for sunset cruise around Paradise Point - Runaway Bay. Big day and night and stayed there to recover and yes finally got Ken to let the boat sit on the sand at low tide.

DAY 2 - Boxing Day: Took off early and motored up to Peel at slow speed to reserve fuel. We got in very close to shore at Horseshoe Bay hoping to beach the boat again at low tide but unfortunately southerly really picked up late afternoon. When we got down to the last 5 boats and KookaSnook was jumping up and down like a yoyo we headed off to Dunwich with another big cruiser in hot pursuit. Waves were so big the motor kept jumping right out of the water and drilling the sand when it came back down again. Full house at Dunwich so we anchored closed to beach but took quite a while to stop anchor drift.

DAY 3 - 27 Dec: Took off early sailing north to Amity making good use of southerly. From Dunwich onwards for us was all first time visits. Our yachty mates had told us to anchor in behind a sandbank just south of jetty and swimming area but Ken went into shallow swimming area. We soon discovered that just off that area there is a massive drop off showing 25meters. Again suffer a bit from anchor drift overnight even with our big plough anchor. I was hoping Ken would try out the diving off the rock wall there but he said he wasn't comfortable when he first tried it and looked down in to dark murky water beneath him. Heard from our mates later this was the spot where young girl was taken by bull shark so I have learn not to question Ken's Island intuition.That day met a great interesting 'old salt' called FLIPPER who had just brought an oyster lease on Moreton. He gave us great advice on how to go across to Moreton from Amity and we shared dinner on his boat with his Scottish girlfriend. Great night had by all and we all now keep in touch via Facebook.

DAY 4 - 28 Dec: Took off from Amity very early in near perfect conditions. Like a millpond. We were suppose to meet our yachty friends at Peel early 29 (Sat
am) so we could all go across to Moreton together but decided when we woke up to perfect weather and with confidence from our meeting with Flipper we should take advantage of the good weather and go ahead of them. We took off with me navigating. Please check out photos and all we can say it was definitely the CALM BEFORE THE STORM. The other best advice Flipper gave us was that he said to make sure that we put up our main sail when the weather gets rough and keep motor running. He told us this will keep the boat nicely held down in the water... BEST ADVICE HE EVER GAVE US and boy did it come in handy in the days ahead.


DEFINITELY THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM



KEN HARD AT WORK MANNING THE ROPES WHILE I'M AT THE HELM


THE SANDHILLS LOOKED SO INVITING ON WAY OVER BUT DICIDED TO GO FURTHER NORTH TO SEE WRECKS AS WE HAD TO RETURN BACK HERE TO MEET OUR FRIENDS SAILING OVER ON THE SATURDAY

We ended up sailing all the way north to Bulwer on the northern end of Tangalooma after a few different stopovers where we were advised that Bulwer was the only place on Moreton we could get fuel. Ken had to walk for ages while 4X drive maniacs drove around him. If it had been other boaties seeing Ken lugging fuel tanks down sand tracks I'm sure they would have offered a lift but not our 4X friends...

TANGALOOMA WRECKS: Have to say Paul we weaved our way through the jungle of boats there and were totally amazed that the wrecks were totally covered in boats and people. Ken couldn't believe it when a guy jumped off the top of one wreck while another guy was fishing under him. Boats were actually tied up to the wrecks and people were swimming and diving all around them. We were flat out getting through there let alone trying to anchor or get to the beach so that's why we kept going.

Weather (southerly) started to kick in as storm was building all around Brisbane. We decided to anchor for the night in the bay just south of Tangalooma and again tried to beach the boat but waves were to big and Ken was worried if it got worse during the night we could do a lot of damage. Have to say we moved further offshore with all the big boats out there in the dark and for the first time I felt very uncomfortable and a bit scared. Probably if we had done this in daylight I would have been ok but felt like we were anchored in the middle of nowhere a long way from land. We have found in big weather that we can't drop our keel due to it banging to much and Ken is worried it will get damaged so spent most of our nights up and down like a yo-yo. Learn to fall asleep anyway usually due to very long days of sailing and totally exhausted. Since that time we have been told my yachty mates that we should tighten the keel rope to just add enough pressure to stop the keel moving around and banging.

DAY 5 -29 Dec (Sat) We took off early heading south to the Sandhills to await our friends coming over from Peel in their 27' Ross racing yacht. They haven't had it in the water for 5 years and they had spent the past weeks doing repairs and getting it all ready for our trip. Seas and winds were really starting to pick up by early morning and our friends were just north of Peel under sail when disaster hit when their rudder snapped in high winds and seas. NOW THE REAL FUN BEGINS as we sail back across the bay to try and help them...and how Flipper's words of advice were really put to the test.... to be continued... (heading off to the office now)

[Mac26Mpaul]

Thanks for the detailed report Stacey. Yes I bet you went through hull out there especially on the 29th. Just going down the Canaipa passage with land 20 metres each side of us was hull. We had to rescue one family in a tinny and tow them to Canaipa point (just about to run out of fuel battling the headwind they were).

yes, beaching the boat on the open bay is something ya have to be weary about. I was worried when I did it at the Big Sand Hills, but we had many days of dead calm then.

The wrecks are a brilliant place, but you should aim for them when it is not school holidays, and prefferably mid week, and of course, when a nice gentle Easterly is forecast.

I'm very glad we decided to bail on the bay trip and head for the Gold Coast..

Glad to hear you made it through safely (if a little shaken perhaps). Looking forward to what happened next. At 1030 that morning we were in Horseshoe bay and the Coast Guard was crusing around on the loud hailer telling people to get out, which they were certainly doing. We had a hull of a trip trying to get down the Eastern side along Stradie. My main blew out of the cover and I had to go on deck and fell over slipping on the black gelcoat next to the window and falling half overboard (clutched to the mast but hanging over the side). Amazingly, a giant Dugong surfaced right next to us right about then.

It was not our best trip, and the wife was heard to scream at one stage, "Thats it, we are selling the boat when we get back" Thankfully later she retracted that and said "No way are we selling this boat!".

[KookaSnook]

Oh my goodness Paul and I thought we had fun... you nearly fell overboard well it sounds like except for hanging on you would have. If you think going down Straddie Coast was bad wait to you hear what awaited us mid bay and even worse when we got near Mud, St Helena and then Garden and all the time I'm trying to work out where we are as we had to go into Manly Boat Harbour to meet our friends but will send more details of our big adventure soon...

[Mac26Mpaul]

You deffinately went through rougher water than us going across the bay up there! Looking forward to hearing how it went

[KookaSnook]

Sorry Paul been a madhouse here in the office since we got back and had A Current Affair turn up last Friday to film a story on our Virgin Coconut Oil which should go to air one night this week. We have also been out busy sailing every weekend since we got back and with all the new tips we are really get the hang of it now sailing up and down to the Gold Coast and back. I've just sent our mainsail off to Doyles and the luff was fraying and I saw another boat with the sail clips and Linda is going to add these to our mainsail and a new sock so that we can keep the sail ready in the mast. I actually hoisted the mainsail (frayed bit and all) last weekend so these clips will make it a lot easier. I just looked at your photo Paul and you look like you already have them on yours. Our friends racing yacht has them for their cruising sail and the normal rope one for their racing sail... so I can't wait to get ours back. Once this is in with the new sock next step is the Lazy Jack to help the sail drop down properly.

To continue our Christmas sailing adventure... once our friends broke their rudder they had to try and limp in to Manly Boat harbour and ended up having to call for a tow from VMR who nearly capsized their yacht under tow and their boat with no rudder used the bow to dig in and cut through the water which didn't go well with the big waves when it started to turn over on its side. During this time we were on our way back across the bay from Slipping Sands on Moreton to their rescue. Well what fun we had as we set the sails to hold the boat down in the big wind and waves. I was using my maps and Iphone to try an plot a course as we have never been this far north before and we had never been to Manly Boat harbour so this was a real challenge as the wind and waves were growing the whole way. I didn't have any laminated map for the last leg into Manly and had to pull out the whole book which got drenched and flapping around in the wind. The boat handled so well with the waves and wind rolling in from our port side but things got really wild as we came towards Mud Island and even worse with waves getting up to around 8 foot rolling in between Mud / St. Helena / Garden Island leg. By this stage we had put down the motor (as good old Flipper had suggested) and this helped us plough through the waves. We finally got in to Manly as drown rats after over shooting the turn in... but we were very pleased with ourselves to handle such big seas and navigate through it all.

The weather continued to get even worse so we stayed in port for the next day as our friend's husband caught a train back to the Gold Coast to build a new rudder. The following day we decided to risk the trip home with our girlfriend and daughter onboard as we had heard the winds would be increasing by the afternoon and we had to get back to the Coast to return to work. Well the trip from Manly to Peel was full on into a head wind and we were all drenched. On the way across to Peel another yacht that had left ahead of us was returning back signalling that they could make it in their boat but we kept going... We even had water coming in under our closed hatch (that was a new one for us) and had to stuff towels in to absorb the water. We went north of Peel and decided to go across to Dunwich to come down Straddie coastline (like you Paul). By this stage us girls had all gone inside for a change into dry clothes and left Ken out there to battle the elements. We finally got our friends back to Tabby Tabby island where they are now keeping their boat and as we went past Cabbage Tree there was a bit of a party going on one of the jetties. Some of the people were looking at us going on like they new us and wondering if they thought our boat was yours Paul?

We had a lovely peaceful night at Jumpinpin before coming back into Horizon Shores the next day.

The moral of our Christmas adventure was that it was a great learning curve and Ken said he is very confident now of how the boat will handle in bad weather. Every weekend now we are sailing going where ever the wind takes us and we are getting better and better at the sailing bit and handling the boat which seems so much easier now. Last weekend sailing home in strong winds was enjoyable and at some stages the current (king tide) was so strong on the run out we had to add a bit of motor power to get back but the boat is just handling so well.

Oh I forgot to add while stuck in Manly port for our 2 nights my girlfriend and I fell in love with a 38-40 yacht called Osteria, a German made Bavaria Yacht that had sailed over from Europe. I have attached some photos here and a link to the actual boat.
http://www.boatsonsale.com.au/boats-for ... -38/119723
She had everything on it and she definitely would have been able to sail to Fiji. We couldn't believe it was on the market for just $155,000 and was seriously wanting to come home and put in an offer only to find it had just sold for the incredible price of $139,000. We all went into mourning... but looks like KookaSnook has a lot more sailing miles in her yet.

[Sea Shadow]

Hi all,

Thought I would announce myself to the world of Mac. I have a , Sea Shadow, that I got new last November and am still working things out. I have noticed that there is some discussion about the relative performance of white and blue hulls - one goes faster that the other? Just wondering about mine then, it has a black hull - does that mean I can only take it out on formal occasions?

Anyway, I have my parked in the driveway in Boronia (eastern suburb of Melbourne) and have put out at Rye and St. Kilda on Port Phillip Bay, Hastings on Westernport Bay and 9 days at Sussex Inlet and St. Georges Basin NSW.

Hope to see some of you around and I have been getting great tips from this forum.

[kadet]

Welcome aboard Sea Shadow

[Mac26Mpaul]

Hey Stacey

Sounds like you really earnt your stripes out there. I'm glad I didnt go North then as I still wouldnt be able to get the missus back on the boat now LOL. We were running out of fuel as we got down past Runaway bay marina but I was too scared to go in there as I knew the boat wouild be uncontrollable in that wind in the Marina....

By the sounds of things, you have got a lot more sailing in the past few months than I'v got in mine in the last three years LOL And your already thinking of offers on keelboats LOL We just went to Peel and Amity this weekend, what a lovely calm weekend that was, little wind ,,, as is the case 90 percent of the time we go out, it was mostly on the nose or nonexistant the whole time we were out there (lucky we own a Mac ) On the way home, the clew ring tore away from my jib so looks like I'll be in for a trip to Evolution sails next week for a repair... Other than that, my sons new boogie board floated away (always loose or break something LOL)

Hey Sea Shadow, welcome, excellent choice of boat You will be fine in your black one, just make sure to bring lots of polish and install AC when you come North

[bartmac]

We experienced some of the winds you write about on the Tweed River just south of the Gold Coast.......but lots of nooks and crannies to hide in and not enough water for waves to develop...had 11days though from Xmas day on....peaceful,quiet and no timetable at all...only to find a good spot for New Years fireworks...ended up in the boat harbour 100metres or so up wind from the fireworks barge

[KookaSnook]

Gee Paul I can relate to your latest comments so well.

We went out with our yachty friends last weekend (the ones who broke their rudder over Christmas trip)... well he is a real sailor and their Ross 27 foot comes with about 12 different type of sails... and to make it worse it was a racing boat.

Well I hope I am setting the picture of what our poor humble KookaSnook was up against. My girlfriend decided to come aboard with us as we both sailed from Tabby Tabby to Blakey's inlet on North Stradbbroke on Sunday. It was like a finely tuned thoroughbred pitted against a comfortable and slow Clydesdale. As we got our boat sitting up to about 5 knots and slightly a bit more they not only sailed passed us but sailed back and around us to try and stay with us. Even as they tacked through Russell island passage we hit the motor which cost us one case of beer to go straight through. On the way back in the afternoon wind was great and we took off ahead so proud of ourselves with our boat nicely up on 15 degrees and cutting through the water beautifully. They left about 20 mins behind us and sailed past again. We know there was method in his plans to ditch his wife on our boat he kept his fully qualified sailor daughter on board to help him, and also we were towing our rubber tender... he had already left his behind and used ours to ferry across to his boat moored off Tabby Tabby. We also saw him putting up every bit of sailing power he could muster with geona, racing sail poles to hold his front sail out, you name it he did it.

There ended up being about 4-5 yachts racing home and good old KookaSnook brought up the rear. But had to say in good strong winds she preforms what we consider well while these other yachts really can dance and manoeuvre in such light winds. They all raced away on about 30 degrees with quite a few of them pushing their boats so hard they kept rounding up. One little sail boat probably more 26 or under out sailed the lot of them and ended up miles ahead. They just seem to be able to pick up such light winds and go like the clappers when its blowing a gale. The Ross has a simple tiller for steering and my girlfriends husband hand crafted a beautiful timber rudder to replace the broken fibre one and it is working a treat. He is a professional boat fitter.

At one stage after again hitting the headwind through Russel we hit the motor and lost another case of beer and had trouble at 9 knots trying to catch up to these guys. Oh to make it worse a great big sailing yacht went past us with just the front sail up and we felt so depressed until we heard his motor purring along as well and he had the decency to yell out that he wasn't sailing. But those yachts were just all flying. Now I know why everyone said don't bother joining the yacht club but join the local motor boat or motor/sailer club... amen to that.

The good thing was that we now have the clips on our main sail and make it so easy to put up and down but the bottom clip is just slight missing the cut out section of the mast where you thread the sail through and we can't keep the sail from falling out of these cut out area when we bring the sail down so don't see how a lazy jack would work on our boat.

Also my girlfriend wants her husband to sail our boat to see what he can do with it. He has already had a good look over it and said that it is so differently set up that he believes the best advice on sailing it will come from other X sailors who have the experience with it. I know \quite a lot of you have M's and they are rigged differently but hopefully there are more similarities with the keel, weight, steering, sails etc.

Our friends are now leaving their Ross over at Tabby Tabby Paul which is just across from you at Cabbage Tree so you might see us all over there. Hope you will come over and join us if you see us there. We will go out over Australia Day weekend and probably not catch up with them until the Sunday or Monday. Will go where ever the wind takes us over the weekend. Also the weekend after Aust Day I am planning an all girls trip and they will be over at TabbyTabby and we are hoping to get Ken (his name is also Ken) to take our boat out for a spin.

So hopefully we can all catch up soon. Would also love to see what you could do sailing our girl... and yes she is full of food, gear, fishing gear so not light.

Regards Stacey

[bartmac]

The good thing was that we now have the clips on our main sail and make it so easy to put up and down but the bottom clip is just slight missing the cut out section of the mast where you thread the sail through and we can't keep the sail from falling out of these cut out area when we bring the sail down so don't see how a lazy jack would work on our boat.

You need to set up some sort of slug gate ie a device which opens the "gap" to thread the slugs in and then it closes.We are in the process of setting up a lazy jack system complete with a zippered bag on the boom....so idea is open zipper hoist sail...and drop sail close zipper.Slug gates are discussed in the forum...initially we had a track stop...ie device which stops the sail from falling far enough to get to the "gap" and have also used a ocky strap around the mast when I dropped the track stop overboard....only problem that either way leaves the sail a bit high above the boom and liable to catch the wind just when you don't want.

[KookaSnook]

You need to set up some sort of slug gate ie a device which opens the "gap" to thread the slugs in and then it closes.We are in the process of setting up a lazy jack system complete with a zippered bag on the boom....so idea is open zipper hoist sail...and drop sail close zipper.Slug gates are discussed in the forum...initially we had a track stop...ie device which stops the sail from falling far enough to get to the "gap" and have also used a ocky strap around the mast when I dropped the track stop overboard....only problem that either way leaves the sail a bit high above the boom and liable to catch the wind just when you don't want.

Thanks Bartmac

Have you got a picture of the slug gate. We found we have to horizon shock cord cleats just above the gate and Ken tried to use this to attach the bottom clip but noted when he dropped the sail the sail still dropped out. So keen to see what other have used for a track stop.

Regards Stacey

[bartmac]

No picture as we haven't done ours but if you search the forum for slug gate you'll get all the previous info....lots of it...will require mast modification ie closing the current opening and putting in a movable bit which opens and closes