First report from the South West

Transcript of the first remote blog from Matt direct from Spain Bay* via the satellite phone 1030 am 2nd April 2010

“After seeing Velocity steam off from Constitution Dock, I did our fresh food shopping from the Hill Street store, before driving south to meet Jules, Hania and Jacinta at Huonville. Together we did a quick $1000 shop to stock up on dry food supplies and then continued to drive south. We all arrived at the Dover Wharf at 7 o’clock to meet the crews aboard the three boats: the Miss Carmen, the Chieftain G and the Velocity. We had a ‘mega-crew’ catch-up dinner on the Velocity with Wursthaus sausages and burgers, Deano and the crew from the Miss Carmen provided a fresh vege plate. Dinner was washed down with some non-alcoholic Gillespie’s Ginger Beer**. Once fed, we handed out the rest of the Patagonia T-shirts to the crew, and then returned to our allocated boats to prepare for departure. We left the wharf and headed south, with the Chieftain G leading the way, at 10 pm. It was a beautiful evening for steaming with light winds, low seas and a beautiful moonlit sky, averaging 10.3 knots (10.9 knots when the tide was with us). We made it all the way [west] to Spain Bay (inside the heads of Port Davey, within the boundaries of the SW wilderness area) arriving to drop anchor about 6 am. After a short siesta, a solid breakfast and delivering the two sea kayakers (who hitched a ride from Hobart for their Easter break paddling in Port Davey), we were all ferried on to the beach at Spain Bay via the dinghies and are currently cleaning the beach…talk to you again soon”

Notes:
* Spain Bay is one of the baseline beaches that we have monitored over the last decade.
** Ginger is thought to be a great natural remedy to prevent seasickness. May as well drink it as beer...