Shanti's turn to breakdown

23/7/2016  Orpheus Island (again)

Having stayed put these last few days, through rain, mist, sunshine and moonlight, I have had a delightful taster of the magnificence of Hinchinbrook in all of its moods.  The only word that comes to mind is majestic. 

 

It's just a shame about the bities.  I sewed a length rope in as a weight around the edges of mosquito netting for the companionway, so I could get some air when the sun came out and heated things up.

 

High tide at the entrance to the Channel was at 1050 this morning, so I upped anchor at 0800 to motor against it for 2 hours.  The entire area was shrouded in thick fog, so navigation was blind, following the breadcrumb trail I had left coming in and hoping no-one else was silly enough to be out in it. 

My AIS alarm made  my heart jump until I saw I was being followed by the impressive black schooner, “Southern Passage”.  The young deck-hands all cheered and waved as they passed close by. It’s wonderful to see young people learning the ropes on these tall ships.

 

Shortly after lining myself up on the leads to avoid the shallowest waters of the channel, my faithful Yanmar engine stopped running.  I immediately pulled the headsail out (in only 2 knots of breeze from behind) and hoped I could work my magic quickly to avoid running aground.  OK, I thought, it hasn’t happened for a while, but I know what to do – just bleed it to get the air out.  Wrong.  This time that didn’t work.

No fuel was spitting out of any of the usual bleed holes, making me wonder if the lift pump had failed. I opened the secondary fuel filter and found it empty, so topped it up with fresh diesel from my jerry can. Still no good.

 Perhaps coincidentally, Townsville was the first place since leaving Melbourne that I have filled the tank straight from the pump, rather than via my jerry cans and polishing system.  Thinking it may be a blockage rather than air in the system,  I changed the primary fuel filter.  This time when I cranked the engine to bleed it, fuel spat out – success!

Luckily we were still on track, drifting slowly over less than 1 metre below the keel, but still afloat.  What a relief to get motoring again.

 

Once out of the shallow channel, I pulled up the mainsail and lifted into shimmeringly  perfect flat water sailing. The sun was shining and Shanti was skimming lightly over what could have been (a good day) on Port Phillip bay, without a speed bump in sight. 

Beating into 8 knots of head wind in calm waters is a far cry from running with it behind when the iron spinnaker is the common recourse. 

This was fun!  Especially so with no great time pressure.

It didn’t bother me to be only making 4 knots and having to tack back and forth, nor that it took all afternoon  to do 10 miles; It was the best sail I have had since leaving Melbourne.  They say that the average is one good sail out of every ten.  Well so much for statistics.

Back on a public mooring in Little Pioneer Bay on Orpheus Island again, the fuel polishing system is now  pumping out the contents of my tank, passing it through a new filter and back into the tank.  Hopefully it will get me back to Townsville tomorrow, when time and distance will once again necessitate burning diesel.