T23 Day 5. Sail to West Point. Cooking and navigation.

 Saturday 23/5/26

Another calm morning so got up later and continued "cooking class" with 5 sausages to fry and a 3 egg omellete. Coleman 20cm frypan on the Trangia25 spirit burner.

Boiled 2L in about 7-8 minutes on the Optimus 111T for a bucket bath. 

Then tested the gas burner on the T25 to boil it's 0.9L kettle in 4 minutes flat (Spirit takes 12-13 minutes).  The spirit is better for slower heating/ ok for bacon and eggs etc. Cooking speed isnt all that important when sailing solo. The methylated spirits fuel is cheaper/safer than gas (It about A$6/ litre vs A$12 for a 460g isopropane gas bottle) 

The daily NE -E  seabreeze began about midday. So set full sail for West Point about 10nm from the Duckpond. Took the helm as it was a fresh 15-20 knot breeze. The first waypoint was the west marker of middle reef. 

It was a nice broad reach in the 20ft deep channel near the reef flat. Magnetic Islands hills offer a fair bit of shelter and alter the conditions. The wind swung astern, weakened to a nice breeze and the waves reduced to wavelets. The tiller-pilot could easily handle it as we glided along effortlessly, arriving at Westpoint beach around 3.30pm. 

The tide was high so anchored in close to the beach in 7ft of water for an easy sail change. Dropped the jib and put up the smaller #2 jib and furled it. Took a reef in the mainsail.

This was a bit of a navigation/piloting learning lesson. It takes about 2 hours or more to sail this leg one way. The note taken: Leave more time for this trip, at least 6-8 hours return. (It doesn't matter if the trip over is pure motoring on flat calm) Also the GPS chart and sounder allowed me to stay in the deeper channel away from reef flats. 

It was only a 30 minute stay before the return leg.  Motored off at 4pm at 5.5 knots (hullspeed) upwind skirting the reef flat but staying in the islands deep channel. Once clear of the windshadow, sailed on a beam reach for west marker of middle reef at a sedate 4 knots. Then hardened up on the wind for a close haul to the Duckpond by 5.30pm (motor assisted last mile)

Cooked up the last of the bacon, on bread with tomatoes, pickes and cheese. The ice finally all melted, 5 days of ice was pretty good. 

A nice sunset at 5.44pm.