trekkingthesea: Musgrave to Pancake Creek to Cape Capricorn to Yeppoon with a fire onboard thrown in for good measure.

By Glenn : Déjà Vu, "If I have probably been here before I would probably know what to do, don't you?"....

....I guess that it had to happen. We have experienced dramatic highs in the last few months. Last week was especially amazing with our unforgettable time at Lady Musgrave Island. During this past week all things nautical have came to a halt. We are in Rosslyn Bay Marina, carrying out repairs after an electrical fire on board................

Jen's eye view of the lagoon

We set sail from Lady Musgrave Island last Sunday heading for Pancake Creek about 36 nautical miles away. The forecast of a 15 to 20 South East wind was accurate and consequently delivered the best sail we have had all trip. ST3 really romped along, no motoring required, and a great day indeed.

"Quick glimpse" video of a great day sailing.

We arrived late afternoon at Pancake Creek. It's always interesting arriving at a strange new anchorage. We have two cruising guides on board for this area and both state that "Pancake Creek is one of the most popular anchorages on the QLD Coast". It's easy to see why with beautiful crystal clear water and a shoreline of rarely visited National Park.

They make the creeks big up this way! Pancake Creek.

We spent the next day exploring and enjoying the rocky shoreline. Breakfast was pancakes of course. Yes I'm a walking cliché.

What was left of my pancake before I remembered to take a pic.

Jen: Amazing things exist in nature, and are often overlook. I spotted this spiders web with its perfectly woven trampoline between some boulders. It is a kind of Russian Tent Weaving spider: Cyrtophora. It is small and grey but is an Orb spider. My research has failed to identify this spider. Although it's web has the same strong structural supporting threads web it is not shaped like a carnival tent. Perhaps it is as yet un named.

Nylon stockings? It looks so synthetic.

Jenniferophora: Trampoline Weave Spiders web.

We set sail early Tuesday morning for Cape Capricorn...although I should say we set 'motor' for CC. We weren't lucky with the wind this time. The challenge of the day was to avoid being on a collision path with any tankers anchoraged off Gladstone, while not loosing too much travel time. If you look on a chart of Gladstone Harbour you will see that the anchorage area holds about 26 ships. We tuned to Gladstone Harbour Control on channel 13 to hear what was going on and to see if any ships were moving in our direction.

I wonder if he's got a spare anchor winch motor?

After an uneventful trip we arrived at Cape Capricorn in the pink of the afternoon. We were feeling quite pleased having crossed the Tropic of Capricorn. ( Not quite as note-worthy as an equatorial crossing). No sooner had we dropped anchor when up popped a very pesky feathered visitor. Cormorants normally keep well away from humans by just diving deep. This little fellow saw me and thought " here's a man who likes his tucker, and just maybe I've scored an easy feast". Unfortunately for him a Love family member and his food are not easily parted. After a long conversation on the virtues of natural selection and a moral lesson of effort equals reward he realised that he was wasting his time, and swam off in a huff.

How's the size of that 'partially unfurled' flipper.

Out of the blue a man motored up to Sea Trek III and gave us his phone number asking us to keep an eye on his boat overnight. He would be doing maintenance "up there" and offered us the chance to view the Cape Capricorn Lighthouse with him. We declined. It was already sunset. We watched him sprint up the hill/ mountain and drive the truck down the razor back. When loaded he revved the Landcruiser all of the way back up again. It was so steep. No road. The convenient tram track remained unused.