Early tomorrow morning (Tuesday September 25th), we will arrive
in Cocos Keeling after a wonderful 3 day passage from Christmas
Island. Both are beautiful, small Australian Territories located
in the Indian Ocean.During the short passage we enjoyed nice wind,
nice blue skies and even a very welcome rain shower, the first in
several months, that cleaned the salt and grime off Blue Pearl,.
She sparkles again. We also had the opportunity to use our new
Code Zero sail which was shipped from Annapolis to Darwin where we
collected it. In simple terms it is a very large jib designed to
sail in light wind conditions on a beam reach or closer to the
wind. I am very pleased with it! We now have Big Orange, Big Grey
and our three standard white sails. We are a true around the world
cruising boat.
I wrote all of those words about a week ago and, sorry, but I
have been a little lazy since. It is Sunday September 30th now and
we will be leaving from here (Cocos Keeling) tomorrow morning
direction Mauritius, a 2350nm passage across the Indian Ocean.
We very much enjoyed the two Indian Ocean Australian Islands that
we visited. Christmas Island came first and it was immediately
clear that the environment is a huge priority here. People care
about clean air, clean water, clean land and the people look clean
too. The highlights of a trip around the Island were the crabs,
the waterfall and the blow holes. The crabs in a variety of colors
and sizes are all over the place, they are big and beautiful; the
waterfall is crystal clear and the water potable, of course, I
should mention that every Island we have been at and all the tours
we have taken always seem to end up at a waterfall. The blow holes
are spectacular. They are vertical openings (like pipes) in shore
side rock and coral which when the swells and waves hit the shore
emit fast fountains of water, a beautiful and wet sight.
Cocos Keeling Island is a true Indian Ocean diamond, only 600
people live here on 2 islands and there are several more
uninhabited islands. The water is as blue as the Caribbean waters
and large expanses of the ocean bottom are sandy which lends
additional beauty to the blue water. Of course there are many
stretches of rocky and coral bottom as well, in fact there is only
one anchorage suitable for sailboats to stay at. The island has
some military significance for Australia and there is a long
runway suitable for big planes to land. The nicest feature of the
runway is that it has a golf course running on either side of it.
Of course, we couldn't help but organize a golf tournament for
ARC fleet participants with the help of the local golf club
members. Other activities here are diving, snorkeling, beach time
, bicycling and other healthy pursuits. Little here in terms of
restaurants and the like. We only found one place to eat at...!
The locals here are mostly expat Australian and a Muslim
population who originally arrived from Indonesia. There is a
beautiful small monument on Home Island commemorating three
casualties of a Japanese bombing during WW 2 which killed a
Muslim mother and two little children and destroyed 23 homes...!
In any case we are saying goodbye to all of this tomorrow morning
and will be on the way to Mauritius, the passage should take about
12-14 days. From Mauritius we will sail to Reunion and then to
South Africa, first Richards Bay and then Cape Town where we will
be for the year end holidays.
Captain Ruud