Captain's Log
22 July 2001

We’ve Caught a Fish!

Yesterday evening we rounded North West Cape with the massive aerial farm of Harold E. Holt dominating the skyline before disappearing into the dark as we continued south-west. At 2200 we got the wind we wanted and were able to shut down the noisy motors and continue sailing overnight, with some teamwork exercises thrown in for good measure.Ben has given a pretty good description of the day below so I won’t double up here. Suffice to say the voyage is going well, we are all having a good time and learning heaps.Same time tomorrowCap’n Bob.Youth Crew entry by Ben Yates aged 23 from Wangi Wangi, NSW.Last night each watch did an activity involving teamwork. We were set the task of putting up a sail without any outside help, within a specified time. We first of all each wrote down what we thought teamwork consisted of and then had a discussion about how we intended going about the task. We completed the task well and within time, but complications arose and these required us to problem solve and work as a team. The exercise as a whole was excellent, including the problems, as they showed us how we could improve as a team, as well as individuals, and hopefully transfer these new skills to other life challenges.In the morning I woke to the call ‘We’ve caught a fish’ and made my way to the aft deck to find Blue Watch had caught a huge yellow fin tuna, estimates are around the 30 to 50kg mark. There was a lot of excitement and the odd snapshot, which you will have to wait to see.After breakfast we had morning brief with Mhanda, the navigator, Eddy the engineer and the salty sea dog (Gav), playing key roles. Brief was followed by happy hour, morning tea and free time. After lunch we had a talk on ‘rules of the road’ by Gav and then some tacking in rotation (see note below).Overall the trip is going great and I would recommend it to anyone contemplating doing it. I’d also like to send hugs and kisses to Tiara-Lahni and say hi to everyone else. Love you, miss you, see you soon. Having a most excellent time, bye.Note: Rotational tacks – where watches rotate through different tacking stations to learn each others jobs.

Latitude/Longitude:

23° 18' South / 113° 24'

Conditions:

CO's Log 22 July 2001Situation at 1800 Sunday 22 July 2001: Course 175 Speed 5 knots. Conditions: wind SW 15 knots, clear skies, temp 23 degrees.