Wandering around Port Lincoln

One of our favorite things to do in a new port is to wander around … sometimes aimlessly. It's a good way to figure out the lay of the land and to spot unique aspects of the town that we might not usually see. For instance, if we hadn't been wandering around in Port Lincoln, we might not have seen the Flinders Theatre … built in 1929 … and still operating as a movie theater or the Flinder's Arch on Tasman Terrace. Matthew Flinders visited Port Lincoln around this time of year in 1802 and actually named it and the bays around here  

The Port Lincoln downtown area is not very large, so getting lost was not a serious concern. We beached the dinghy at the friendly Port Lincoln Yacht Club then walked up Tasman Terrace along the shore of Boston Bay. Nine of Cups was looking pretty fine anchored in the bay and we couldn't resist taking a few pix.

We spotted a life-sized bronze statue of a horse along the foreshore which, of course, piqued our interest. Tony Santic, the owner of Makybe Diva, a three-time Melbourne Cup winner, is a Croatian fisherman from Port Lincoln and the town commissioned the bronze in honor of what the brochures call his “supermare”.

We noted that the town jetty seemed a popular place for local fishermen to throw out a line. There was also a protected swim area since the area is known for its great white shark population.

There was no dearth of opportunities to cage dive with great white sharks, swim with tunas, swim with sea lions and swim with dolphins. We had no inclination to do this. Hmm …. get into a cage, flash some bait and wait for great white sharks to come visiting AND pay $500AUD/pp for the pleasure. We find other ways to get our adrenaline rushes.

We chose to walk up Adelaide Street for no particular reason other than it connected with Liverpool Street which seemed to be the home of all the supermarkets in town. A tree along the street was teeming with squawking birds and as luck would have it, they were ring-necked parrots aka the Port Lincoln parrot, a new bird to tick off our list. I wasn't quick enough with the camera to get a good pic, but I nicked one from Wiki to introduce you to this handsome bird.

There are three good sized supermarkets here, all along Liverpool Street, each offering mostly the same stuff, but all offering just a few things different. Woolworths (aka Wooly's here and nothing to do with the old Woolworth's 5 & 10, if you're old enough to remember that) had a free Vegemite poster with each Vegemite purchase. Wow! Unfortunately, we had sufficient supply of Vegemite on board from our last tasting, so we missed out on the freebie. They also offered Kanga-Bangas … we hesitated on this one, but eventually decided to give it a pass as well.

All in all, we have found Port Lincoln to be a pleasant little town with all the amenities we could ask for, a great anchorage and friendly people. Tomorrow, we meet some new friends for lunch and we're looking forward to it.

Anchorage in West Cape, Yorke Peninsula

 

Up before daylight again. We heard the patter of raindrops on the hatch above us. The wind and sea calmed during the night and we slept well. It was cold as I put the kettle on for morning tea and dragged out our weathers/foulies (foul weather jacket and bibs). With so many 40+C days (100+F) days in Adelaide, I'd packed away our heavy socks, gloves and watch caps, but I dug them out this morning.

We were anchor up just after 0600, mainsail luffing, and motoring out of Emu Bay in calm waters with nearly no wind. Once out of the lee of the bay, the wind picked up to a reasonable SW 12-15 and we were sailing west, main and jib full, into the Investigator Straits. The rain cleared, the sun came up and we ate our oatmeal relishing the day.

It was an on again/off again kind of day with the wind: sometimes no wind, then a little wind, just the right amount of wind and way too much wind interspersed with rain squalls. Sometimes wonderful; sometimes uncomfortable. We sailed past Althorpe Island with its stately lighthouse and wondered about the volunteer caretakers that might be living there. Cape Spencer Light on the mainland was too far away to appreciate.

We found the passage between Althorpe and the mainland, a natural channel between several shoal patches just off the mainland and some rugged offshore reefs and rocks which signaled their positions with huge breaking waves. With Kangaroo Island no longer providing protection from the Southern Ocean's southwest swells, the rollers increased in size and the ride became more bumpy. As if to mark the entry into Southern Ocean waters, white, graceful mollymawks and muttonbirds made their welcome entrance, ocean birds we hadn't seen in quite awhile.

We could distinguish West Cape jutting out in the distance, its solitary metallic lighthouse gleaming in the late day sun. We ran a slalom course trying to avoid the mass of craypot floats that were laid out in our path. Though it might have provided dinner, dragging a craypot behind us would have definitely hindered our speed. Sailing in Maine came to mind immediately.

We hauled in the jib, doused the main and made our tumultuous entrance into the West Cape anchorage. Well-protected from the south and east, we were hoping the waters behind the Cape would be free of the southwest swell that prevailed. The entrance, however, is through some rather large rollers, reminding us of entering some South Pacific atolls we've visited.

West Cape is more of a local fisherman's refuge, no facilities, but a reasonable overnight layover in the right winds. The high, golden sandstone walls are heavily eroded from time and weather and there are thousands of tiny caves and crevices which seemed to attract the local swallow population. Sure enough, once we plowed through the rough entrance, the water calmed to near still.

We dropped the hook in 14' of good holding sand, set it well and gave a sigh of fatigue as we tidied lines and prepared for tomorrow morning's repeat performance. We grabbed a drink and sat in the cockpit appreciating our surroundings. It's amazing how tired you can get from not doing much at sea. Tomorrow … on to Port Lincoln.

Kingscote, Kangaroo Island

Half of Kangaroo Island's population of 4,000 people live in the vicinity of Kingscote. It's the commercial and shopping hub of the island. We motored the 15 miles or so in flat calm waters from Eastern Cove and anchored off the port. After confirming that 1) there were still no rental cars available and 2) we were too late to go on a tour, we decided lunch in town and a walk around Kingscote would have to do.

A rather odd thing happened as we were hauling anchor in Eastern Cove. A bee flew in from the island and landed on the windscreen. I saw him and thwacked him off with a snap of my fingers. He flew back and landed a few feet away. I thwacked him again. And again, he moved a few feet away and landed. I figured he was interested in a lift to Kingscote to visit friends and family or look for work and keen to find a ride. The third time, I let him rest. I read that the Ligurian bees on Kangaroo Island are quite famous and unique … who was I to mess with insect fame?

Kingscote boasts that it's the first official European settlement in South Australia. The British barque Duke of York anchored in Nepean Bay on July 27, 1836 and established Reeves Point as a formal settlement. The Visitor Info kiosk is part of the KI souvenir shop and a Kingscote brochure was easily obtained. There were several walking tours described, but the best was a 4km walk along the beach to historic Reeves Point with lots of historic info placards strategically placed along the way.

We walked along a boardwalk through a protected blue penguin (aka little penguin) reserve. Penguins are nocturnal and this happens to be breeding season, so nobody was at home, but we did see their little fabricated huts along the tufted hillside.

It was the bottom of the low tide as we walked along the shore, traipsing through shells and debris along the wrack line. I found several pieces of well worn sea glass to add to my “I'll do something constructive with it later” collection. We passed the remains of old jetties, lost long ago to wind, sea and weather, a few errant pilings the only reminders of their existence.

At Reeves Point, we headed up to Flagstaff Hill for better views of the bay. En route, we came across The Mulberry Tree, originally planted in 1836 by the first settlers. It has some support nowadays to keep it upright, but it still purportedly bears fruit each year.

The climb to Flagstaff Hill wasn't difficult, it's not that high, but the panoramic views were indeed lovely. We saw the foundations of old home sites along the way and thought the early settlers definitely had a rough time of it, but their choice of house locations were spot on.

Back to town via the original settlers' cemetery. This is always an interesting stop for us. We learn so much from the epitaphs and gravestones. The children seemed to have the worst time here … sickness, starvation, accidents, all noted on the gravestones. People who died en route and were buried at sea were remembered, as well as those who died in the early years of settlement.

We returned to Kingscote via the Esplanade, high above the shore. Nine of Cups bobbed gently in the waves, her wind gen spinning smartly, toting up amps, so we could watch a movie this evening. A fine day, perhaps not as much as we'd hoped for our time here, but sometimes we take what we can get.

Back to our Ligurian bee hitchhiker … he flew off just as we anchored at Kingscote, obviously figuring he could make his own way from there. We bought some KI honey in his honor.