Peak hour in the Reef

Peak hour for us occurred the next morning as we were approaching Corbett Reef, some 70nm later.
As we approached the 2.5nm gap between Corbett and Rodda Reefs, with the wind having how veered towards the ESE again, it was of course  Mr Murphy at play, that had us meeting in that area with three ships, all doing considerably more speed than us,as we were now having to beat (tack) our way through the gap.

First to deal with, was the RTM Twarra  northbound , I gave it a red hot try, but decided to live to fight another day and threw another tack in, to pass around its stern.Then in succession it was the Tenjin Maru and the BBC Asia, southbound . Having piloted the first two and several of the sisterships of the BBC Asia, I know what it's like when yachts want to play chicken with you . So to keep everyones blood pressure in check, all I needed to remember was, I was now the smallest of them all. No point in it ending in tears!


Continuing on we thought about stopping for a snooze in Princess Charlotte Bay ,as the wind was forcing us progressively closer to the Flinders Group. Then true to form the wind backed again for the afternoon ,which made the choice somewhat easier.

We tacked out of Princess Charlotte Bay and  onwards towards  either the Howick Group or perhaps Lizard Island.