Cape Melville

Tuesday 16th September saw us raise anchor at dawn and set off northwest from Watson's Bay towards Cape Melville. We had initially planned to overnight at Howick or Ingram Island but a brisk 20 knot wind steadily built behind us and we passed Howick shortly before lunch. So we decided to push on for Cape Melville.



 

Cape Melville - a lizard on every termite mound.

As we passed Howick we were buzzed for the first time by one of  the small Australian border protection planes who then hailed us on the radio, adding some much needed excitement and intrigue to the crew's day. At much the same time we had a double strike on the lures just north of Howick, pulling in two nice sized Bonito. This kept the Captain busy on deck for some time filleting and cleaning, as the First Mate wended a course between the reefs, which start to come in quite close to the coast by this point. With two functioning sails, constant 20 knot winds and low swell in the lee of the reefs, our speed over ground reached a new personal best for this voyage of 9.5 knots. By day's end we had covered a whopping 70 nautical miles under sail only - also a new record for the voyage.

 

Things start to get choppy at Cape Melville

Rounding Cape Melville we didn't have a lot of time to appreciate the wild alien boulderscape as we were suddenly hit with 35 to 40 knots of wind against tide in a bay of shallow 5m water. We have since learnt that this is standard for Cape Melville - if it's 25 knots on the eastern side expect 35-40 on the other side, particularly in the mid afternoon.

 

Bathurst Bay

Ceilidyh were not far behind us and we radioed them with a heads up that they may want to reduce sail before rounding the cape. Our charts didn't give great hope of being able to tuck in very far out of these wild conditions, indicating very shallow depths through most of Bathurst Bay. However we edged our way in closer and closer to the beach and managed to actually creep in quite a way further than the charts would indicate was sensible.

 

1899 Pearling Fleet disaster

 In the morning all was calm and we headed ashore up the short sandy track to the memorial of the 1899 Cyclone Mahina disaster. This category 5 "super" cyclone resulted in the loss of 54 vessels and hundreds of lives in Princess Charlotte Bay. Dolphins were reportedly found 15m up the cliffs of Flinders Island and fish and sharks several kilometres inland due to the storm surge generated.

 

You may have observed the small footnote after the names of the 9 (white) pearlers of the 300 nameless "coloured men" who also drowned. Many of the Barrow Point Aboriginal people were also killed in the disaster. A project is underway to identify and remember these unnamed people. Some of them were undoubtedly victims of the infamous "blackbirding" slave trade which was carried out in the Torrres Strait and Pacific Islands during the 19th century to supply slave labour to the Australian pearling and sugar cane industry. There is more at www.pearlingluggers.com.au by Blackbird International.

 

 

The able sea monkey observed how this very peaceful sheltered little spot tucked in behind the hills felt like an orchard, with its European looking mature trees and flat grassy areas. Except it is surrounded by those unforgiving grey boulder strewn mountains for miles as far as the eye can see. The landscape and plants are quite different here to the rainforested coast between Cairns and Cooktown and it's much drier and hotter. 

 

A perfect place to go bouldering, just mind the death adders.

 Three hitherto unknown species of  animals were discovered at Cape Melville in March 2013 - http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2013/10/new-cape-york-species-are-incredible-find with the chance that there are more out there yet to be found. In such a remote wilderness anything is possible.

 

 

 

We set off to the Owen Channel between Flinders and Stanley Islands before lunch, a short 13 nautical hop. Here we caught up with Canadian Ceilydh and Geelong's Endurance of the South.

 

View of Castle Peaks up the Owen Channel