Location: 43° 20S, 146° 00E
Thursday 12:00, 04.19.2007

Rainy day today. We are happy for Tasmania, which has been very dry. This morning we remained tied up to King’s Landing in Melaluca Channel, Port Davie, Tasmania until noon. The scene on the Maggie B was very domestic: Hannah sewed up her trousers and then made tea muffins; Bori wrote in her journal; Claus studied the walking map to decide on hikes he is going to take; Owen worked on our SSB radio to tease weather reports out of the air; Theresa stitched a sheath for her new marlin spike to her sailor’s knife; and Frank wrote postcards.

When Hannah’s muffins were done, we had tea and ate them with jam and butter while we watched the excellent video: “The Last Cape Horners”, produced by Mainsail Books Australia. It is a video every sailor should see (mainsailbooks@ansonic.com.au). I got it from the excellent Maritime Museum in Hobart, but it should be available on line somewhere.

We then motored out of the Melalueuca Inlet, and most of the way out of Davie Sound to Wombat Cove, just near the mouth 43° 20S, 146° 00E. It is a quite tight anchorage and well protected from the NW to Westerlies we expect tonight. After some boat cleaning chores, most of us plan to go ashore for a hike, possibly up the nearby Mt. Misery (catchy name!).

The plan for tonight is to have everyone recite a favorite poem and then, perhaps, watch “Cold Mountain,” which was the film chosen in last night’s 6/5/4/3/2/1 exercise. We have about 10 books of poetry on board, including one of Rilke, so Claus can be comfortable in his own language.

One sad note — Hannah has been interested in having a pet on board, threatening to smuggle on board every kitten or wombat we see. Yesterday I relented and brought her back a pair of leeches, named Port and Starboard, that I picked up (unknowingly) on our walkabout. She turned them down! So they had to swim home.

We plan to leave tomorrow morning (hopefully in a nice NW’erly) at about 6 AM, so that we can get back to Hobart about four or five in the afternoon.

All is well.