The team arrived back at Enderby Island late morning yesterday, only to find that the bay there (Sandy Bay) was filled with dinghies off the Heritage Adventurer cruise ship.
It took quite a bit of work to reassemble and pump up Rusalka’s dinghy and get ready for a shore visit, and unfortunately by the time they were ready the tide had fallen. At low tide (and in southerly winds) the surf gets up on this beach making it very hard to safely land our small dinghy. In the end, Alex decided not land and to head back to Port Ross for the night.
Today, they got up at sparrow’s fart (that means very early in the morning for non-Australians) and headed back to Enderby for another assault on the beach.
This time they had the beach to themselves and in very good conditions – sunny, calm, no surf.
The protocol for landings is that one person has to stay on the boat at all times, one person drives the dinghy back and forth so that it isn’t left on the beach, and the remaining crew are free to explore. So first Alex and Lucy had a wander around, seeing lots of sea lions, some yellow eyed penguins (very shy and you’re not allowed to get close to them) and some subantarctic megaherbs.
They also met the friendly DOC people who are staying on the island, looking after the sea lions and birds.
Then Al brought the dinghy back to the beach, Alex swapped with him and Lucy and Al had some more time to explore further along the boardwalk track that runs around the island. Geoff opted to skip landing as he’d been to Enderby Island 40 years ago!
Five of this season's sea lion pups (pale brown) being watched over
Finally, around mid-day, with everyone back on board, Rusalka headed south along the east coast of Auckland Island. They had excellent sailing conditions (wind angle between 60-80o, making 7 knots) and enjoyed looking at the coast as they went. They pulled into Waterfall Inlet, where Geoff had anchored 40 years ago – a beautiful basin with a tiny waterfall, and then continued on to Carnley Harbour at the bottom of Auckland Island. There are numerous historical sites in various bays in Carnley Harbour (eg. WWII coast watchers huts, the 1864 wreck of the ship Grafton), but getting ashore will depend on breaks in the weather.
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