Dispatch from Brisbane

Tag : polypropylene monofilament

Dispatch from Brisbane

• Monday, April 14, 2008 2:12 PM EDT
(The Spier family of West Side Road continue their round-the-worldsailing voyage, and are currently refitting their trimaran inAustralia before shoving off toward the Indian Ocean and theNorthern Hemisphere. Here’s the latest news)

Aldora is ready to go, and so are we. Two months has been longenough in this friendly place that isn’t much different fromhome. Highlights of our stay here have been the friends we’vemade, and Shawn Arber’s Multihull Marine, the best boatyardin the world. For this dispatch, Sally writes about Australianfauna, Sam writes about his new fishing skill using the cast net,and Dave writes about Steve Irwin’s Australia Zoo.

Kerri writes about our travels inland, and I summarize our sailboatrefitting work. We hope to start doing more interesting things towrite home about soon.

— John Spier

Australian fauna

By Sally Spier

Australia is home to a wide range of interesting fauna, such askoalas, kangaroos, wallabies, wombats and dingoes. There are alsolots of reptiles, some of them very dangerous.

Ten of the world’s 15 most poisonous snakes are found here.While camping, we came across a dangerous red-bellied black snake.We kept our distance; everyone but Dad retreated to the car untilit had slithered away.

We have also seen many kangaroos and wallabies. On our first daycamping, two of the latter wandered into our campsite and looked atus imploringly. They were obviously quite tame, so we fed them somehealthy mini-wheat and they hung around for an hour or so. We laterfound that there are two species of wallaby — thebrush-tailed rock wallaby, and the whip-tailed wallaby. They areall tame and friendly, even the ones that don’t hang out incamping areas.

A large herd of kangaroos appeared near another of our camps. Whilevideotaping them, I kept my distance, as I had been warned that thebig male gray kangaroos can be quite aggressive if they feelthreatened. These kangaroos ignored me completely and went abouttheir business of grazing.

One day we were lucky enough to be serenaded by severalkookaburras; large pink birds with a raucous laugh. We sat insilence enjoying their unearthly cackling, which fortunately ceasedbefore we tired of it.

We haven’t yet seen koalas, wombats or dingoes in the wild,but we will be looking for them as we continue our travels inAustralia. We’ll also keep a sharp eye out for snakes and thedreaded crocodiles as we travel north into the tropics.

Cast-netting

By Sam Spier

Cast-netting is an ancient method of fishing. I’m told thatit was invented by Malaysians, who used the inner bark of fibrousplants to weave into nets. Using the cast-net looks easy, butgetting it to sail out over the water and land in a big circle isvery difficult.

Cast nets can have a diameter up to five or six meters. Mynet’s diameter is about two meters. Modern nets often havepockets to take shrimp and prawns out of the top of the net. Thecurrent material used for cast nets is polypropylene line andmonofilament net fabric.

My experience with cast-netting started when my dad traded one ofhis favorite books (“The Complete Rigger,” by BrionToss) to a local man for a small modern net for me. He includedthrowing lessons in the trade. In the end, three or four differentpeople helped me learn to use my net: Peter, a fisherman; Glenn, awelder; Tony, a Navy officer; and Matthew, a dentist. I melded mytechnique using a few of all of their steps, and practiced a lot.

My prime target with the cast-net is prawns, but I also catchherring, mullet and other small fish. I need to watch out fortoadfish and stonefish, which are deadly poisonous. Prawns are likebig shrimp and are delicious boiled or barbecued. The other fish Ican use for bait. Learning to use the cast-net has been fun andeducational.

The Australia Zoo

By Dave Spier

When we first came to Australia, I thought of Steve Irwin as justanother guy who had a television show. To Australians, however,Irwin was much more than a source of educational entertainment. Hewas a bigger-than-life national hero who has done an amazing amountof good for the world’s threatened wildlife.

One of his greatest achievements was creating the Australia Zoo toprovide a home for all kinds of Australian animals. Although he isnow dead, his family still runs the zoo and continues hiseducational programs. We visited this zoo with some newfoundAustralian friends.

It was interesting to be in a country so different from our own andthen go to a simple zoo that was amazingly similar to the ones wehave at home. The animal life was abundant as soon as we walked in.A pair of zookeepers held a baby crocodile and a koala bear for usto pet, and another keeper was walking two beautiful, doglikeanimals called dingoes.

The first caged animals we saw were actually American alligators.They were mostly bathing in the midmorning sun in the cool poolsthat were in all of the enclosures. They looked a little bitfriendlier than their crocodile cousins, but that reallyisn’t saying all that much. Looking at a long mouth that wascontorted into an incongruous smile with big, wickedly curvingteeth, we quickly agreed that we would not want to cross the pathof one of these potentially deadly animals in the wild.

After this, we saw a colorful menagerie of tropical birdlife, acomprehensive exhibit of snakes and other reptiles, and an amazingarea full of kangaroos. Kangaroos are native to Australia and areabout the friendliest animals on the continent. They have long,thin faces with sorrowful, drooping eyes. Their powerful hind legsare ideal for hopping and jumping long distances. While theirsmall, spindly forelegs are not used for running, they areextremely useful for holding food while they eat it.

The zoo’s most unique feature is a giant, Roman-style theatercalled The Crocoseum. In the middle of the theater is a large poolsurrounded by grass. Two people in the middle were doing aneducational show on snakes when we entered.

After the snakes came a bird show, which was pretty funny. Onezookeeper picked four random volunteers from the crowd and toldthem what to do to get a bird to land on them. The method, shesaid, was to stick your arms out to the side and let out a loudsquawk. She demonstrated the motion, throwing back her head andspewing forth a loud “caw-caw.” The four haplessvictims provided huge entertainment for the rest of the spectators,but the birds didn’t go anywhere near them.

Of course, crocodiles were the star attractions in the Crocoseum.The zookeeper attracted them by slapping a piece of raw meat on theground near the pool. When the crocodiles came to him he held it upand the deadly reptiles leapt into the air to snatch it from hishands. The speed, ferocity and agility of these huge and seeminglyclumsy animals was amazing.

Travel by “troopie”

By Kerri Spier

While waiting in Brisbane for our new sails to be completed, wedecided that we’d like to see some of Australia that wewon’t be seeing along the coast. Australian car rentalcompanies are everywhere. We did a little Internet research, andfound what we wanted from a company called Britz Rentals.

Most visitors travel by campervan or motorhome, but we wanted toget off the beaten track, so we chose a four-wheel-drive ToyotaLandcruiser, otherwise known as a “troopie.” Aussiesnickname everything with an “ie” or “y,” sowe named her “Britzie.”

Britzie came equipped with a rooftop tent, a regular land tent,camp stove, sleeping bags, and all of the other gear you need toexplore the outback. Like most Aussie vehicles, she had a“roo bar” in front to absorb the impact from theunfortunate kangaroos that meet their maker on the gravel highwaysof Australia. The kangaroo population is much like our deerpopulation. We saw loads of them hopping around, but were fortunateenough to avoid hitting any.

We set off from Brisbane and headed southwest, toward Sydney by wayof the mountains. Australia is a huge country, similar in size tothe continental United States. We traveled about 3,000 kilometers(approx. 1,800 miles) in our week of exploration. The first coupleof days we camped high in the mountains of the Dividing Range. Thisis actually a series of ranges, like our Appalachians, that divideeastern Australia from the Outback.

We stayed in national parks, of which there are hundreds; with sucha large landmass and only 20 million people, Australia haspreserved huge areas. The ones we visited were clean, beautiful,interesting and mostly empty. During the days we drove throughamazing landscapes, unlike any we have in the States, althoughsimilar in magnitude to some of our West. Our first day out wedrove through mostly plains and farmlands. There were fields ofcows, horses, sheep, goats, llamas, even ostriches and camels.

Then we went up into the highlands, and were rewarded withbreathtaking vistas and hairy switchback turns. John did a greatjob driving on the opposite side of the road, as Britzie labored upthe steeper hills in second gear.

Day three found us in Katoomba, a great little town in the heart ofthe Blue Mountains. We drove into the only caravan park around,just across the road from where some of the Blue Mountain hikingtrails begin. Our tent site was nowhere near as tranquil andbeautiful as our previous two had been, but it afforded us a safeplace to leave Britzie while we hopped the train into Sydney. Wehad been warned that driving in Sydney was challenging andexpensive; the train ride was fast, smooth, scenic and cheap.

Sydney was much like any of our big American cities. Streetsthronged with people, cars and bikes. Anything one wanted to buywas available. The famous harbor was crowded with sailboats,ferries, and powerboats.

I am not a city person, but the chance to see the Sydney OperaHouse drew me in. It truly is an amazing building. We clamberedaround the outside steps and walkways, admiring the ingenuity andcreative detailing. Next we hiked across the famed Sydney HarborBridge to catch yet another amazing view of the Opera House. Highabove us, tied into climbing harnesses, were a dozen or so touriststhat had paid the $200 fee to climb over the top of the bridge.This expensive experience is so popular that it’s booked formonths in advance.

After a full day in the city we were happy to climb back into thetrain and return to the slower pace of Katoomba. We got an earlystart the next morning and headed north, back toward Brisbane by adifferent route. We were happy to have our four-wheel drive as weexplored the mountains, taking “shortcuts” on gravelroads that were occasionally awash with wayward water.

The ability to ford small creeks allowed us a peek into a part ofAustralia that most tourists never get to see. We saw all kinds ofbirds and wildlife; wallabies, snakes and kangaroos visited ourcampsite. On our last night out, we camped by the Mann River, some40 rugged kilometers from the nearest bitumen. This was my favoritesite. It had everything one could want: a river, trees, wildlifeand a sand bank to laze and fish from. It had a soft, flat place topitch our tent, plentiful firewood for our campfire and, to topthings off, we were serenaded by the true voice of Australia: atrio of kookaburras.

We dropped off Britzie late in the afternoon. We were tired, andfilthy, but happy. John and I had traveled like this b.c (beforechildren), but this was our first experience camping as a family. Iwould venture to guess that we will be doing it again sometime inthe future.

Australia re-fit

By John Spier

They say that “ships and sailors rot in port,” butwe’ve spent the past couple of months renewing Aldora inpreparation for the second half of her circumnavigation. Longdistance sailing and full-time living put a lot of wear and tear ona boat.

Our biggest item here is a new suit of working sails — ourold laminated ones had given out after 20,000 miles. We expect todo some serious windward sailing in the next year or two,especially in the Red Sea, so we’ve opted for a new main andjib of Spectra Hydranet. These premium sails should get us the restof the way around the world in good shape, so to speak.

We also went through our rigging piece by piece, checking everyrope, wire and fitting. We replaced our Kevlar cap shrouds withnew, 12mm stainless wire after discovering some serious chafedamage, and also replaced the headstay and the furler foilbearings. We’ve been replacing running rigging all along;this stop it was new lazy jacks, reefing lines and furling lines.

We also end-for-ended most of the halyards and sheets, and reneweda few splices. The running gear is all in good shape, but cleaning,polishing and lubricating every part of it gave us the chance tocheck it all over carefully — peace of mind on dark andstormy nights.

We’ve gotten this far with only 800 engine hours, so ourdiesels are in good nick, but we did disassemble and clean ourentire fuel system. We drained the fuel, removed the tanks and hadthem acid-dipped, and purged the lines and filter housings. Thiswas mostly a problem that we inherited from the previous owner, aswe filter every liter of fuel that we buy, but now we have animmaculate clean start.

We’ve also replaced both starter solenoids, water pumpimpellers and covers, and adjusted the valves, in addition to theusual routine maintenance items of fluids, filters and zincs. Theexpert advice we get from Tony Edwards, Mike Muessel and KentGrimbeek goes a long way toward keeping us mechanically fit!

Our other big project here was a new bimini top. We’ve gonethrough two of these tropical essentials in canvas, so this time weopted to build a solid top of foam-cored fiberglass. Made of 10 milKlegecell