Adios

Well, the time has come for us to say goodbye as we will be no longer sailing and blogging for Tropical Soul. We ENJOYED our time IMMENSELY! Bruce and I have been very busy up on the range in Kuranda, unpacking, cleaning, organising, and purchasing. We are really liking our space up here on the range in the rain forest. It is So peaceful. We have a babbling creek at the bottom of the property and it is so relaxing to listen to. The weather at present is a bit on the cool side and we are lucky enough to have a beautiful fireplace/ heater. I'm all packed and ready to fly out before daylight to the Sunshine Coast to visit with my daughters. Two of them are at this moment travelling from the states to be with us.
Next week they will come back with me to visit our home.
I hope you all have enjoyed reading the blog as much as I have enjoyed writing it.
Adios mi amigos

Bluewater marina with Deane

The new owner of Tropical Soul pictured below. The survey complete and to our credit the surveyor mentioned he hasn't seen a used boat in such GOOD condition in years. The only suggest he could make was to get the life raft serviced later this year. We are quite proud of our girl and have lovingly taken care of her as such. It was a big job sometimes, but we always had our list going to keep her in good condition.
Bruce & Deane are down at the slipway now slashing her, and then bringing her back to Bluewater marina. This is where Deane will keep her while he readies her for travel with him. It's time for him to move all his personal things on board and make her his home. We are very excited for him and for her that she will continue to cruise and not waste away at a dock somewhere!

 our last sail on our girl.

 We were cruising along quite well you can see our trail line from the keels

The new owner bringing her up the Trinity River.

For all those reading this and have heard about Smithys slipway through our blog, just wanted to update those that are thinking of using the slipway. We were quite shocked to find the prices have mored then doubled since our time there last year. If you are wanting to slip in the Trinity river best to get some prices from the other slipway as we have found out are considerably lower!!!!!!

Moving

Well it has finally happened. We have now officially moved off the boat. Started packing her up on Sunday and worked everyday to get it all off by Thursday. On Friday we got off the last few things and put the finishing touches on her. I've been working on the inside, and Bruce has been polishing her on the outside. She is all empty, clean, and shiny. Ready for her new owner.
All that is left now is to haul her out and have her surveyed. She comes out of the water on Tuesday, and is surveyed on Wed.
We moved her today from the marina to the river, and had a GREAT sail. Blowing SE 20/25 kts and we sailed her close hauled tacking back and forth, then we turned her downwind and had a nice run into the river. All going to plan she will be in the hands of the new owner in a few days.
It was a bitter sweet day for us both and we are SO happy that she will continue to be loved and sailed with the new owner.

Cinco De Mayo

It's hard to believe nearly a month has past since my last post! I have been away for 22 days. I was completing Dru yoga training. I finished my Post Graduate Masters course. From there I went to visit Samantha on the Sunshine Coast. Bruce then joined me (drove from Cairns) and we travelled south back down to Nowra to help with the estate dealings of Uncle Bob. We stopped to visit some close friends Marg & John in Woolgoolga for a couple of nights. So good to catch up with them. Once in Nowra we were able to wrap business up quicker then expected. We left there on Saturday a week ago to make time for Brisbane. It was Joanna birthday the following Monday. It has been quite a few years since we spent her actual birthday with her. We had a lovely visit there and spent the Sunday & Monday night with them.
Then it was on the road again making way for Cairns. No more visits as we have business to take care of. We were back on board by Wed. night. WOW what a long drive. We stopped for a night in Rocky to break up the trip.
Now that we are back we have organised storage for all our things on board. In 10 days we will be hauling TS out of the water for a bottom job and she will be surveyed for the new owner. Once that is complete we hand her over to the new owner! EXCITING times. We will have all our gear off by then.
In the mean time we need to find a place to live!! We will be staying in a little cabin in a tranquil setting while we get sorted out. Yesterday we looked at 4 houses, and I think we have found one that will suit

us perfectly. We will go there today to check it out again. I will update once we have all the details. 

 Birthday Fun with Jo @ her place

 Out and about at Southbank riding the ferris wheel

Sunbirds

When we got back to the boat we noticed there have been a pair of Sunbirds busy building
a nest. Luckily they hadn't laid any eggs yet, as today when we took our sunshade down the nest
came down as well as it was attached to one of the ropes. The poor things kept coming back through

out the day trying to find where their nest has gone.

Uladulla on Good Friday

 Boat harbour and entrance

 Nick showing us around the beaches and the bush

 Merridee

Australian heath land

Back on board

Well it has been a while since I last wrote. We have just returned from our travel south. We
went by plane to Sydney, and rented a car to head for Nowra. Our Uncle Bob was in hospital
and being 92 we needed to get there asap. I had to wait for clearance to fly after my surgery, and
when we finally got it we were away.
We arrived on Monday 26th of March. Lucky to find Uncle Bob in good spirits and quite happy to see us! We had a wonderful day with him. We visited everyday through out the week, and on Thursday
he started to take a turn for the worst. We stayed with him all day on Friday and at 11:25 Friday night
he passed away. We are so glad we had this time with him as he got to say his goodbyes and we got to tell him how much he meant to us and how much we loved him. It has been quite an emotional time.

We have just this afternoon arrived back on board. We are so happy to be home, and look forward
to sleeping in our bed!  We will need a good nights sleep as tomorrow we start on our list of things
we would like to do to Tropical Soul. Lucky we have some really good weather to start our work.
We even have windows open and the ac is OFF!

Wet weather

Funny we are up here to experience what a wet season is like in Cairns, and Cairns has
had the driest wet season in 6 years!

Now that we are into March, our autumn, we are actually having some REALLY wet weather! The monsoon trough is over us now and has spun 2 tropical lows to the west and north of the top end.
Which are both expected to form into cyclones, but shouldn't effect us more then heavy rain.

The outside jobs are on hold until we get some drier weather. There isn't much left on the inside
to do as I tackled that earlier this year. I have 2 cupboards left to do. So Bruce has been working
on building some web sites, and I just finished a blanket for one of our daughters. Glad I've got
some books to read, and the time to relax!

It is OFFICIAL!!

Tropical Soul is for sale! Visit her on www.boatpoint.com.au   search Lagoon.
We're kind of sad, but it is time for us to move on. After 3 years of cruising with her
fulltime we have decided we will settle down for a little while here in Cairns.
We have had SO much fun on her and look forward to handing her over to someone who plans on
 having more GOOD TIMES with her!
If you know of someone that wants a cruising boat she is ready to go Blue water or Coastal!
Just ad some personal effects and food and your off.

we've been busy with some of our daughters visits

We have been busy with some of our daughters visits. We had such a good time with Jo and Mitch, and then Samantha and Brendan. The weather wasn't right to take them to the reef, so we found things to do on shore. Trip up to Port Douglas, Mossman River, Daintree River, Kuranda, and down town Cairns.

weather

Well, looks like things on the weather front are getting a little more active. The monsoon trough has moved down over us bringing more rain and a few thunder storms. Bruce has been following a couple of weather sites and admits he has learned a lot from these guys. I'm attaching a link to the sites for all those that might be interested in weather. We had a red sunrise yesterday, which brought rain but no bad weather to speak of. One of the sayings on the sea is red skies at night sailors delight red skies in the morning sailors take warning, and just this morning was the same quote but with Shepard instead of sailor. The middle link below is Bruce's favourite!

http://westernpacificweather.com/

http://www.xweatherlive.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=75&t=166&p=6557#p6557 

http://28storms.com/typhoon/?tag=www-westernpacificweather-com

Rainforest

 Lunch @ Frog Tree Kuranda

 Rainforest walk this and the next 2 photos taken with the new Sony Hd camera.

 We think this is a Pheasant.

 This little seed has the potential to grow into this mighty

We FINALLY got to go out and about today! The weather hasn't been that bad so far this year.
I think it has been a drier then normal wet season! We've been doing things on the boat, as Bruce is recovering from minor surgery he had 2 weeks ago. We had a lovely day today exploring Kuranda and surrounds.
We had a big thunderstorm come across the marina this evening!

While in port

Well, we've kind of settled into a bit of a routine here in port. What a lovely marina this is! I'm in my 2nd week of teaching and sharing my passion, Dru yoga. Today I had two classes one at 6 am followed by one at 9:30. I have to admit I'm tired, but it is a good kind of tired! I had one of those sleeps that was disrupted by dreams of over sleeping when you know you have something important to attend! I'll sleep good tonight for sure! We have been blessed with unusually dry weather, and I have been enjoying a daily walk. I say unusually dry, but we are still having rain. I got caught in a rain shower yesterday during my walk came back soaking wet. At the present it seems to be raining in the evening and early morning then the sun comes out and dries everything up making it very humid!

  Bruce has started on some of the things on his long list. Organising work to be done, haul out schedule, mechanics, parts ordered, ect. I've been attending to the inside of the cabins and continue to work on down sizing cleaning and reorganising. I am nearly finished with this job though. I've even sewn new curtains for all the windows!

 One day soon we will have a ride around and take some photos of this beautiful part of the country, so stayed tuned!

Full Moon on the outer reef (Flynn)

 The water today wasn't as clear. There were 100's of fish eggs like these in the water and the fish were eating them all up.

Along with the fish eggs was 100's of jelly fish the fish were eating these too!

 This turtle swam right along side us and we watched it eat a jelly fish.

Wrasse

 Bruce in the back ground in this reef.

 Full moon rising over the reef.

The end of a magical few days on the outer reef. We have to return back to the marina tomorrow, but we feel SO BLESSED to have had this time on calm weather on the reef!!

Glass out on the reef

 Saturday morning at Vlassoff

 Sunday morning on Flynn

 Sunday afternoon playing with new camera with polarised lense. We had 2 snorkels today Brilliant!

 Sunday sunset

We have stow aways!

We realised today that we have a birds nest up by the radar on the mast. I worried most of the trip out to the reef today as the little one was chirping and baking in the hot sun. Bruce hoisted me up the mast and I took down the nest with not one but two baby chicks in it. That was my first time up the mast, and was glad the mission was successful! The little birds are now inside the cabin with us getting hand fed. Fingers crossed they survive until we can turn them over to some wildlife carers once we are in on Tuesday.

I played with our new underwater camera!

We're out on Flynn reef, and the conditions are perfect!! The water clarity and the fish life is Amazing!!!! Here are a few of the photos and a video. We're staying here tonight, so we can do some more snorkelling tomorrow.