Just returned from Lizard Island on the final Mico tour of all our old haunts before we have the handover to the new owners in a fortnight.
Once again she sailed like a dream and coming back into 25kts plus and a 2.5m swell - with one reef in the main and a full inner stay sail cranked on tight - she just kept tracking on at a steady 5kts without a care in the world.
To be honest, if the new owners were to call us next week and tell us they have changed their mind, I think we'd gladly refund their deposit and keep her. - she really is a beauty.
We did console ourselves however with some Chrissy gifts to ease the pain of her parting.
One was a new iPad loaded with a heap of books and Navionic charts for Australia and New Zealand and our new sailing ground in Australis - the South China Sea.
We've never had an ipad, even though I have a studio full of Macs for work, and was very impressed with how well the charts performed. With the new G4 built-in GPS it showed us exactly what our Garmin displayed - even when we were down in the cabin. We have a large Garmin plotter and radar on Australis plus a Garmin repeater unit in the cockpit as well as all the plotting software on our laptops but the new ipad will certainly be going with us to Borneo next month.
To ease the pain of having nothing to sail back here in Oz, we purchased two sails for our sea kayaks which had us tacking back and forth across Watson's Bay at a great rate of knots and will definitely come in handy for long distance touring around Hinchinbrook or further up the coast between our trips back to the South China Sea.
My better half now tells me that having two kayaks eliminates any issues relating to tugging ones forelock when passing onboard for as she has always said 'like many...love few....always paddle your own canoe'!
The rest of this week will be unloading Mico, giving her a final polish and preparing for the handover.
One door closes and another opens
Fair winds,
Mico/Australis
Farewell tour...
Linear Mode
