Dunk Island

We dropped our mooring at Orpheus Island at 8.00am and headed out of the bay.  The weather had turned very cloudy and was drizzling with showers of rain.  We were planning to stop at Zoe Bay at Hinchinbrook Island and walk up to the waterfall and fresh water swimming hole but as we passed by the entire island and bay were covered in thick cloud and rain so decided it would be better to visit on our return journey later in the year. The wind started off very light and we put up the spinnaker but it was too hard to keep it flying in the light variable winds. The wind slowly built up to between 12-15 knots and better with some storms and gusts and we unfurled the sceecher but as a rain and wind storm hit us at over 20 knots we erred on the side of safety and quickly furled that up and we set mainsail and headsail in wing and wing position and sailed the entire way with a following sea.  There were squally showers that kept coming across and very little sun, I hope the tropics warms up soon. We are in the wet tropics apparently so have to expect a bit of rain.

We dropped anchor in front of what was the Dunk Island Resort and settled in for the night and plan to go ashore to explore the next day.

We are spending two nights at Dunk Island and once the rain disappeared around midday today we were able to take the dinghy ashore and explore.  We walked past the abandoned resort that was damaged during Cyclone Yasi and has never been repaired to Muggy Muggy Beach.  The walk takes you through some beautiful rainforest to a lovely sandy beach with vegetation down to the sand. Forgot to bring our Oyster tools so just had to look and drool this trip. There has been plenty or rain as all the vegetation is so green and healthy. Coconut palms every where loaded with Coconuts but all well and truly out of reach.

Tomorrow we are heading further north to the Barnard Islands.