Monday 22nd March - Bass Strait Crossing

Alarms went off at the lovely Hanlon House at 4.30am.
Woke up, put my rashie and shorts on, made coffee, went to see if the others were up. Had to get the boat captain out of bed, told him we had work to do today. Last check of the weather forecast and I squeezed into my wetsuit, far earlier in the day than I ever have before. Then took it all off to go to the toilet again... so nervous.
Paul drove Stuart the boat captain over to the boat harbor so the boat crew could have breakfast. I looked at the cereal Maxine from Hanlon House put out for me, then managed one bite of the toast Graham from Hanlon House kindly made for me.. but food wasn't really possible with the nerves.
Dean and I headed to the beach with all the gear. It was pitch black outside. We carefully made our way down the road past the cemetery surrounded with little Wallaby's.
At the beach we were greeted by the Chanel 9 reporter who had interviewed me the day before and was there to capture the take off. He kindly parked with his headlights shinning on the beach so we had some light to set up the kite.
Paul and Scott came back to the beach to photograph the set up then left with Dean for the boat.
I waited on the beach in the cold and dark with the reporter and Graham til I saw the lights of the boat come around the Nut. Just writing this I can feel all the nerves I had then. I asked Graham to help launch as there was hardly any wind and what there was, was on shore in this sheltered cove. It took several tries to get the kite up. In the end I had to hot launch it and then 2 meters out it dropped into the water.
A wave went over my head so I was drenched already. Was hoping to stay dry for a little while. Finally I relaunched and didn't look back. Stared at the kite willing it to stay in the air. It was 6.30am by the time I left land. Headed for the light of the boat. I could just make out the outline of the Nut to my right and the cliff face to my left. As soon as I was away from land the wind hit me. I estimate it was around 25 knots, I depowered the 10 m crossbow I was on all the way. I was really scared that it was going to pick up more as the day went as I already felt a little overpowered. Luckily it held about that strength for the first half of the journey. The gps on my bar showed I was heading North around 30 - 35knots km hour. I thought I would travel about 25 knots so was happy to have more speed which would enable me to slow it down later if I got tired. I kited for about an hour in the dark and it gradually got a little lighter. It was very overcast and there was no sign of the sun until after midday. After a few hours I noticed the GPS had fallen off my bar. Very sad as the little arrow that represented me had just nudged its way off the little pic of Tasmania. The GPS screen was about big enough to fit 5 or 6 arrows between Tassie and Victoria so was very pleased that it had made its way clear of the pic of Tassie. Once I lost that I didn't know what direction or how fast I was going which was a real bummer. Couldn't go too far from the boat in case I went off course. I had another GPS with me taped to the backpack but I was not able to get it off to look at it. Dean has downloaded my track off it which is really cool.
I was totally stoked when the boat radioed to tell me I was over half way. This was around 11am which was so much earlier than I expected.
Suzie had to go and get the kids out of school to make it to the finish on time.
I managed to keep good speed up during the second half and reached the beach before friends and family could make it. Pretty funny and quite unexpected.
After about 5 hours I started to imagine I was seeing land. The big waves in the distance with white caps on them looked like islands. Then much to my disappointment the wave would break and the imaginary island would disappear. At about 1.30pm I saw a vague long purple shape on the horizon. LAND!!!!!!
Its funny on the GPS track you can see where I see the land as I change direction to head straight for it.
With 2 hours to go the wind dropped to maybe less than 15 knots. I had the kite fully powered up and I was working it through the wind window. By now my back, knees, feet and blisters where pretty sore. I had to concentrate really hard as I was scared if I fell off and the kite lost momentum it would fall in and not relaunch.
I put in a prayer for a little more wind and got a gust. Wind held in from then on around 15 knots. Boat was indicating I go straight ahead to Inverloch. Not having my GPS I didn't know how far away that was. I had been watching the land from Wilsons Promontory and asked on the radio if I could head for land. They said it was all cliffs. As I got closer I could see lots of sand. Worried wind might not hold out I decided to head for the beach. Left the boat and headed in. At 4pm I landed at Venus Bay. I did not realise at the time people had been there but the boat had told them to go to Inverloch. So after my moment of victory I had to head back out to the boat.
I was very thirsty, having run out of drink 3 or more hours earlier. My mouth was dry and I had been so nervous I had only managed to eat 1 and half muesli bars all day. Wish I hadn't bothered to sew on 2 extra pockets on my shorts to carry the mountain of food I didn't even consider eating. Motivated by a juice box on the boat I tried to kite back to the boat out through the break. The support boat was sitting out about 1km from shore. Got past the first few waves then got knocked off. I was having a lot of trouble steering the board or trying to jump the waves as I had broken the back foot strap an hour earlier. Back on shore the kite tumbled through the waves, got covered in a heap of wet sand and sat on the beach.
It took so much effort to relaunch it and I had to pull so hard to get the wet sand off that when it did go up I went flying towards the cliff. I was thinking i was about to kill myself after I had completed my dangerous mission. Tried to get out again, got knocked off again, used my arm to protect my head from the flying board. Having said arm x-rayed today in case I broke it. Board went between the lines and the leg rope and got tangled. Patiently untangled everything while getting hammered by breaking waves and third time lucky managed to get past the break back to the boat.
Little did I know I was only 5km from Inverloch where there were waiting reporters, friends and family and that by making it back to the boat I was up for a 3 hour tour to San Remo where the boat could dock. I spent that 3 hours being sea sick over the side, and shivering despite the kind captain piling towels and blankets on me.
On the inside I wanted to jump up and down in excitement but on the outside I was too sick.
Once on land all was well, hugged family and friends. Drank champagne. Thanks so much to those who traveled around to finally find me in San Remo.
Thank you to all those who had very unproductive day at work watching my dot travel from Tassie to Victoria.
Some more thank yous...
Dean for his help leading up to the crossing and for enduring the long journey on the boat. Thanks to my kids Bailey and Maddy for understanding all activities over the past year or so have been "dependant on wind"
Thanks to the camera crew, Scott who flew over from Sydney, and Paul from kitelife. The story will be on Kitelife soon on Foxtell. Update on this will be on twitter.
Thanks to Mike from SHQ for planting the crazy idea, and to Ivan and all the crew at SHQ for all their help and equipment.
Thanks to Bob Leighton who was the first piece of the puzzle beginning this huge project. Bob was so patient giving me a daily weather report for over a month. It has been the most unpredictable season for wind with cyclones and tsunamis and Bob was so great dealing with my frustrations of not getting the expected conditions for so long. Thank goodness Bob encouraged me to wait as I had the most perfect conditions I could have hoped for.
The next piece of the puzzle was securing the support boat.. Calypso 11. Stuart the captains was fantastic from the very 1st day we met. He took me out 3 times for practice runs in Bass Strait, each one of them having their own dramas, but that didn't deter his commitment to my mission. After a month of being on standby, Stuart gave up work and fishing charters to do the mission this Monday. Stu's crew Col and Joel were terrific too. It was heaps of fun spending the day before with them in Tassie, I might have been overcome with nerves if it wasn't for their fun antics. When the fisherman out on Bass Strait radioed through the conditions of 4 - 6 m swell out there I needed the distraction the boys provided. If anyone is entertaining the idea of a fishing charter in the Bay or out in Bass Strait I couldn't recommend a better bunch to go with.
Thanks to Hudson and Cabrinha for lending me extra kites and loads of expertise, fins and other bits and pieces that I desperately needed all at short notice!
I'd like to thank Maxine and Graham at Hanlon House for putting us up before the crossing. Their Bed and Breakfast was more than I could have hoped for. A beautiful house with slanted wooden ceilings and amazing views and most importantly for me only 100m from the beach. I'd love to go and stay there again when not under the pressure of kiting back home.
Thanks so much to Mary, Grand mother of 2 kids in our swim program who picked us up from Launceston airport and gave us a guided tour to Stanley. The ride was very squashy with 4 of us in her little car, but lots of fun.
Thanks to Ripcurl for the heated wetsuit, South Eastern Sails (highly recommend them if you want a sticker on your kite to advertise something), Seapecs for the sunnies,Garmin for the replacing Silvu's GPS that I got water in that I unfortunately lost somewhere in Bass Strait (could I have another please!)Gatorade for the drinks, and Winners for the Museuli Bars.
And finally thanks to all the friends for their encouragement and support!