19 July 2004: Breakwat er Marina, Townsville

What a magnificent place to live aboard a cruising yacht. The weather is perfect - blue skies everyday, temperatures 12C at night to 25C during the day and we are surrounded by friendly and interesting cruisers from Australia and abroad. A scan through the sea of masts yields 10 or more Australian courtesy flags flying from the starb'd spreaders indicating the presence of a foreign flag at the stern. After so many years of being warmly greeted in similar circumstances overseas, it is our turn to welcome those people who sail into Townsville from offshore. We are still working on illywhacker but rather slowly given the amount of time spent with friends new and old both during the day and at night when a barbeque in the nearby gardens is a common event.