23/06/2020
J got up at 11pm last night to take over my shift. I went to sleep at 12pm. I set the alarm to 2am, but I didn’t wake up until 4am. It turned out that J quietly turned off my alarm clock… I quickly got up and take over his shift. So that he could go to sleep.
The route was simple and it had always been on autopilot. I sat behind the dodger(windshield) wrapped in a blanket and were eating chocolate, I only have to see from time to time whether there is a fishing boat or something in front.
When conditions are good, night cruising is actually very pleasant, and brings more thoughts and inspirations. Zhang Dai in the Ming Dynasty wrote “Night Sailing Boat”, where a group of scholars talking about everything in the world on a night boat, and came up with an mini encyclopedia. Beryl Markham conceived her “West with the night” during her night flight west.
The gentle west wind blowing from the mainland continued to fill up the sails, so the sailboat moved northward steadily. On the left was the ancient Australian continent, on the right was the open Pacific Ocean, ahead was the lighthouse and our unknown journey, and behind was the distant city lights and the trivial and busy world, overhead was the eternal and unchanging stars and Milky Way, I really hope that moment was eternal. However, it didn’t take long for the Venus to rise from the east, and lifted a layer of ‘fish belly white’ (a Chinese term for the colour of the early morning sky), telling me that an eternal cycle is repeated, and all the lives are just going in and out of it.
6:34am I saw in the first sunrise of our journey, also announced the success of my first night sailing.
9:45am sailing into Double Island Point and anchoring at Rainbow Beach. We sailed 105 nautical miles in total.
Then I had a very relaxing day, mainly eating sleeping and painting. Early breakfast was toast with avocado and cream cheese, late breakfast was toast with bacon and omelette, and dinner was Hokkien noodles with chicken, pine nuts, pumpkin and beans.
Sea Journal 