Day 1 – Traveling in James Cook’s Footsteps

The Sounds of Ship’s Cove

Today’s effort was an absolute success! I’m sitting in Punga Lodge having a couple of Parrotdog Hazy, a delicious salad and a sticky date pudding.

It was a tough day, where I felt like a lot of effort didn’t move me very far. But that was also partly a story of conditions. Finally, there’s a good reason why I’m here and not Portage, as Vic suggested: I got a flat tire 🙂

It was a Dark and Storm Night

Yesterday was a beautiful day – I even got sunburnt. But overnight, everything quickly turned yuk and .. it was a dark and stormy night.

The morning started wet, and on the water, the boat bounced around on 20-25 knot southerlies.

Ships Cove: Steeped in History

After dropping off other passengers, I got to Ships Cove at 9:30.

I’ve always loved Ship’s Cove, every since I visited it with Woody and John Andrews back in about 2017.

Captain Cook used Ship’s Cove and Endeavour Cove as his regular rest and recuperation point during his visits of the Southern Pacific and the Southern Ocean.

It’s plentiful wood supplies, fresh water stream, and its abundant fisheries made it a perfect stop to rest the men and repair the Endeavour.

One of my Kindle Books, Captain Cook by Alastair McLean outlines the history of the cove.

So yeah, its always with a sense of history, I visit the cove, and I imagine how it must have been for his contingent of men to have camped up for, ultimately, the years they did. 

Let’s Go!

The Kennett Brothers weren’t kidding when they draw two big humps starting directly from the beach, and lasting for 10kms. And add to this a clay base and a truckload of wet, and today became a recipe for lots of slip-slidey goodness.

It was more than just wet. There were rocks everywhere, and tree roots. Everything was slippery and pointy and ick.

Pretty good when it involves a paddling pool and ladies in bikini’s. Not so fun when its a fully ladden mountain bike on a wet day.