Darwin

Nothing to see, nothing to say. A big modern town, like so many others around the world, all of the same design and you wonder sometimes if you know where you are.

The good thing is that since the day we arrived we put my bike together and I can ride everyday, not much because there is nowhere to go, but I manage to put in around 15 miles, just going around town and around the various marinas.

Since we have a lot of time on our hands, we finally decided to get on with identifying the failure of the power supply on the autopilot. We followed the cable inch by inch and finally discovered inside a connection box that a Y connection had been made to get power to a wheel pilot in the cockpit. The connection had come loose and we could see why it would work sometimes and sometimes not. Since we don't have the wheel pilot anymore, we eliminated that connection and the y connection. This should solve the problem once and for all.

Apart from that, the various boats we had met while sailing up the east coast which are part of the Indonesia rallye are starting to arrive here and this is the occasion to meet again and have a few drinks around the stories of our different passages.

Tomorrow morning, we are going to Spot on Marine, 10 miles from here, in the northern part of the harbour, to haul out and install the new Variprop prop. Then we will come back here in Tipperary Waters marina and finish the provisionning before leaving on sunday for the Cocos.