• Lacey Travels
  • Lacey Travels

Australia Circumnavigation

~ a legendary voyage ~ Læs mere
  • Sea Day - Indian Ocean

    2. december 2024, Indian Ocean ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C

    Getting used to these sea days and loving the chilled feel. Today the Christmas decorations have started to go up. They are different to last years.
    Today we had Australian Border Force onboard doing our passport & customs check for re-entry back into Australia. It was a well-oiled machine, thanks to the HAL protocols. Completed well ahead of time.
    This afternoon I attended a crochet class and then we had drinks in the ocean bar listening to trio, Third Avenue West.
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  • Broome, WA

    3. december 2024, Australien ⋅ ☁️ 30 °C

    There are a lot of shuttles going into town but the turn-around is slow. I wait for more than 2 hours to get ashore but I give up at 3:30pm. We need to be back on board by 6:30 and, with the slowness of shuttle turn-around earlier, there would be so little time ashore. By now the heat is intense, so we stay on board. We watch a sea-eagle who has built a nest at the top of a pole on the jetty. As the afternoon draws on, we see how far the tide has already gone out. In the evening, the show was Anne Frances Celebrating the 70’s.Læs mere

  • Exmouth, WA

    5. december 2024, Australien ⋅ 🌬 27 °C

    Today was to be Exmouth but the high winds and wave height does not make tendering safe, so we will not be going ashore today. We will instead be heading for sea after we get maritime clearance.
    Announcement over the PA - one tender has transferred a seriously ill passenger to Exmouth hospital.
    The shore is a low-lying peninsular, North West Cape. The Cape Range forms the backbone of this area. It’s a small town and very remote.
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  • North West Cape

    5. december 2024, Indian Ocean ⋅ 🌬 27 °C

    As we leave Exmouth Bay, we have a great view of the North West Cape Naval Communications Base. There are 13 radio towers set around a central tower that stands for than 350m tall. All have significant stays to protect from cyclones. This is a joint Australian/US endeavour built in the 60’s and named after Harold Holt, former Prime Minister. There’s a naval jetty almost on the point. The Cape Range forms the backbone of this narrow peninsula. Exmouth is a small low-lying town set amongst the sand dunes.Læs mere

  • Modern Day Wrecks from WW2

    7. december 2024, Australien ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C

    HMAS Sydney II and the German, HSK Kormoran went into battle in the Indian Ocean off the WA coast on 19 November 1941. Sydney’s entire crew of 645 was lost and this still remains Australia’s worst naval disaster.
    Of the Kormoran’s 397 crew, 317 were rescued.
    For decades the location of the wrecks was a complete mystery until they were found in 2008.
    At the Museum we watched a 3D film made on the site of the wrecks in the Indian Ocean off Geraldton.
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  • The Wreck of the Batavia

    7. december 2024, Australien ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C

    The Batavia Story
    On 4 June 1629 the Batavia was shipwrecked on Morning Reef in the Wallabi Group of the Houtman Abrolhos islands. Commander Francisco Pelsaert and select crew set off in the ship’s longboat to seek help and those left endured one of the most horrific mutinies in history.

    The Batavia was the flagship of the Dutch East India Company fleet and left Holland on its maiden voyage 27 October 1628 en route to the East Indies to obtain spices. The ship was under the command of Pelsaert with Adriaan Jacobsz as skipper. Also on board was Jeronimus Cornelisz, who conceived a plan with Jacobsz to take the ship with all its gold, silver and supplies. After Jacobsz deliberately steered the ship off course it was eventually shipwrecked at Morning Reef near Beacon Island.

    Abrolhos Islands
    The survivors, including women and children, were transferred to nearby islands. With no food or water Pelsaert decided to gather a group and head for the mainland. After an unsuccessful search for water they headed north to Batavia (now known as Jakarta). The journey is ranked as one of the greatest feats of navigation in open boats, taking 33 days with all on board surviving.

    Mutiny
    Back on the islands, Cornelisz had been left in charge putting all weapons and food supplies under his control. He then moved the soldiers to West Wallabi Island under the false pretence of searching for water. This left Cornelisz in complete control and the two month mutiny endured. Of the 341 people who left Texel aboard Batavia, around 125 men, women and children were murdered and some cannibalised.
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  • In Geraldton

    7. december 2024, Australien ⋅ 🌬 27 °C

    Mini lighthouse replicas are at each roundabout. A bustling, friendly town with a beautiful foreshore and a proud maritime history. Some beautiful old buildings in the Main Street have been well restored.
    Balayi-Open Your Eyes Memorial commemorating the 400th anniversary of First European Contact 1619-2019.
    HMAS Sydney II memorial overlooks the town.
    Point Moore Lighthouse, built in 1874 was the first all-steel structure of its kind on the Australian mainland.
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  • Cottesloe Beach

    8. december 2024, Australien ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C

    One of Perth’s most iconic beaches, known as “Cott”, this beach is known for its clear water, white sand and shady Norfolk Island Pines. From October to March, an eco-shark barrier protects swimmers. The Indiana Tearoom on the beach was restored in 1983. The beach hosts the start of the Rottnest Channel Swim. It’s a little after 9am and already every car park for kilometres along the beach front is full.Læs mere

  • Kings Park, Perth WA

    8. december 2024, Australien ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C

    Kings Park is 400 hectares of grassed parkland, botanical gardens and natural bush on Mt Eliza. It was officially opened in 1895. There are several memorials in this park but the biggest is the State War Memorial. Entering the park, we drive through a long avenue of eucalypts each one with plaques honouring dead servicemen. There’s a wedding happening while we are there.Læs mere

  • WA Shipwrecks Museum

    8. december 2024, Australien ⋅ 🌬 25 °C

    Is recognised as the foremost maritime archaeology museum in the Southern Hemisphere.
    It is housed in an 1850’s era Commissariat building which has been restored. It houses hundreds of relics from ships wrecked along WA’s treacherous coastline including original timbers from the Batavia (wrecked 1629), the Hartog and de Vlamingh Plates, and artefacts from other Dutch shipwrecks.Læs mere

  • Relics from the Batavia

    8. december 2024, Australien ⋅ 🌬 27 °C

    In the 1600s the Dutch-owned, Batavia, was shipwrecked off what eventually became known as Western Australia.
    More than 100 people died in the grounding but the carnage didn’t end there.
    What befell the survivors was sheer horror – anarchy, tyranny, madness, murder and rape, in a reign of terror where people were picked off one-by-one.
    In the end, only about a third of the 340 passengers and crew would live.
    And the waters off Western Australia were cast as the harsh and unforgiving end of the earth.
    The skeleton in the pic was retrieved after a 2014 expedition to Beacon Island. The male was 35-39; 1.8m tall; right foot missing; right shoulder broken; cutting edge wound on the top of the skull.
    The kedge anchor was not discovered until 1971 some distance out to sea from the Batavia wreck. This anchor would have been used in a desperate attempt to winch off a reef.
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