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 From The Coastal Passage, issue # 18
 Fast Bikes and Slow Boats!... I have been astounded at the number of yachtie/ex bikey types that I have come across on the water. Course, Sharon and Tony only partly qualify because their 40 foot Grainger/Chincogan isn’t what you would call slow and the current bike is a Harley... OK, so it’s a fast Harley (contradiction in terms?) But I know Tony’s dirty secret as he was pro Aussie superbiker! Still just as competitive. NO MERCY! Shaz and Tony make T’ville the home port these days, so if you see em out there... sheet in and hustle or get out of the way!
 A Californian gone bad! Dave took a wrong turn off the freeway one day and wound up in the south pacific... somewhere.. good thing he hasn’t been in a hurry. I asked him where he had been and he pulled out his “chart” and said, “according to my precise navigation and calculations, we are about here, which means I used to be there and I’m heading that way.” Can’t argue with that can you.
 HEY BOB!! I was at the Bowen Yacht club when I got the hoy. It was John, Maria and Luke and the last time we had crossed paths was for that magical time at Lizard Island in late 04 for “the games.” Just another cruising family doing their best to be in the right place at the right time and going well!
 Seven years, five months and four days!!! Says Kerry when I catch up with her at the marina. She gazes in a way that implies nervousness about where she is. “All this time and now we are here... water all around the boat! It’s a bit strange to take.” I was wondering where the new kids came from that were scooting around the marina on their little skate scooter things. Not that I mind a bit. The kids were cool and I like the action. The Alexanders had moved aboard a friends motor boat while the last bits of work were done on their cat. The house in inland Moranbah where the cat was a backyard fixture all that time was sold and gone. Jim and Kerry both worked full time, built the bloody boat and ... had a couple of kids that never knew life without the ‘project’ in the yard. Now seven years sounds like a long time and it is but with a project of this magnitude it is amazing that it could be accomplished at all. So the launching drew the family, friends and accomplices. In the centre on the main photo, that’s Aaron standing and Brendan below. They were help for the fairing and other bits, then there is Jim at left, with Thomas and Kerry at right with daughter Molly. So what now, I ask? “Ah... circumnavigation,” says Kerry but she said it like it was a question... then smiled.