Tall Ship Adventures - 10. TSA Chapter 10

“I will be leaving the constable here to watch over the yacht before I take over the watch, so I suggest you return to your accommodation until we have caught the person or persons responsible,” the Sergeant said to me, and reluctantly I agreed to go. Later that afternoon, Dad his colleagues and I headed to a nearby restaurant for an early dinner, enjoying a wonderful western sunset as we ate, with a great view of the mouth of the river and the Indian Ocean.

“Look at that yacht sailing out, you think it would be sailing out in the day time,” the Producer stated, and as Dad and I looked up, we could see the catamaran yacht – Sheila heading for the mouth of the river, where it will need to tack northwards to get to the ocean.

I was out of my seat straight away and heading for the door, “Dad, call the sergeant, find out what is going on,” I called out, as I dashed out the door, and sprinted towards the beach, and quickly I dumped my mobile, shoes and shirt on the grass edge and a few steps later I was in the cold water of the river, swimming as hard as I could to try and intercept the yacht, but unfortunately I was just ten metres short of reaching it as it sailed past me, and I stopped and scanned the deck of the yacht, and saw three people onboard.

Taking a mental note of them, as I watched the yacht turn and head north then west out into the ocean and disappear into the darkness of the night, I headed back to shore, where Dad was talking on his phone, and he had my mobile shirt and shoes in his spare hand, which he passed over to me.

“Is the Constable, ok?” I heard Dad ask over the phone… “Oh that’s not good, well I hope it’s a speedy recovery. My son swam out to the yacht but didn’t quite get out there in time, I will pass you to him as he may have some additional information,” Dad said before handing over his phone.

I spent the next ten minutes giving the Sergeant a good description of the three people onboard the yacht, a woman and two men, all in their mid-twenties, and very tanned skin, sandy brown hair for the woman and dark brown hair for the men, all were quite tall and I heard snippets of them talking, as the yacht passed me, which sounded like a foreign language, Italian or French or a mix of both.

By the time the Sergeant was able to round up a crew from marine rescue, it was decided that they would be too far ahead of them and that it would be impossible to track them, so instead he put out a report to all WA coastal town police stations, to be on the lookout for the yacht and the three people who stole it.

After some discussions with Dad, about losing the yacht just after we found it, he called his bosses in Geraldton and asked to delay the project by a week, as a family emergency had come up, that he and I had to deal with, and Dad was given permission to go. With that, Dad quickly told his colleagues that he was going to try and chase down the yacht down the coast and that the project had been put on hold. While doing that, I quickly repacked my bag and loaded up the vehicle with all of our food supplies, and once Dad had packed his bag, we were soon setting off southwards to track down the yacht.

As we were travelling, I had my laptop running, and I had a coastal waters map of the Mid-West coast of Western Australia, I was working out some calculations to try and estimate where the yacht would be now since it had been approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes since we watched the yacht sail through the mouth of the river and disappear into the darkness on the Indian Ocean.

“Dad, I estimate that the yacht will get to the first small coastal town of Port Gregory in about 4 hours give or take depending on the winds, but if we are lucky, and we divert to the Beach Quad Bike Tours Farm, located about 24 kilometres down the road, we may just see they sailing past,” I said to my Dad.

As we saw the sign for the quad bike tours, Dad slowed down and turned down the gravel road, and passing the chalets and caravan park, we headed directly to the beach, with a farm vehicle hot in pursuit, to find out no doubt what we were doing travelling so fast through the property, with the gravel road becoming a narrow farm track and we slowed down a little, as we made our way through coastal shrubs and low dunes, until the water came into view, and Dad came to a stop just twenty metres from the water.

There was a bit of moonlight out, so we could see a little way out to sea, as we heard a farm vehicle come to a stop behind us, and footsteps running. “What the hell do you think you are doing, tearing through my property at this time of the night,” a man demanded, and he didn’t look happy.

“Our apologies sir, our friend has had his 98-foot catamaran yacht stolen from Dampier, which we spotted while visiting Kalbarri, and we are trying to track its location since the thieves assaulted a police officer and sailed off into the night onboard the yacht,” I explained to the man, as Dad continued to scan the ocean.

“Yes, I am sorry, we do urgently need to keep an eye out for the yacht, and I do sincerely apologise for us bursting onto your property, this late at night. We will be on our way, and will not disturb you anymore,” Dad added. “Oh, who was assaulted?” the man asked us. “The junior officer, a Constable, but he will be fine according to the sergeant, who has put out an all-points Bulletin to all coastal towns to be on the lookout for a 98 Catamaran yacht, believed to be heading south,” Dad replied.

“Well, in that case, you have permission to stay as long as you need to,” the farmer replied. “There! I see a shadow way out, is that a yacht?” the teenager with the farmer asked, and the farmer dashed to his vehicle and returned moments later with a pair of binoculars. “Good spotting son. Yes, it does look like a catamaran yacht, but it is a fair way out, and hard to confirm with the minimal amount of moonlight that we have,” the farer replied, as he handed the binoculars to Dad, who had a look and nodded his head.

Thank you, sir, for allowing us to visit your property, we will be leaving now,” Dad said as he retrieved his phone and dialled a number. “Sergeant, this is Julian Hynes speaking, we are at the Quad Bike Tour Farm about 25 kilometres south of town, we have spotted what we think is the stolen yacht, but is hard to confirm with the moonlight and the distance that it is from the beach.

My son estimates that it is travelling at about 8 knots and that it will be at Port Gregory in about 3 hours,” we heard Dad say into the phone, “Ok, we are continuing south to Port Gregory, and we will let you know when we get there and see the yacht again,” Dad said before ending the call.

After thanking the farmer and once again apologising for the intrusion, we set off south to Port Gregory, a very small coastal community with mostly farmers and fishermen in the area. As we continued down the road, Dad’s mobile rang, and I answered it for him.

“Julian Haynes phone, his son Zac speaking,” I said into the phone, as I hit the speaker button, “Hello, this is the Parks and Wildlife Ranger at Lucky Bay, located 47 kilometres south of Kalbarri, and 4 ½ kilometres north-west of the George Grey and Balline junction. I have been briefed on your situation with the stolen yacht, and I am sorry to say that the yacht has ended up on a small reef, just off the Lucky Bay coast,” the caller announced.

“Oh, that is not good at all… let me check this navigator, to see how far away we are from you… ok, we will be there in about twenty minutes,” Dad said in response. “Very well Mr Haynes, I will see you soon, bye,” the Ranger said before ending the call.

After a period of silence, absorbing the bad news of the fate of the yacht, I sighed. “Should I ring Jordan and let him know the news?” I asked Dad, “No, let's wait until we get there and see for ourselves how bad it is, then we will decide what to do,” Dad replied.

When we arrived at Lucky Bay, which has a heap of beach cabins, plus a camping area, and a Ranger Station set back away from the visitor's area, we saw the Ranger vehicle parked on the side of the road waiting for us, “G’day, Mr Haynes I presume? The reef is 400 metres off the coast and is 7 kilometres further south, but we can access it from the beach,” the Ranger said to us.

Leaving our vehicle at the Ranger’s Station, we climbed into his vehicle and set off down to the beach before heading south, it was a good fifteen minutes before we came to the spot where we saw the remains of the yacht, which was been tossed around with the strong winds and waves, pushing it against the reef more, teaching the yacht apart.

There was not anything that we could do about it, but just watch, and after about half an hour, a fishing boat appeared, sat about twenty metres further out from the reef, and made several attempts to try and hook a line to the yacht, to try and drag the yacht away from the reef.

We watched as two more fishing boats arrived, and together, they worked to recover all of the broken bits, as the yacht fell apart. Nearly five hours later, the yacht had been destroyed, and the fishing boats and their crew were kept busy trying to recover as much of the yacht as possible to reduce the amount of pollution in the area.

As the ranger drove us back to Lucky Bay, we received news that three people responsible for stealing and grounding the yacht had been detained, and were on their way to the Northampton Police.