Two Island Bay, Marchinbar Island

[Kyle]After anchoring under sail at Lagoon Bay, I got it in my head that we could leave the same way, hopefully even spending the entire day engine-free. The winds were less than two knots during the half-hour it took me to crank up the anchor using the manual lever. With full sail up, it still took us eighteen minutes to leave our anchor's swinging circle. Maryanne seemed to think that was especially amusing.

Kyle sets off again without fossil fuels

I persisted though, and soon we were ghosting away in a slowly building breeze. An hour later, we were chugging our way up Marchinbar's east coast enjoying a repeat of our last marvelous sail. When we arrived at Two Island Bay, on the island's north side, we tacked our way in and again anchored under sail. Our engines had been cold for three days. Oh, how marvelous!

More sunsets at anchor!
I love it - every day just a little different!

The name Two Island Bay gives it away. We were anchored off of a very long white sand beach with an island on each side of us, making a box about a third of a mile wide in which to rest. Once we were settled, we determined the best time to go ashore, considering the tide, would be at first light. When I asked Maryanne where she was thinking she wanted to go, she gave me a vague answer that I could tell meant, 'everywhere'.

I responded by pointing out that 'everything we can see' is not a real option. At the end of our summit meeting, we finally reached an agreement that must have been fair because we both felt like we lost. We would explore the visible side of one of the islands, circumnavigate the other, then walk the beach on Marchinbar between and just slightly to either side of the islands. I got her to agree to skip the far side of island A and saved us walking the main beach until it disappeared over the horizon in a thin haze. She would have tried to walk all of the way back to Lagoon Bay if I hadn't stopped her.

Our first landfall was on the south island. At low tide, it was connected to Marchinbar by a long sandspit, so we used that to dispense with (I mean explore) the big beach on that side. Needing to get back to the dinghy before the sandspit disappeared put a hard limit on that one.

The 'South' Island connects to the mainland at low tide
Making for a fun exploration

We walked and dinghied around the coast of the 'South' Island
The bird is a Beach-Stone Curlew

And then circumnavigated the 'North' Island
(The bird is a Red-Capped Plover)

After a dinghy tour of both islands, we landed on the far side of the north island for an intertidal scramble. Then we headed for the part of the main beach on Marchinbar nearest to Begonia for our northbound walk.

Just before we got there, Maryanne spotted a crocodile. This one was in the water swimming toward us. She put out an oar to fend it off (we were using the electric outboard). That seemed to be enough deterrence and it altered course to parallel us for a few seconds before swimming away slowly and then disappearing below the surface. While it was swimming alongside, we were able to note that it was longer than the dinghy, making it the biggest one we have seen yet. Our subsequent landing on Marchinbar's beach was with textbook efficiency – no standing in the water faffing around with the oars or anchor for us!

The beach was magnificent. What looked like a rocky stretch from Begonia was in fact a wonderland of different shapes carved by erosion into as much abstract art as we could take in. We walked until the combination of shrinking intertidal zone and a difficult headland made for a logical turn-around point.

And a stroll along the main island beach too, we were surprised how the rocks varied on such a short stretch of waterfront

The sand had patches where our feet sunk very deeply - wacky!

Our dinghy was now high and dry above a basin of clear water leading to the main bay through a little gap. We could see that our croc buddy had given up on waiting for us. Perhaps it was enjoying the shade under Begonia. At the little gap, the water was now deep enough for us to stop dragging the dinghy and get into it. Our heads were both on a swivel, but we saw nothing suspicious in the deeper water.

After climbing aboard and getting the dinghy hoisted again, we both kind of crashed, physically. That's when we both made real note of the time. We had been gone for nine hours. That's a whole shift of hiking and croc dodging with nothing more than a liter of drink each for lunch. Well, no wonder!