Showing posts with label Off. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Off. Show all posts
Monday, December 26, 2016
A very moving stop off the beaches of Anzio
July 23-24, 2013
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| A lone flower arrangement in row of headstones - Lest We Forget! |
We slipped the lines and left our berth in Porto Roma Marina a little before 11.00am and made our way to the fuel dock to fill our tank for our journey down the southern coast of Italy. The later departure was timed to hopefully take advantage of the stronger breezes in the afternoon but as we motored out through the breakwaters there was still no sign of any wind at all. Fortunately the breeze did come in around One and we were able to get the mainsail up, genoa out and finally silence the engine for a relaxing sail along the low coastline towards our destination at Anzio.
Once again we had an option of anchoring just outside the harbour if conditions were right or taking shelter inside if need be. As it turned out the mild north westerly blowing made the anchoring option very viable and we were able to creep into close to the breakwater and anchor in quite shallow but nicely protected water just off the beaches that runs from Anziodown to Nettuno just to the south.
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| We anchored in quite shallow water outside Anzio harbour but the protection from north westerly swell was very good. The American War Cemetery can clearly be seen just north of the marina at Nettuno. |
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| Porto Roma to Anzio – 27.0 Nautical Miles – 6 Hours 04 Minutes Average Speed 4.5 Knots – Max 6.9 Knots |
We were aware that these beaches were made infamous in World War Two as the site of major Allied landings which led to the Battle of Anzio but weren’t aware of the full story. As we enjoyed post passage sundowner drinks in the cockpit, a quick visit to Google revealed the full story.
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| Viewed today the beaches of Anzio show no sign of their violent past. |
Operation Shingle was an launched in January 1944 commanded by American Major General John Lucas. It was intended to outflank German forces of the Winter Line and enable an attack on Rome. The success of the landings around Anzio, in a basin consisting substantially of reclaimed marshland and surrounded by mountains, depended completely on the element of surprise and the swiftness with which the invaders could move relative to the reaction time of the defenders. Any delay could result in the occupation of the mountains by the defenders and the consequent entrapment of the invaders. Lieutenant General Mark Clark, commander of the U.S. Fifth Army, understood that risk, but Clark did not pass on his appreciation of the situation to his subordinate, General Lucas, who preferred to take time to entrench against an expected counterattack. The initial landing achieved complete surprise with no opposition and a jeep patrol even made it as far as the outskirts of Rome. Despite that report, Lucas, who had little confidence in the operation as planned, failed to capitalize on the element of surprise by delaying his advance until he judged his position was sufficiently consolidated and his troops ready.
While Lucas consolidated, the German commander in the Italian theatre, Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, moved every spare unit to be found into a ring around the beachhead, where his gunners had a clear view of every Allied position. The Germans also stopped the drainage pumps and flooded the reclaimed marsh with salt water, planning to entrap the Allies and destroy them by epidemic. For weeks a rain of shells fell on the beach, the marsh, the harbour, and on anything else observable from the hills, with little distinction between forward and rear positions.
After a month of heavy but inconclusive fighting, Lucas was relieved and sent home, replaced by Major General Lucian Truscott. The Allies finally broke out in May, but instead of striking inland to cut lines of communication of the German Tenth Army's units at Cassino, Truscott, on Clark's orders, reluctantly turned his forces north-west towards Rome which was captured on 4 June. As a result, the forces of the German Tenth Army at Cassino were able to withdraw and re-join the rest of Kesselring's forces north of Rome, regroup, and make a fighting withdrawal to his next major prepared defensive position on the Gothic Line.
Our Google research also revealed the a large American war cemetery was located just inland from Nettuno so we decided it would be our next day’s destination. In the morning we motored the three of four kilometres south along the beaches where we re-anchored outside the new marina at Nettuno and took the dingy ashore. We skirted around the old walled town and headed a couple of kilometres inland to the cemetery. Our journey through Nettuno had been all passing traffic, with our path all concrete and bitumen which reflected the fierce Italian summer heat, quickly sapping our energy and making our walk less than pleasant. When we made our way through the gates of the Sicily-Rome American Cemetery and Memorial we entered into a lush green world where the ambient temperature dropped noticeably and the noise of the busy city outside seemed to fade away into a reverent near silence.
A wide central mall leads to the memorial, rich in works of art and architecture, expressing America's remembrance of the dead. On the white marble walls of the chapel are engraved the names of 3,095 of the missing. Rosettes mark the names of those since recovered and identified. The map room contains a bronze relief map and four fresco maps depicting the military operations in Sicily and Italy. At each end of the memorial are ornamental Italian gardens. Wandering through reading names on gleaming white marble headstones recording the final resting place of so many young man was incredibly moving. Looking across the row upon row of these silent sentinels not only brought home the horrific reality of war but also made us thankful that the changing nature of the armed conflicts that our country has been involved in during our lifetime have not resulted in losses of this magnitude.
We were both fairly subdued during our walk back to the old town area of Nettuno where we explored the medieval streets and enjoyed a light lunch in one of the cafes.
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| Old Nettuno town was another very attractive area to explore |
Returning to the boat we found a reasonable sized swell now rolling in making things a little uncomfortable so we upped anchor and returned to the shelter of our previous night’s spot in behind the Anzio harbour walls. A little later, we were treated to yet another colour packed sunset silhouetting the buildings of Anzio as we planned our next day’s journey further down the coast.
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| Nature turned on a very colourful sunset over Anzio for us. |
Sometimes we’re so busy out doing things we don’t have enough time to write about doing things and our blog slips a little behind time. To stay right up to date with what we’re up to these days and see lots more photos check out and 'like' our Dreamtime Sail Facebook page at Dreamtime Sail on Facebook
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Saturday, November 26, 2016
Off to Masthead Island for some reef hopping South
December 1 - 2016
The sky began to lighten nice and early at Great Keppel Island as the calendar ticked over to December first. It was now well and truly into summer and we were enjoying nice long days. Despite having fifteen or so hours of daylight available to us, we still raised the anchor in the predawn for our fifty nautical mile passage offshore to Masthead Island on the outer Great Barrier Reef. We wanted to arrive early enough to have time to go ashore and do some exploring as we only planned to spend the night there before moving onto Fitzroy Reef for a couple of nights before sailing further south to Lady Musgrave Island.
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| On our way from Great Keppel Island as the sun climbs into the sky. |
Only a very weak north easterly breeze blew in the early morning. Hopefully it would strengthen enough later in the day for us to sail but the engine stayed on as we began the passage on flat seas. Fortunately the wind angle generated as we motored along was such that we were able to fill the sails and gain a small lift. We also look a lot better with the sails up, very important of course.
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| Light winds and calm seas en-route to Mast Head Island. |
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| Our Whitby 42 ketch does well motor sailing in light conditions. |
As hoped, the wind did fill in enough in the late morning for us to silence our 80HP Ford Lehman and glide along nicely maintaining better than five knots. Karen took advantage of the calm sea state to spend some time in the galley teaching Kristian how to make his own sushi rolls for lunch which proved a smash hit – highlight of the very laid back passage in fact.
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| At last, enough wind to silence the engine. |
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| Kristian constructing his own sushi rolls for lunch. |
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| They're a winner. |
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| Great Keppel Island to Masthead Island 49.9 Nautical Miles – 9 Hours 17 Minutes Average Speed 5.4 - Max Speed 7.9 Knots To see our track in a zoom-able format click HERE |
The pilot guide suggests the best depths to anchor in are to be found off the north west corner of the island’s fringing reef and the Google Earth imagery also indicated this was also where the most sand was to be found. However, the wind was forecast to continue from the north east before swinging slightly more northerly over night. The tide was very low when we arrived and the reef was totally exposed but we were concerned that the high tide overnight could see any swell sweep over the reef so we anchored in 7 metres a little further in along the reef edge in attempt to gain some more protection from the island itself.
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| Masthead Island has good sand for southerlies through to north easterlies but we pushed the anchoring envelope with an overnight northerly predicted. |
Dinghy access to the beach was impossible with the low tide so that ruled out our planned afternoon’s exploration of the island. Rob decided to see if he could spear us some dinner instead so we dropped the dinghy off the davits and zoomed over to a likely looking section of reef. He was only in the water a few minutes before surfacing with a nice coral trout.
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| Hunter-gatherer about to do his thing. |
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| One coral trout headed for the dinghy. |
Next he spied two crayfish hiding under a coral ledge and was soon passing the first one into the dinghy before heading back for the second. Unfortunately this larger specimen managed to evade him scurrying into a deep inaccessible hole in the coral. Keen to add to the catch to provide a decent dinner of crustacean, a long but ultimately unsuccessful search for more crayfish followed.
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| The fringing reef at Masthead Island provides incredible snorkelling |
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| La Jorja arrives at Masthead Island |
Having enjoyed a sleep in and later start from Great Keppel, our friends, Matt and Debbie on La Jorja had arrived while Rob roaming the reef was chasing shellfish. They anchored up nearby and while a visit for another sundowners session was inviting, we opted to get the dinghy back up on the davits as the wind and swell was building. We also had another early start planned next morning to arrive at the right point of the tide to pass through the narrow entrance into the lagoon at Fitzroy Reef.
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| Rob's snorkelling yielded a good sized coral trout and crayfish. |
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| A couple of visitors on the bow. |
We enjoyed a nice feed on the very fresh coral trout done on the BBQ that evening and were treated to a truly awesome sunset that went on forever evolving through a number of stages. That night the wind did swing more from the north at about 15 knots with a bit of swell finding its way over or around the reef at high tide. We also spun 180 degrees when the tidal flow reversed but still enjoyed a reasonably comfortable night.
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| The Masthead Island beaches were lined with the tracks of nesting turtles. We look forward to exploring ashore next time. |
Next morning both us and La Jorja found our anchors/chains fouled and took a fair bit of time and effort to free ourselves. We both paid that price for choosing the additional protection of anchoring further behind the island rather than over the clearer sand bottom to the north west. Regardless, we are very keen to return to Masthead Island sometime in the future and explore underwater more of the great fringing reef and get to land on the island itself. A few more crayfish would be good too.
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| We hope you enjoy the evolution of a magnificent sunset below. Good night from Masthead Island. |
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| Cape Capricorn in the distance. |
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