From Stalker to the Stalked

It turns out we are not the only ones who have been 'watching' the whereabouts and movements of other boats in Tasmanian waters.  We had already noticed 2 catamarans that were 'known' to us - Skelum and Sans Souci were in the area.  We recognised them from Skipr.net as having participated in the Van Diemens Land Circumnavigation So when Paul the skipper of Skelum, motored up in his dinghy to invite us onto his boat for 5ers, we already had an idea of where he'd been and who he was.  In fact I'd already photographed the boat!

The catamaran, Skelum, alongside a public jetty at Paynesville. 

Paul revealed that he'd been 'watching us' too on Skipr.net ... and here was us thinking that it was an eccentric pastime peculiar to us. Perhaps 'monitoring' is a better description. While we were largely driven by curiosity of who else was around, Paul had a more useful purpose. He was collecting the GPS locations of possible viable anchoring spots and overlaying the information on a chart he was keeping. Very clever indeed! The commentary associated with the positions that cruisers were reporting often revealed additional useful information about the nature of the anchorage, holding, fishing etc. You can always learn new tricks from 'old salts' like Paul; an 8 year cruising veteran and circumnavigator of Australia!

It didn't take long to additionally establish that Paul and wife Sharni had cruised in the company of Fayze Two II owned by Fud and Faye, who we'd met in Esperance and with Rob and Henma from Easy Rider with whom we had just crossed over Bass Strait. Oh, the threads that bind us!