Welcome home Jessica

Saturday 15th May

We were trying to dock at the fuel wharf in Bowen as the TV was showing Jessica Watson arriving home in Sydney. So moving. She is such an inspiration.

I think she serves as a Rorschach test for people to project their patterns and beliefs about issues such as:

• Coming of age rituals and ordeals,
• Emancipation
• How parents should manage teenagers, with what balance of 'protect and control', vs 'liberate and tolerate risk'.

Coming from a tradition of early independence and encouragement of calculated risk-taking, I am greatly relieved that she came home in one piece. If she had drowned, it would have unleashed a tidal wave of schadenfreude from the cosset'n'control crew.

I just hope she has as much luck coping with a tidal wave of celebrity.

We had a nice sail north from Butterfly Bay through the Gloucester Passage, and had a walk over a headland in Bowen, where some of the film 'Australia' was shot. Today we have an eight hour sail to Cape Bowling Green, within striking distance of Townsville.