10/03/2026
UNCHARTED - Special - Captain Kitty’s Log
Excerpts from the Log of another uncharted journey.
Episode 1: “Leadership by Four-Letter Word”
In this irreverent, adventure-packed beginning, a fiercely loyal, foul-mouthed mum defends swearing as a health tonic while revealing how her torturous PT and quietly manipulative dad push her to do far more than she thinks she can. Just as she’s piecing together how challenge shapes her, a year of discovering that sailing is a brutal, no-mercy sport culminates in a Scout sailing camp gone sideways: the official leader throws out his back and, with all the nonchalance of offering a takeaway coffee, hands her command. Now unexpectedly promoted from snack-duty parent to Scout Leader in Charge, she must captain a crew of kids through choppy waters and emotional storms, armed only with grit, loyalty, and an Olympic-level swearing vocabulary that might just save everyone—from actual mutiny and from herself.
Capt Kitty’s full story starts here: Part 1
https://180letters.substack.com/p/sailing-through-fing-life
Episode 2: “Scouts, Capsizes, and Other Life Choices”
In this episode, an untrained stand‑in leader is hurled into a remote sailing camp with a dozen kids, a four‑hour drive, a pit toilet, and a five‑page text of ambitious objectives, armed with only slightly more than zero knowledge of sailing and a willingness to wing it. Over a week of gleeful capsizes, getting mocked by the safety boat, flying trimarans in 20‑knot winds, late‑night bushcraft and card games, and ticking off every item on the overstuffed objectives list, they discover that Scout leading is really a backstage pass to adventure, learning, and self‑discovery—ending the season on a high as they sign up as a full Scout Leader, then cut to credits with a six‑month world tour on the horizon.
Read Capt Kitty’s full story here - jump to: “Plain Sailing with Scouts”
Episode 3: “The Savage Dolphin Experiment” or “Winds, Waves, and WTFs”
In this rollicking episode, our narrator signs up for what she assumes will be a chilled summer sailing jaunt with Scouts—sunshine, quick-dry undies, and minimal responsibility—only to discover she’s been secretly cast as Captain. After dutifully levelling up her skills on a tiny lake dinghy under her daughter L’s expert tutelage, she arrives at SLF’s ambitious Port Phillip Bay expedition expecting to supervise kids on shore. Instead, the towering, no-nonsense SLF orders her onto his bathtub-sized 16.5-foot Savage Dolphin and, once clear of the ramp, casually hands her the tiller with the bombshell, “You’re now the Captain.” Terrified, she zigzags upwind along the coast for hours, juggling fear, responsibility, and bodily functions, while SLF offers only maddeningly calm reminders that the decisions are hers. When she finally beaches the boat, trembling but victorious, her greatest on-board achievement is having kept full bladder and bowel control—an achievement that ends, with comic timing, the instant she steps into the shallows and pees her pants.
Read Capt Kitty’s full story here - jump to: “Training Day”
https://180letters.substack.com/p/sailing-through-fing-life
Episode 4: “Captain Kitty vs. The Bay” or “F- Me, I’m the Captain”
In this high-stakes, low-freeboard two‑parter, reluctant skipper “Captain Kitty” takes command of the notorious floating spa tub and a boatload of Scouts, parents, and SLF’s nearest and dearest, only to discover that fate, weather, and basic physics have not read the float plan. Day 1 is smooth sailing and sun‑drenched optimism, but Day 2 turns into a nautical chaos special: a jammed centreboard, growing swell, seasick kids, a 10‑year‑old sailing prodigy as her de facto XO, failing radios, and a towline that behaves more like an anchor than a lifeline. With reefs looming and morale dipping, Kitty makes the one manoeuvre SLF explicitly banned—gybing in strong wind—to save the crew, diverting to an extra‑fancy yacht club instead of any planned destination. Hypothermia, jelly snakes, space blankets, hot chips, and an emergency marina sleepover later, SLF calmly declares she has “totally exceeded expectations,” leaving Captain Kitty equal parts proud, furious, and bewildered as she realises this unplanned port might be the real adventure after all. To be continued…
Read Capt Kitty’s full story here - jump to: “Expedition Day 1-2”
https://180letters.substack.com/p/sailing-through-fing-life
Episode 5: “Tow Me, Maybe” or “Life Jackets and Life Choices”
In this episode of Captain Kitty’s Adventures, the Scout flotilla lucks into “six-star” luxury at the Extra Fancy Yacht Club, trading cat holes for hot showers while the captain quietly ignores a ban on member-only facilities in the name of crew morale. A weather-hobbled training day of drills, knot shows, and beach hijinks gives way to a big coastal push in marginal conditions, where Kitty, Big Kahuna, SLF, and their Scouts battle fading light, gusty winds, confused swell, and tight timing to reach a distant marina, punctuated by on-the-fly crew transfers, communal pee breaks, and anxious navigation in the middle of the bay. Kitty’s boat hammers in at 9:15pm, but SLF’s slower, Scout-powered vessel vanishes into the darkness, triggering a farcical “not-quite-emergency” response that escalates from borrowed radios and hitched car rides to police, Marine Search and Rescue, and an ultimately cheerful late-night recovery of a perfectly safe, song-singing crew—followed by rinses under a hose, cuppa soups, and bed at 1am. The next day the show leans into its comedy-of-errors vibe: Kitty and Big Kahuna helm a wonky supermarket trolley like a dinghy, weaponize Scout puppy eyes to transport a tiny boat on a stranger’s SUV, and then settle into an unexpectedly blissful day on a stunning beach, where the winds refuse to cooperate and “waiting it out” becomes a sun-soaked debrief. Marine Search and Rescue reappear not as saviours but as a casual tow service, turning the return leg into a glassy-bay cruise complete with coastline views that beg for canapés, and the episode closes on sunset pizzas, sand-soaked Scouts, and the revelation that their hard-core sail-camp-sail plan has quietly morphed into a beachside mini-break that gives a very tired Captain Kitty exactly the accidental R&R she deserves.
Read Capt Kitty’s full story here - jump to: “Expedition Day 3-5”
https://180letters.substack.com/p/53-captain-kitty-sailing-part-2
Episode 6: “Girl Power and Mouse Farts” or “Bring It On, Commander-in-Chief”
In this swashbuckling three-day finale, Captain Kitty dives into her happy place—the ocean—before presiding over a Scout-led day of beach games, self-catered feasts, and a windswept pier-fishing session where her much-mocked, last-minute rod grab produces the night’s only fish, a smug little pink snapper. Reinforcements arrive in the form of partners and Captain J’s mum, injecting “girl power” into a male-heavy expedition just in time for Day 7’s languid, low-wind voyage, where the “spa tub” sailboat briefly becomes a chaotic fishing charter and the emotional stakes spike when Captain J’s water-phobic mum not only sails but also jumps in for an open-bay swim, earning Kitty’s deepest respect and a lesson in real courage. Day 8 promises a simple sprint to a boat ramp but delivers lightning, an aborted five-minute sail, and a long, anxious wait until Kitty shamelessly hustles the local surf lifesavers into towing their stranded fleet to safety, allowing Big Blue (the newly named spa tub) to be hauled from the water at last. Staring at the boat on land, Kitty is startled by her own sadness—this unrepeatable first expedition, 90km down the coast from Port Melbourne to McCrae, is over—but consoles herself by signing up for “SLF Cruises” again, vowing to negotiate Captain-to-Captain terms next time, and promising that unless SLF drags her into open ocean (in which case he’ll get a very polite “go fuck yourself”), she’s ready for whatever madcap, high-seas chaos the next season of Captain Kitty’s adventures brings.
Read Capt Kitty’s full story here:
https://180letters.substack.com/p/54-the-brave-and-the-kind-sailing
Episode 7: Epilogue - “The Great Bay Hospitality Tour”
Captain Kitty and a motley Scout crew wrap up a nine-day, eight-night “cruise” that costs just $112 per person, fuelled almost entirely by volunteer power and the kindness of strangers. Armed with borrowed gear and bottomless goodwill, they’re rescued from cold seas by an ultra-fancy yacht club that offers free mooring, warm showers, and shelter fit for royalty—if royalty wore neckerchiefs and packed their own noodles. Along the bay, they crash at Scout halls, leave every place cleaner than they found it, and collect a supporting cast that includes police searching for a lost boat, Marine Search and Rescue towing them in style, a mystery SUV couple hauling their sandy vessel, and even a supermarket checkout conspirator who authorises a rogue trolley loan. The season-long subplot pays off when we learn none of this would have happened without a year of free sailing lessons and friends crazy enough to hand Captain Kitty the tiller, culminating in a trip of a lifetime that money couldn’t buy, only courage and community could.
Read Capt Kitty’s full story here - jump to: Postscript
https://180letters.substack.com/p/54-the-brave-and-the-kind-sailing
