If It’s Not One Thing, It’s The Weather!
Tuesday February 4th – After a long delay waiting for our mast and rigging work to be completed, we are finally untying the lines to depart from Stephen Everett’s dock in Raby Bay.
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Our next cruising destination is Tasmania which lies about 900nm south of us, and to get there, we will sail down the east coast of Australia and then cross the Bass Strait which separates Tasmania from mainland Australia. However, we don’t want to sail down the east coast of Australia without making another visit to Sydney. We were in Sydney with Avante at the end of 2012 and spent New Year’s Eve in Sydney Harbour. Sydney is one of our favorite cities, and we are looking forward to sailing there again.
We departed from Raby Bay which is near the southern end of Moreton Bay, and the shortest route for going south would have us taking the inside passage to the Gold Coast like we had done previously. Unfortunately, the timing of the tides is not good for making that trip with Avante’s deep keel. This time, we will have to go north across Moreton Bay before we are able to get out into the ocean and turn south.
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The weather forecast for heading south is not looking good. Should we go or shouldn’t we? We decide to be patient and head to Tangalooma to anchor off the coast for one or two nights. Because we have been living in Stephen Everett’s house and not on the boat, we rationalize that this stop will allow us to get better organized and into the rhythm of being on the boat before we begin our passage down the coast.
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Friday, February 7th – The forecast now looks good, so we leave the anchorage at Tangalooma and head out through the Northeast Channel and then turn south to parallel the coast. Although there are several places where we can stop if necessary, we are not planning any stops before Pittwater. It will be a 475nm trip, and we want to get far enough offshore to take advantage of the strong south flowing Eastern Australian Current. Wind starts off from SE, but it is forecast to back to E tonight and then around to NE. We should be able to sail most of the way.
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Sunday, February 9th – Our passage down the coast has been relatively uneventful. Wind has been generally good, and we have not had to motor much. The current has been helpful, and on Saturday, we covered 207nm. As usual there has been a lot of ship traffic off the Australian coast, both underway ships and ships that are anchored or just drifting.
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Wind began freshening in the afternoon, and by early evening, it is blowing 25 – 32 knots from NE. We have switched from the jib to the staysail (so much easier with the staysail now on a furler) and have found the ride smoother. The weather is totally clear with not a cloud in sight. We have been making good progress and are not far from Pittwater. With our current wind, we will be there around midnight.
Monday, February 10th – Wind has been dropping for several hours, and just after midnight, the wind dies completely. We take down the sails and motor the remaining distance to Pittwater in calm conditions with some moonlight. By 0150, we are anchored off a mooring field in Careel Bay. Just as we drop anchor, the wind starts blowing from the south. What great timing! We have arrived just before a Southerly Buster comes roaring through.
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After a good night’s sleep, we move further down Pittwater to Taylor Point where we go ashore and have dinner with our friends, John and Julie Lamble and their family.
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The Captain and The First Mate’s 44th wedding anniversary occurred on the our passage south. Before heading on to Sydney, we spend one more day in the Pittwater area and celebrate that anniversary with a lovely lunch at Cottage Point Restaurant.
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Wednesday, February 12th – After a quiet morning, we leave Cottage Point and have a nice sail south along the Australian coast to Sydney. We enter Port Jackson, as the greater Sydney Harbour area is called, and anchor just south of Manley in Spring Cove.
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For the next two days, we explore Manly and some nearby attractions. We hike along the pretty and interesting Manly Scenic Walkway which runs along the coast, and we hike to North Head.
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We also visit the Quarantine Station that was set up to protect Sydney from ship-borne disease. All those who arrived by ship and might have an infectious disease were kept in quarantine until it was considered safe to release them.
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We stop to read engravings on a wall of rocks. Ships’ names, dates, number of passengers, officers’ names and ranks – all testified to a length of time spent here and the number of souls detained for fear of infection.
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Saturday, February 15th – After a rainy morning, we move across Sydney Harbour keeping well clear of the afternoon yacht races. It amazes The First Mate that in this busy harbour with ferries, sea planes, an occasional freighter and sometimes crazy yacht people that they can run these races without incident. We anchor near where we had spent New Year’s Eve in 2012 and enjoy watching the races.
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Heading ashore into Rose Bay to shop at some of the great little food stores in the area, we pick up oysters and champagne. What an elegant treat aboard Avante here in Sydney Harbour!
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Sitting on deck that evening sipping the rest of our wine from dinner, we enjoy the lights of Sydney Harbour all around us.
Sunday, February 16th – We motor under the Harbour Bridge and into Lane Cove River where we anchor. We have found this quiet and well sheltered location to be a great place to keep the boat for several days when touring around Sydney. It is removed from the noise and ferry wakes of the main harbor, and yet, it has easy access to Sydney via ferry service.
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After a short dinghy ride to a nearby park, we walk over a hill to the Woolwich Ferry Station. Circular Quay in Sydney is just 20 minutes away.
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Sydney is one of the world’s prettiest cities, and we love walking around some of the many parks like the Botanical Gardens…..
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…..and wandering through some of the districts like The Rocks.
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Wednesday, February 19th – After several days in the city, we are toured-out and anxious to be heading off for Tasmania, but the weather once again is not cooperating. As the photo of our computer screen shows, the current weather in Tasmania is horrible with a low pressure area just south of Tasmania and very strong winds of 30 – 40 knots surrounding the island. This is no place to sail to until the weather calms its fury!
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What to do while we cool our heels and Avante‘s keel here in Sydney? One of the nearby areas that we have not explored is Middle Harbour, so we decide to head under Spit Bridge and spend a few days in Middle Harbour while waiting for good weather.
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The immediate entrance into Middle Harbour is densely developed with homes seeming to rest one upon another as they move up the steep hillsides. Lots of stairs and some funiculars appear to be the main mode of transportation to and from one’s home or boat moored or berthed below.
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As we move deeper into the harbor, development decreases, and nature once again becomes prevalent. We are pleased to see this. We find a quiet place to anchor with only a few homes visible on the shoreline across from us.
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We spend our time here exploring the coast with the dinghy finding quiet places with interesting shots of the greenery reflected in the water.
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Friday, February 21st – The ugly weather hanging over Tasmania just will not move off. Our weather window for departing has slipped again, and we are now looking to leave on Sunday. We need to get some fuel before heading for Tasmania, and there is a small fuel dock at the marina on the west side of Spit Bridge. It is easier to get fuel today rather than waiting for Saturday when a lot more boats will be out on the water.
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After fueling, we join the line of boats waiting for the bridge to open. Once through the bridge, we return to Spring Cove near Manly to wait for a weather window.
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Sunday, February 23rd – At long last, we are off and sailing out through Sydney Heads. Our plans are to sail overnight and then stop for Monday night at Eden.
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We are glad to be underway, but the day does not start out easy. The wind is still from the south when we leave Sydney, and we have to tack our way down the coast. The seas are up from several days of stronger wind. The hull is banging into waves, and the occasional wave washes down the side of the boat. Weather has deteriorated after leaving Sydney with lots of clouds and some drizzle for a while. It would have been nice if we could have waited until later to depart, as winds are forecast to swing around to the east and drop off a bit in the afternoon. But Eden is 210nm down the coast, and we needed to leave early to reach it before dark on Monday.
Conditions slowly improve, and by midnight, they are near perfect. “All nights should be like this,” reads The Captain’s Log. We are sailing down the coast of Australia pushed by a gentle 10 – 13 knot wind off the port quarter. With a little help from the East Australian Current we are making 5 – 6 knots, and we passed Jervis Bay several hours ago. Occasionally, we run into slightly stronger current, but never more than 1.5 knots which is much slower than on the passage south from Brisbane to Sydney. The boat is rocking gently fore and aft with none of the quick and violent motions from earlier in the day. Sailing downwind like we are now doing is so much more peaceful. The mainsail is well out and locked in place with the preventer in case of an accidental gybe due to autopilot failure or a sudden wind shift. The jib is up, but it is doing little work at this deep wind angle. It will come down if the wind backs any further. It’s a fairly clear night with lots of stars and a last quarter moon that has just risen in the east. The familiar constellation of Orion is lying down in the west. The First Mate is off watch and sleeping in the port aft cabin where she went to escape the creaking of the mast in the forward cabin.
There is a fair amount of ship traffic off this Australian Coast. The passenger ship, Marina, which is 240 meters long is 2nm to our east and headed to Melbourne. The 245 meter tanker, New Accord, is 2nm further east and headed to Botany Bay. The AIS is magical. Before we installed this system, you just saw lights in the nighttime and had to guess at what kind of ship it was and where it was headed. Now, all that information is on the AIS. But the real value of AIS is safety. It identifies any potential collision threats and gives us a clear picture if we need to take evasive action. It is a secure feeling knowing that Avante shows up on the AIS systems onboard these ships and is not just a small target on radar or some tiny navigation lights in the dark.
Of course, the commercial fishing vessels are not on AIS, but they are generally pretty well lit up to allow the crew to see what they are doing when working on deck. Their movements are often erratic and not predictable, but we can see them on radar if they are close enough. We had one fishing vessel pass us about 1/2 mile away on a northbound course. You could hear his engines throbbing as he passed and for a long time after as the sound carried on the wind.
We are on track for reaching Eden late on Monday afternoon, but at noon we download the latest weather and learn that a Southerly is now forecast to arrive in the Bass Strait late on Wednesday. This forecast shows a good weather window for us if we keep going and continue on to Tasmania, but it means that if we stop in Eden as planned, we will probably have to stay there for several days. Since Eden is not the most protected port and since we are already behind schedule, we decide to keep on sailing to Tasmania. The First Mate is disappointed. She had been looking forward to seeing Eden. With a name like that, she just assumes it has to be worth seeing, but mainly she just wanted a break from passage. “Will the weather ever work for us?” she wonders.
Tuesday, February 25th – Winds have not cooperated on our passage across the Bass Strait. They have been from the north and behind the beam, and being much weaker than forecast, we have been motoring a lot to keep up our speed. By early evening, we are over halfway across and approaching Flinders Island with a little over 90nm to go before reaching the Tamer River on the northern coast of Tasmania. Winds are still a comfortable 11 -14 knots, and they have recently backed to SW, putting us on a starboard tack.
By 2300, conditions have deteriorated, and it has become an ugly night with some rain and lightening all around us. Winds are 20 – 25 knots from WSW and we are on a hard starboard tack with a reefed mainsail and our staysail up.
Wednesday, February 26th – In the middle of the night, the winds are still 20 – 25 knots, almost twice as strong as the 10 – 15 knots that were forecast. We are making progress toward the Tasmanian coast at about 7 knots. Waves are choppy and bouncy, and the boat is twisting around quite a bit.
By 0700, the front has passed. It is a very clear morning, and the mountains and hills of Tasmania are visible on the horizon. It would really be beautiful if we were not sailing into 22 – 28 knots of wind. The updated weather forecast states that “winds will increase to 15 – 25 knots sometime during the morning and further increase to 30 knots in the afternoon.” This forecast totally misses the fact that we have had winds in excess of 20 knots all night!
Captain’s Log – 0540 – “A wave has found its way under the dodger and has drenched the watch stander. This used to be a more frequent occurrence, but the wooden blocks that we installed at the front of the dodger have really helped. However, the sea can find its way through anything, and this wave landed squarely on The First Mate leaving very little trace of water anywhere else.”
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Shortly before noon, we have taken down the sails and are motoring through a well marked channel into the Tamer River.
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The tide is flowing out at several knots and our SOG is only 4 knots. The wind is now coming from behind us and is opposing the tide, so the channel is quite rough until we get far enough up the river that the wind becomes a bit blocked. The channel is quite wide, and the river is amazingly deep, mostly over 100 feet.
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We are heading for Beauty Point Marina which is about 6nm from the river mouth. Finally, we can see the masts of boats berthed in the marina ahead of us.
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By early afternoon, we are tied up in Beauty Point Marina in Tasmania. Our friends, John and Di Joyce, from s/v Allusive have come down from their home in Launceston to welcome us to Tasmania.
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The total passage from Sydney was 538nm and took us 3 days and 5 hours. Thank goodness we have a boat that sails to windward, for this was another of the many passages where we have had to do so. The last 15 hours of our passage were rougher than we liked, but as our friend John Joyce says, “Bass Strait passages are not meant to be easy.”