A friend mentioned the above when we set out. Well, leaving Port Stephens last Thursday and hitting 11 knots flying past Broughton Island in a fresh South westerly, brought this saying to mind. We hope to have more exciting sails like this 45nm leg to Tuncurry and Forster.
Leaving Broughton island behind
We put down an anchor opposite the Fish Co-op and spotted “Now and Zen” who we have seen on the AIS over the last two days of sailing. We invited them over and met Marty and Sue from Western Australia who had sailed their boat from Adelaide in South Australia to this spot.
Esprit from Now and Zen
The next morning we set sail for Camden Haven and carried the spinnaker for half the 40 nautical miles and motored the rest as the wind died down. We made our way up the river and put down the anchor at the village of Laurieton. The next day was spent exploring this area on foot and attempting to climb Big Brother mountain behind the village – we gave up halfway up because it was much higher than what we expected.
At the RSL jetty in Laurieton
We consoled ourselves over a couple of beers before sprucing up for a Saturday night at the local RSL club. We shouldn’t have bothered – the friendly locals go out dressed very casually. We had an early night.
Hiking up to Big Brother
The following day we did the relatively short sail to Port Macquarie beating into a freshening North easter. By the time we reached the harbour entry, the sea was probably 2-3 metres and we had a hair raising ride in over the bar, trying not to broach the boat in the breaking waves.
We found a quiet little bay next to the Fish co-op and at 4pm, had what Sue describes as a “calming red”. Graeme and Jenny Smith who happened to be in Port Macquarie for the week joined us and Marty and Sue on board for some extended sundowners.
Monday was spent exploring Port Macquarie, which is a delightful town, before joining the Smith’s for dinner.
We are currently in Nelson Bay, Port Stephens having motored here on Monday from Lake Macquarie. The predicted Westerly didn’t materialise so we had to resort to the 54 hp. Yanmar to take us the 41 nm over 6 hours. We were in the company of another 44 footer, “Now and Zen”
Approaching Port Stephens
We picked up a mooring in Shoal Bay and went ashore early Tuesday for a brisk walk along a beautiful beach, before Annie did her exercise regime and we went for a swim. A surprising number of retirees were swimming and walking along the beach. This was followed by a hearty breakfast.
Shoal Bay
Morning walk
We relocated to a mooring in Nelson Bay for Tuesday night. Annie, who is convinced she can feed us from the sea, then splurged money on fishing gear at Brent’s Tackle World. She got the inside info on how to trawl. The new tackle was put to use immediately and although the 500 mm long yellow tail we could see from the boat, didn’t take her bait, she managed to catch a small something which was returned to the water.
Fishing gear
Success!
We are cruising around Port Stephens today and will set off to Tuncurry tomorrow, in what “PredictWind” says will be a good South Westerly.
Sunday 15th May 2016: After four days of packing up the house, loading the boat and a number of farewell dinners, we started the day with a hearty breakfast and had coffees with some friends who came to see us off.
We cast off the RMYC breakwall at 8:45am. There was a fresh Westerly blowing and after hoisting the sails, Esprit took off like a racehorse. There were a number of friends on their boats sailing out with us to the Barrenjoey lighthouse to wave us goodbye.
The beauty of a Westerly is that it blows off the land on the Eastern seaboard, resulting in an almost flat sea. The result is a quick passage and in the 15-18 knot breeze we were sailing at 8.5 knots. We had logged on to the Marine Rescue service with an ETA at Lake Macquarie for 7 hours later to coincide with high tide at 16:20, to cross the bar.
We had a school of dolphins following in our wake for about 30 minutes, which was a good omen. We logged off at 15:00 after 6 hours, to cover the 37 nautical miles at an average of 6.2 knots. A great day’s sailing which beats a day at the office. We tied up at a mooring in Lake Macquarie for a cup of tea and some Tim Tams.
We have been very conscious of safety measures for this trip. We are not getting younger or stronger as the years pass. Unlike our South Atlantic race from Cape Town to South America in 1982 and the Indian Ocean race from Mauritius to Durban in 1987, when we were younger, carefree and stronger, we are older and wiser now. So we set about ensuring safety as far as it was possible.
The first rule is: don’t fall overboard; second rule: follow rule one; third rule: guess what, follow rule one and two! Therefore, the first priority was manual self-inflating life jackets with built-in harnesses. These are attached to Jackstays running the length of the boat on both sides, to which we are hooked onto while sailing. Each life jacket has attached an EPIRB which is activated by water, to transmit an emergency signal to Canberra and Marine Rescue giving an accurate position of the person in the water by satellite to within 50m.
Each life jacket also has an AIS beacon attached which is activated by water, to transmit a position of the person in the water to the GPS on board, allowing the person on board to locate the one in the water on the GPS. We also have a self-inflating dan buoy to throw to someone in the water. Needless to say, there is a 4-person liferaft, flares, EPIRB and AIS.
AIS (Automatic Identification System) is a marvelous system which will replace radar in time. It gives an accurate description, position, heading and speed of any commercial vessel (compulsory) and yacht registered, on our GPS (chart plotter). We have the usual VHF radio for communication at sea and mobile phones when within reach of the 4G network up to 50km out to sea. Beyond that, when we sail out into the Pacific we will switch to satellite phones like the Iridium or Inmarsat systems.
The unpredictability of the weather is still the biggest threat to safety in sailing. Weather forecasting has improved dramatically since the blurry weather faxes of the 80’s. In addition to all the free Government meteorological websites, we have subscribed to “PredictWind” which utilizes complex algorithms to calculate optimum departure dates and weather routing for the areas we are sailing into.
Physical systems which require checking are numerous. We have had our rigging (standing and running rigging) checked and adjusted before we set off, as this has stretched and settled down over the last 8 months. We have bought a “SeaClaw” storm drogue for extreme conditions, added another 120m of 18mm rode and a spare anchor. Not least our own physical systems: Annie is as fit as a fiddle after years of gym and I have carefully calibrated my wine consumption to cope with the possible sea conditions.
Performance Boating Sales, the importers of Jeanneau yachts in Sydney organised a Jeanneau rally to Newcastle and Port Stephens from the 9th to 14th April 2016. We saw this as a good opportunity to stretch Esprit’s legs for a shake down cruise before we set off North in May.
Approaching Newcastle
Our friends Ron & Michelle Watson and Peter & Mandy McLean joined us for the sail up the coast. We departed Saturday at 9:30am from Barrenjoey light house in light Easterlies for the 48 nautical mile sail to Newcastle. We had to motor initially, but the wind freshened from the South-east, allowing us to hoist the asymmetrical spinnaker. We arrived at Newcastle Yacht Club around 5pm and after a few sundowners joined the rest of the Jeanneau sailors for dinner and a party on the floating “The Princess”
Michelle, Ron & Annie
Sunday dawned with some serious headaches, but our new Aldi coffee machine produced some strong blacks to soothe the nerves. We departed at 10am for Port Stephens on a glassy sea with no wind. The 54 hp Yanmar iron genoa came to the rescue and we watched some dolphins as we motored up the coast. A Southerly breeze allowed us to sail the second half of this leg into Port Stephens where we tied up in the d’Albora marina.
Mandy, Dirk & Annie
After some sundowners, Peter and Mandy treated us to dinner at the local pub. We had an early night! The following day Annie and I did extensive walks around Port Stephens, which is a beautiful area just 3 hours North of Sydney. With our sailing companions bussing home, Annie and I sailed out of the heads on Tuesday at 8am, into a freshening South-easter.
Annie & Dirk
The seas were rough and with the wind building to 25knots, we reefed the main and furled the headsail by 50% to make good headway at about 8.5 knots. One long tack out to sea allowed us to clear Newcastle by about 4 miles, to ease out and sail a straight beat into Lake Macquarie. We arrived after 7 hours at about 3pm, with enough depth before low tide to clear the bar at the entrance. We picked up a mooring just outside the draw bridge.
The rising tide meant we could sail out of Lake Macquarie at 9am into a moderate 13-18 knot South-easter. One long beat to Barrenjoey light house and we arrived at Royal Motor Yacht Club at 4pm after 7 hours of sailing. The boat performed very well, making a good and dry passage and promising excellent passage making come May. We look forward to this.
