A week of sailing down the southern coast of Australia

This past week we have sailed south down the Australian coast and have been blown away by how beautiful it is.  Many cruisers say to give Australia a miss, but we’ve discovered that is because they make landfall in Brisbane or Bundaberg, which is too far north.  If you cruise in to these ports, it is almost impossible to get to the southern Australian coast.

Heading in to Port Stephens

We had good advice before we left New Caledonia, so QuickStar made landfall in Coff’s Harbour.  From there we set out early in the morning and made our final overnight sail of the season, arriving in to Port Stephens mid-morning.  The overnight passage was awesome, with lots of stars and a smooth ride, so I’m thrilled to end this season on such a positive note.

Our anchorage in Port Stephens

 The area around Port Stephens is a huge, world-class cruising area.  Unfortunately, we needed to get moving due to commitments, so we’ll have to save this cruising area for another season.  What was really cool here is that the dolphins come right in to the swimming beach and swam around our boat as we were sipping our Gin and Tonics! 

Port Stephens beach (and dolphin playground)  

 Stand up paddle boarder taking a break

 What is really awesome in Australia are the many volunteer marine rescue stations that are located all along the coast.  When you leave a destination you can check in with them and give them your ETA for your next destination.  Once you arrive you log off.  It is a great system. This past week there was one SOS by a sailboat who lost his engine power, so he needed to be rescued before crashing into the coast with the 25 knot plus winds.

Marine Rescue station atop the hill.  Many are manned 24 hours a day

 

The next morning we had a 30 mile trip to Newcastle.  The coastline was very picturesque with continuous sand dunes and we had an entire three days of dolphin visits and lots of humpback whale sightings. The port of Newcastle is a large commercial port, so it was exciting to be there and watch the comings and goings.

The port of Newcastle

 

Newcastle is being revitalized and becoming a major tourist draw

 

Our final leg of 80 miles began before dawn.  We left Newcastle and

 arrived in Pittwater (near Sydney) that same day.   

 

Di keeping a close eye out for incoming and outgoing freighters.

This is where we will be leaving QuickStar for the winter season.  We feel really confident about the strength of the mooring.  Yesterday, we had over 40 knot winds and everything was just fine. We will have the boat looked after while we are back in Canada, which is estimated to be early November.

Lots of very large Jelly Fish in the mooring field

 

Pittwater is a huge destination and every Wednesday in the winter (which is now) they have Race Day.  In the summer months it is every day of the week.  Peter will hop onboard one of the racing boats next week.

 Today, we are heading out on a 10 day road trip to Melbourne and Adelaide to visit friends that we’ve known for 34 years.  Will be a nice trip down memory lane.  We’ve rented a Wicked car with a tent that you set up on top.  This should be fun – but the weather is quite cool and rain is expected.  Not that it matters to me, but Peter is getting really soft and spoiled, so he is already whinging about sleeping in a tent (I say…don’t spit the dummy – which is my favourite Australian saying - thanks Ara for sharing).  I also remind him that it is because we are so frugal, we can have all these adventures.

I’m posting this blog two days earlier than normal because of the road trip.

                   Will update once we are back.

Until next time……Have a safe Friday, September 13^th

P.S.  The sad part of being away for six months is we do miss very special and important events.  In August we missed the wedding of Sheena (daughter of Joe and Fatima who are great friends of ours) and Alex.  Just last weekend, Nicole and Chris got married at our son and daughter-in-laws Whiskey River Ranch.  This upcoming weekend Colin and Amy will be tying the knot.  Sending our best wishes to all of you.  We will raise a glass (or two) to celebrate!

Chris and Nicole’s wedding at Whiskey River Ranch

Sheena and Alex's wedding at the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club

Sailfish, dolphins and whales, oh my!

Some of the many dock birds at Coff's Harbour

Great news!  I’ve been busting at the seams for the past month – but I’ve finally been given the go-ahead to share the wonderful news that our baby girl Kylie and her husband Taylor are expecting their first child Feb. 15, 2014 (and our 4^th grandchild).  So excited!!!! 

What is intriguing is that 26 years ago when I was pregnant with her, we visited our friends in Australia.  That was where I heard the name Kylie for the first time and just loved it.  Kylie travelled to see our family friends when she was 17.  This inspired her to do her 2^nd year of university on exchange in Australia and she returned yet again to do her teachers college.   

During this time she met and fell in love with an Australian named Taylor. They married last year in Canada, and bought their first house in Ashcroft, B.C.  this spring.  In the summer they went back to Oz for a visit, completing the circle that began 26 years ago; as this time Kylie was pregnant with her little one.  

We have had a fun and productive week at Coff’s Harbour.  We spent the weekend playing tourists and enjoyed two days of offshore motor boat racing.

Don't worry - we didn't do this really tacky camel ride

Exciting motor-boat races

 

I still had my little cottage, so this gave Peter a couple of nights off the boat after his crossing.  Once the weekend was over, and the stores were open, Peter fixed the prop shaft leak and also the problem with the jenny that they encountered during the crossing.  So thanks to my talented Captain, we were good to go!

Picture this…yesterday morning at 9:00 a.m. we left Coff’s Harbour.  Although the weather called for favourable winds, we didn’t see anything over 10 knots so we began motoring for our anticipated 24 hour journey to Port Stephens.  As we exited Coff’s Harbour we were rewarded with a large pod of dolphins playing off our bow for over half an hour.  Just as they headed off, we saw two humpback whales in the distance.  Throughout the day we were treated to continual visits by more dolphins and more humpback whales. They were everywhere.

 

While we were watching two juvenile whales playing in the distance, without warning, two whales almost broad-sided us.  At the last moment, Peter veered course and so did they.  The whales continued to travel alongside us, showing off and playing by flipping their tails and blowing.  One slap of the tail was so close it splashed the boat!   I was in heaven, as I’d never seen these huge creatures up so close and personal.  The pictures don’t do them justice, but I will never forget this wonderful experience.

 

 Amazing, we could almost reach out and touch them and as we moved away to give them more

 space they just kept right alongside us.

 As the sun began to set (yes, another amazing sunset), the wind picked up and we were able to engage the self-steering.  As soon as we turned off the engine, two more whales breached and entertained us as if to say goodnight to the day.

 

 sailing off in to the sunset

  

It was a pretty easy sail until my 1:00 a.m. shift when the wind died.  From then on we had to hand sail, but that was okay since it kept us alert, as there were lots of ships, ferries and other boat traffic out.   We were steering by the stars, as there was no moon and it was pitch black.  We were hoping we didn’t hit a sleeping whale. Very surreal.

 

At dawn this morning, Peter thought I needed my sleep more than witnessing a gorgeous sunrise.  When he was relating this to me afterwards about how awesome it was, I mentioned that I would’ve thought that after being married for 35 years, he would know I’d rather see an ocean sunrise than catch a bit of sleep.

It was my turn to take the next three hour shift.  During this time, we were listening passionately to The Canadian Tenors singing their hearts out.  (they are fantastic, if you haven’t heard any of their three albums).   To heighten this experience, we were surrounded by different pods of dolphins for the entire morning.  At one point, on starboard, a large sailfish jumped out of the water.  The icing on the cake though, was a full grown humpback soaring completely out of the water as if dancing to the music.  (Bucky…all I could say was wow, wow, wow!)

 

They love playing under the bow wake

As I write this, we are heading in to Port Stephens (just 3 hours behind schedule due to the light winds).  Another two days should find us in Sydney.  

This past 27 hours, I’ve felt like a kid on Christmas morning.  I am just so incredibly grateful that Peter and I can live outside in this world teeming with natural wonders.

Until  next  week…..Congrats to Taylor and Kylie.  We will love your child to the moon and back…just like we do you.

Our beautiful baby girl......now all grown up!

Hooray....QuickStar made it to Australia

Yahoo….QuickStar sailed in to Coff’s Harbour yesterday around lunchtime with a tired, but happy crew.  Since I have been here for the week, I arranged everything with customs and immigration, as well as reserving a berth in the crowded marina.  I got to know the customs officer (Mick) quite well, so he allowed QuickStar to come right in and tie up rather than having to anchor out and wait for them. (he even helped with the lines as they were docking, which is a definite first for a customs officer).  

Very cool for me to watch from the top of Muttonbird Island, as QuickStar made landfall.  They had an added bonus of seeing humpback  whales and dolphins as they were nearing Coff's Harbour

 

Australia is quite strict about their quarantine procedures, so the officer took off all fruit, vegetables, meat, nuts, and seeds (including unopened popcorn).  Sadly for Barb, she had been collecting seeds and nuts from around the world to make in to a necklace once her world tour is completed. These were taken away.   For some reason he didn’t take her sour dough bread starter which she has been using for over five years. All in all he took off over 15 kilograms of supplies.

Flying the Australian flag and removing the yellow quarantine flag

I have had a fabulous week here.  Just love Coff’s Harbour.  The weather has been hot and sunny, which is a little unseasonable, as it is still winter here.  It has been great to see so many people – old and young - out and about at all the parks, walkways and beaches.   Everyone has been really friendly, even though whenever I talk to the locals, I am asked to repeat myself– which I do much more slowly.  I guess I have a strong Canadian accent, eh?

Lots of signs about the "half-men" here, but so far haven't seen a live one, ha,ha

 Very grateful for these warnings to help us cross the street with cars

 driving on the "wrong" side

 I can't get over the great number and variety of birds.  When I remark about this to the locals, many of them say "they are just noisy".  I love the birds singing.

 The beaches and walkways are endless.  They have a 78 kilometre coastal walk/bike path here.  Would love to do it, but can't walk that far right now.

 

Coff's Creek - a lovely 9 kilometre circle walk

 

It’s been a relaxing week in my little cottage, getting lots of projects done in the mornings and then heading out for long walks in the afternoon.  At the end of the day I’ve been enjoying the solar-heated hot tub and I am the only one using it since the guests in the other 6 cottages think it is freezing!  

 

We’ll have this cottage for two more nights because it is so popular I had to book right away when Peter thought he would be arriving later.  He had been in touch with me daily and admitted that they had a prop shaft leak, which might have resulted in not being able to use the motor.  There was no wind for the last 4 days of the crossing, so this would have meant bobbing out in the ocean for an unforeseen amount of time.  I was quite concerned about this, but he insisted that it wasn’t that serious and he asked Barb not to put this problem in the blog as he didn’t want people worried (especially his Mom).   Now that he is here safe and sound he  told me that they also had a problem with the gennaker, so they were unable to use that sail and could only motor sail with the main sail.  Other than these two glitches, and the fact that they had to motor for 4 solid days, they had a good crossing.  

Peter said he couldn’t have had a better crew.  No one got sea-sick nor did they miss any of their watches.  Barbara also did the daily blog update, which was quite impressive since her first language is German.  As an added bonus, they did all the cooking and cleaning and were great company.  I snuck a cake mix on board and Barbara baked it for Peter’s Australia birthday (since we are a day ahead here, he got to celebrate for two days).   Last night for Peter’s Canadian birthday, and to celebrate a successful crossing, we took the crew out for dinner.  It is always great fun to rehash the crossing.  Both Barbara and David were going on and on about what a great, safe, patient Captain that Peter was.  All in all a memorable birthday for him. (Unfortunately, my camera battery died, so I didn't get our final night celebration photos).

We’re not sure what our plans are now.  Peter has to fix the damage once the marine stores open on Monday.  For the weekend, we will be watching the offshore racing championship, which sounds pretty interesting.  Tomorrow is Father’s Day here in Australia, so another excuse for a celebration!

 

Until next Friday……Enjoy the last long weekend of summer!

P.S. You know it's hard for me to do a blog post without a sunrise or a sunset.  This was the morning I flew out of Brisbane airport to Coff's Harbour.