Cowan Creek - Brooklyn - Hawkesbury River

We spent three nights at a beautiful spot called Jerusalem Bay, down Cowan Creek in the Ku-Ring-Gai Chase National Park. According to our guide book this area is "loved to death" during the summer, but in winter its fantastic - we've largely had the place to ourselves, except for some local fishos and a few bushwalkers. The weather has been gorgeous - perfect sunny winter days and cold, clear, calm nights.

It was the perfect place for me to work. Full internet access, mobile coverage... I feel incredibly spoiled - here are a few views from my office window.

 And here is my chief finance officer procuring dinner.
 

 

We're thinking of renaming Bass Voyager to The Office (just kidding)

7 on one mooring... Pretty sure this is illegal...

This week I also learned a new phrase - apparently we are now "digital nomads" - which wikipedia describes as "individuals that leverage digital technologies to perform their work duties, and more generally conduct their lifestyle in a nomadic manner."

Yesterday we moved to the moorings just off the little community of Brooklyn at the mouth of the Hawkesbury so I could catch the train into Sydney today for a meeting. Brooklyn has a definite alternative arty vibe. Nice.

We've decided to stay around the area for a little longer as I have another trip to Sydney next Tuesday, there is heaps to explore, and plus there is a chance we will be able to catch up with our friends on Wind Warrior and Bravado which would be fantastic.

Bye for now!

Sydney - Hawkesbury River

Today we left Sydney and pointed BV north again. It felt fantastic to get underway, but I surprised myself by getting a bit 'motional about leaving! Its not hard to see why it was hard to leave - we had a great few weeks in Sydney in an amazing central location (did Michael mention, for FREE?) explored the city, mingled with the arty student-types on Glebe Point Road, scoured second hand bookshops and wandered the fish markets, met some lovely people, and all round had a fabulous time. I think maybe after achieving the huge milestone of reaching Sydney and sailing under the bridge ... well it kinda feels like "Act 1" of our trip has come to a close. Which is pretty cool really, because that means Act 2 is about to start!

Today we had a fabulous sail into Broken Bay and we're now anchored on the north side of Dangar Island at the mouth of the Hawkesbury river. We had strong NW winds today and were sailing close hauled the whole way - I am still so impressed by how well BV sails to windward - just 30 degrees off the wind and we were scooting along at almost 6 knots. Not bad for a big steel yacht I reckon.

What a pretty area this is - so glad was never developed like Sydney Harbour just to its south. Huge parts of the bay are National Park, which we want to explore over the next week. The only complication of course is I have a work project to finish and money to earn, so I am fantasising about a secluded cove, somewhere down Cowan Creek in the Ku-Ring-Gai National Park WITH internet access (!) where I can put in my 8 hours each day while Michael catches fish and I'm serenaded by native songbirds. Hmm. I have high expectations of my Telstra wireless internet. We might end up back here near Brooklyn/Dangar Island.

We plan to stay in the area for the week, before aiming for our next stop at Lake Macquarie.


Approaching the Bridge at dawn this morning




Bye bye Sydney


Our anchorage at Dangar Island

Sydney Harbor - Rozelle Bay

Well here we are in Rozelle Bay not five minutes from the Sydney CBD in a very well protected, surprisingly quiet and FREE anchorage! That's right, we now live, albeit temporarily, on Sydney Harbour with three hundred and sixty degree water front views, easy access to shops and public transport, did I mention we haven't paid a cent?

I am quite surprised that we have spent so long here as we had heard from other cruisers that's its a pain to stay here with Maritime NSW hassling boats who stay too long and what not. We have had a great time and enjoyed Sydney more than we expected. Caitlin has also picked up some contract work which will fit in well with our current lifestyle and provide some much needed funds to keep cruising in comfort.

The weather is getting better by the day and has improved dramatically since leaving the Jervis Bay area - days are much warmer when the sun is out, right now I'm sitting in the sun with a light Northerly blowing - feels about 20C. We are now feeling the urge to move on though and have Pittwater in our sights by the end of the week if we can get the right winds.

So a few maintenance jobs to do this week while Caitlin works (real work) and hopefully we will be posting from Pittwater some time next week.

Best thing about our anchorage? Fish market 5 minutes by tender! And cheap!

Wharf where we leave our tender to go 'sploring. Crap location... ;o)

People watching at our anchorage...

Only in Sydney...

Sydney!

We're in Sydney! On our honeymoon road-trip back in 2002 it took us 7 days to drive from Adelaide to Sydney. This time it took us 7 months, albeit with a few stops and detours along the way...

From Greenwell Point we sailed to Wollongong and then on to Pt Hacking. After four gorgeous days in Gunnamatta Bay at Cronulla (God's country, apparently), today we had a fast sail in ideal conditions into Sydney Harbour. We ran the gauntlet of hundreds of racing yachts, ferries and powerboats, and sailed under the bridge which was incredibly exciting!

We are now anchored in Rozelle Bay, near the suburb of Glebe. We'll stop here for at least a week, perhaps more. The Sydney Fish Market is just a short tender-ride away - so yeah, there's plenty to disuade us from moving on! More soon.

Anchored at Rozelle Bay

Jervis Bay - Greenwell Point

We are currently at Greenwell Point in the Crookhaven River - a nice place, and very comfortable.

We left Batemans Bay eager to push on after a pretty uncomfortable week, complete with storms and surgey anchorages. Next stop was Jervis Bay. We had a good trip despite some big seas and couldn't believe our luck when we arrived at an anchorage called "Hole in the Wall" on the south east side of Jervis Bay - it was like a millpond and so pretty, surrounded by national park. Plus,we had it pretty much all to ourselves - perhaps the only benefit of cruising in winter? ;o) Finally we got a few nights of good sleep! Kitty loved this spot too, as there were hundreds of greedy, kitty-sized leatherjackets under the boat.

The rest of the week we explored a few other anchorages around the bay, none of which were very comfortable as the swell had gone easterly and the wind northerly. The town of Vincentia was very pretty though, and had excellent facilities. We also spent a couple of days at Callala Point (not "Koala Point" as we misheard!). The storm we weathered in Batemans Bay had hit Callala really hard. Eleven boats broke their moorings and three were complete write-offs, ending up on the rocks on the northern beach. There was a lot of damage to the foreshore and evidence of huge seas all along the beach and creek entrance.

JB was quite interesting as a lot of it is Commonealth territory and falls under the laws of the ACT. So I guess you could kinda say we have sailed to the ACT! Our 5th state/territory so far. (SA, Vic, Tas, NSW and (sort of) ACT). There was quite a lot of naval training activity going on, which was fascinating to listen to on the VHF radio - for about 2 minutes! zzzzzz.... Michael says there is a saying that being in the defence force is 90% waiting around, 10% digging latrines - I can believe its that boring after listening to them training on the radio!

Yesterday we decided to move back to Hole in the Wall in preparation to leave in a few days. As we passed the entrance to the bay the conditions looked so good, Michael looked at me and said "do you want to just go?" I said "hell yes!" so we quickly packed the boat up for sea and pointed BV north once again!

We rarely make spontaneous decisions like that, and although we made it to the Crookhaven River safely we did face some 30+ knot winds which made things a bit... interesting!! We knew the westerly winds wouldn't affect the sea state too much and we were right, but we won't be making a habit of unplanned passages! Still, it is a pretty cool aspect of sailing that you have the freedom to make a split decision like that. Bored? Want a change of scenery? No need to pack a suitcase, just go! (well, its more like "check the weather and go" really) It definitely suits our restless personalities.

Anyway, with some advice from the Shoalhaven marine rescue we rounded up and entered the Crookhaven river a few hours later, picking up a courtesy mooring near Greenwell Point.

Tomorrow we head to Woolongong, then Port Hacking, then Sydney by the weekend! Wooop!

Anchorage at "Hole in the Wall". No one knows why they call it that..........

Warship HMAS Anzac

 

Anchorage at Callala Bay. 11 of these boats broke their moorings. Club Marine insurance is refusing to insure any new boats permanently moored at this anchorage now.

Beautiful cliffs along the coast between Jervis Bay and the Crookhaven River

Taken earlier today at our anchorage at Greenwell Point, BV on the right.

Finally we have some gorgeous sunny weather to enjoy!

Clyde River Batemans Bay

Just a quick update on the last few days. After my last entry the conditions got progressively worse. The storm coincided with an abnormally high tide and the resulting surge knocked us around pretty badly. Around 9pm as the tide reached its peak Michael went on deck and tossed some of our spare ropes to the marina security guard and a couple of other boat owners so they could secure some vessels that had broke their dock lines. It was way too dangerous for us to get off the boat - we were lurching and pitching so violently. Quite a rollercoaster ride! After 10pm the tide began to ebb and things settled down a bit, but we had a pretty sleepless night.

In the morning we inspected the damage. BV came through ok, although one of the stanchions on our starboard side was torn out of the deck. Other boats were not so lucky - because the tide was so high and the marina doesnt have floating pontoons one power boat with two large outboard engines on its transom was slamming up and down on the jetty doing a fair bit of damage, to itself and the dock.   The boat next to us broke one of its lines and had been scraping its transom against the dock too.

We went for a walk down the promenade where the waves had been crashing well over the walkway, tearing up paving and depositing it on the doorsteps of the riverside cafes. "It was the worse Ive ever seen it" was a phrase we heard a number of times that day.

Anyway, we were keen to move out of the marina as even in calm conditions it was very surgey and uncomfortable so two days later we are happily anchored out in the Clyde river enjoying the post-storm sunshine and calm waters and planning the next leg of our journey to Jervis Bay. We hope to leave on Sunday or Monday once the swell has settled. Bye for now!

Damage to the Batemans Bay promenade

 View from our anchorage in the Clyde River. Hard to believe we saw a big storm just two days ago!

Kitty

We are stuck on the boat today as the weather is APPALLING - heavy rain and 60 kts recorded nearby at Montague Island couple of hours ago. Michael is playing Diablo III and I am soooo bored! ;o) To amuse myself I'm looking back through our latest photos and videos. Here's a cute little one of our ships cat Kitty - she gets a mad look in her eyes when there's fresh fish around!