Saturday
The weather outlook was not favourable for the next few days, so we decided to visit a couple of anchorages that were recommended by other people around Port Stephens.
Lemon Tree Passage was one of the suggestions and has gained popularity as an attractive retirement area (note: we are in age denial and were not scoping). Enjoying the terra-firma under our feet we took Lucy for a long walk along the mangrove board walk which weaves around the picturesque bay.
Sunday
Another place of interest was Tea Gardens which I thought sounded as though it had a strong English influence, I was wrong. The truth is, it is not known exactly how Tea Gardens was named but a couple of theories were, tea was once grown in the area and the other because of the tea tree that grows along the Myall River.
At times going ashore for provisions can turn into an epic. For example, to visit Coles at Tea Gardens was a 5km walk return. Under normal circumstances we welcome the opportunity for exercise and classify carrying groceries back as weight training. But on this particular excursion we had planned to get a taxi or Uber for the return trip (half share with Pete & Sal), but when none were available we made the slow walk back to the dinghy carrying multiple shopping bags (our mistake we didn’t take our granny shopping trolley) cursing the weather.
When an opportunity arises that we can access a larger supermarket that offers competitive prices, we are prepared to walk a few extra kilometres. There are times when we do not know where we will be so we may only be able to access a convenience store which in turn blows our weekly budget. Over the 10 months we have been away it has all worked out in the end, swings and roundabouts!
Monday
We pulled up anchor at 0630 and motored out of Port Stephens towards our next destination, Broken Bay (aka Pittwater) and more specifically Refuge Bay. The wind was blowing 10-15 knots from the north west with a 1.5 metre swell.
Thankfully it was an uneventful motor sail. Even the schedule of the cargo ships off Newcastle was working with us as we did not have to alter course once. We were motor sailing at an average of 7 knots, Georgie was not sea-sick and Lucy was comfortable sitting out in the cockpit watching the world go by and keeping an eye out for dolphins, Happy Days! 😊
We reached Refuge Bay at 1600 and anchored in mud, which was just what we needed for a good night sleep.
Tuesday-Wednesday
Refuge Bay was a glass-out, so we pumped up the SUP and took turns paddling around the relatively quiet bay that was filled with mooring buoys. You could see how the bay could be a zoo on weekends and holidays.
Along with Peter we did the steep walk up a hill to the top of the waterfall overlooking Refuge Bay. It was a great hike which involved some scrambling on all fours, it was good to mix it up a bit.
Thursday-Friday
Port Stephens is similar to Port Hacking. Suburbia surrounded by National Park. Opting for a change of scenery we motored up Cowan Creek stopping briefly at Cottage Point to have a look around and give Lucy a walk.
As a matter of interest we priced the diesel. It was a new record $1.99p/l. The record was then broken once we arrived at Bobbin Head with the price of diesel 2.01 and unleaded 2.21.
Mark noticed the genset was blowing some steam and on further investigation found that the impeller had to be replaced with 2/3rds of the blades missing.
Bobbin Head is located within a National Park. If you take away the marina it had the feel of Walhalla. Peter knew of a walk that took us up to the Sphinx war memorial which had been carved from sandstone (in memory of lives lost in the First World War) by a returned soldier in the 1920’s. It took 1.5 years to complete.
Saturday
We required access to the internet, so dropped our mooring and motored around to America Bay which was also closer to the entrance to Port Stephens as we would be leaving tomorrow. Making the most of the calm water we would go for a SUP whenever the wind dropped below 5 knots.
Sunday
After we all had an early morning SUP around the bay we pulled up anchor washing the sausage mud as we flaked the chain into the anchor well. We departed Port Stephens bound for Bantry Bay in Sydney. Arriving early afternoon, we briefly anchored at Manly so we could go ashore and re-stock dodging the shower of rain we completed the task in record time.
We were heading to Bantry Bay which meant that we had be at the Spit Bridge at 1630 in time for its opening. We lined up with Music Maker ahead of us. We were shocked and annoyed by the number of smaller yachts that would just push in ahead of us. They would motor at high speed and not even look to see what our intentions were, which forced us to take precautionary measures. To make matters worse, once we allowed them to go ahead of us there was no acknowledgement or thank you wave.
