Comfortable Cruising

It is very comfortable cruising in Broken Bay and in particular in Ku-Ring-Gai Chase National Park. This is for three main reasons:

1.  Public moorings are provided everywhere so there is no need to anchor and more importantly no need to retrieve and clean a muddy chain (particularly as I haven't yet installed the washdown pump that is still in the box in the bilge!).
2. A dude in a boat comes around each day to all the bays and sells the papers, coffee, bread etc etc,
3. Waterfalls abound ashore for a daily fresh water washdown of salty kids (no need for aforementioned pump)!

D'Arcy buys the weekend SMH

Washdown

We spent a great few days pottering about various spots in Broken Bay including a picnic lunch at Patonga Beach with our friends Caro, Pritch and Doogs. The anchorages weren't too crowded at all and we met some really nice friendly local sailors.

Local traffic bringing Sydney folks up to swanky restaurants

The girls loved swimming from the boat and also getting in and under waterfalls. One set of falls in America Bay were hard won after a steep climb to the pools at the top.

View from above

The climb to get to the view

The reward for the climb

I'm writing this having just crossed the Swansea Bar while we wait an hour for the bridge to open so we can enter Lake Macquarie. The trip up from Broken Bay took us 7 1/2 hours motorsailing at first and then with a nice following 15-20 knot breeze filling our poled out headsail for the final 3 hours to reach the bar on a rising tide. It was also our first bar crossing of the trip so good practice in terms of getting the tides right etc. Luckily Swansea Bar has a good reputation as not being too nasty and today it was a calm bar that greeted us as we crossed it.

We grabbed this opportunity today to head North before another 5 or so days of Northerly winds set in tomorrow.

We are looking forward to visiting friends and relatives in Lake Macquarie and also seeing the sites of what looks to be a fantastic waterway.