The weather deteriorated throughout the day, getting really bad this afternoon and evening. We went for a very long walk 10+K along the foreshore to make up for our lack of exercise over the last week and spent the rest of the day tinkering with the boat.

2nd October
Well it sure did come in last night. The southeasterly change hit and was blowing over 40 knots which is classified as gale force. We were happily and safely snuggled up in the marina without a care. Phew!

Anyway it more or less blew itself out last night and by this morning the forecast was down to 10-15 knots and moving around to the east, on it’s way to northerlies again! We’d planned an after lunch departure to catch a north-flowing tide which would have meant some night sailing which would have been lovely. But in view of losing the southerly winds we left Manly marina for Scarborough marina just after breakfast.

The Coffee Pots – channel markers into Port of Brisbane

It’s a 22 nautical mile sail (pretty long) and we got in to Scarborough at 3pm. One of the higher stress times is crossing the entrance channel to Port of Brisbane. You have to tune in to their VHF channel and monitor it, timing your crossing to not disrupt a ship. Actually a small yacht like ours wouldn’t disrupt them, but we’d probably have ended up on the 6 o’clock news! Anyway as it turns out our timing was good and we slipped easily in between them without a worry.

We’re now moored at Scarborough marina at the end of our first long-ish period of cruising. 10 days of predominantly wonderful sailing and good times. We learnt many lessons and gained bucket loads of confidence. We’re now looking forward to long periods around other cruising grounds – maybe next year!

Soon after I send this we’ll walk over to Morgans Seafood where we’re booked in for their seafood smorgasbord. What better way to end the trip. We’ll sleep aboard on the marina tonight, pull Top Shelf out tomorrow and derig her before towing her home.

To see all the photos from our Moreton Bay sailing adventure CLICK HERE.

Here is the track of our trip.

The plan was to sail Top Shelf around Moreton Bay for two to three weeks from Monday 22nd September. Moreton Bay is reputably one of the best boating grounds in Australia with relatively protected waters ( ie no ocean swell) and lots and lots of islands and passageways to explore.

Our departure was delayed by a day due to Steve’s brother and wife coming up to spend Sunday night with us, and our return has been brought forward to the 3rd October so we can attend my brother’s 80th birthday party – so just short of two weeks. We don’t mind changing plans for family, after all they’re what’s important in life. However, having a schedule on a boat is always potentially fraught.

Steve spent Monday morning getting Top Shelf ready – fuel, water, fishing gear, new BBQ, etc. I spent the morning doing the provisioning. We’re both currently on a ‘low-carb’ diet and it provides a menu of all the food you can consume in a week – made provisioning very easy! Everything stowed and ship-shape we headed down to Scarborough Marina where we planned to rig her, sleep on the boat in the car park and launch at the high tide on Tuesday morning. This is when you start to find the things left behind – like my doona. We had dinner at the club (very average) then popped over to a friends place who lived nearby who lent me a doona. (I sleep in the forward cabin and Steve sleeps on the starboard berth – gives us both plenty of room).