Here are some more photos from our visit!
Echuca / Moama continued
Author: crimsonkathyrnandcrew
Echuca / Moama
We’re back in Ballarat after our weekend visit to Echuca and Moama. We travelled north east on Friday (Sept. 2) up to the border between Victoria and New South Wales to stay at Kerry and Porky’s cabin. The drive was amazing through some very picturesque scenery. The route took us through some familiar towns, like Daylesford and Bendigo but continued north to a part of the country that was new to us.
This northern part of Victoria is very flat with lots of farmland. One of the main crops grown in this area is canola. We saw fields and fields of bright yellow canola flowers mixed with fields of sheep and some cattle. Most farmers can plant 3 crops in a year and this current crop should be harvested by the end of September.
We arrived at the cabin just after lunch (it’s about a 3 hour) drive and had a chance to look around the caravan park. There are lots of these holiday parks which are a combination of trailer sites and permanent small houses. Kerry and Porky’s cabin faces a little lake and is 2 stories tall with 3 bedrooms. It’s a really nice place to vacation in and was super quiet this time of year. The park itself was mostly empty with only a few campers brave enough to camp out. The park also runs alongside the Murray River. After all the rain of recent weeks, the river was very full and had flooded parts of the area around the holiday park.
On Saturday we visited Echuca / Moama. These 2 towns straddle the border – Echuca in Victoria and Moama in NSW. Echuca is an old logging port situated on the Murray River. It has a very cool historical part of town and some really nice little shops. We spent a few hours looking around the old port area and also doing a bit of shopping.
Moama is a smaller more residential town that has some nice walking trails. We spent some time on Sunday morning (Australia’s father day) walking along a trail that took us to the overflowed shores of the Murray. This river can be quite dangerous because it has a lot of current and with all the recent water, it was moving fast. We had a beautiful day for our walk and got some awesome photos!!
By the way, I am using a gallery format for some of the photos (I can add more photos this way!). To see these photos larger, just click on the first one and they will open into a slide show format. I have lots of photos so I will do 2 posts!!
Exploring Ballarat and area
We’ve had a few cool, rainy days this week so we’ve stayed pretty close to home. We did take a Sunday drive to Geelong, a town that is south east of Ballarat and right on the water (Port Phillip Bay). We had a great drive down to Geelong and a lovely walk along the waterfront. This town has put a lot of effort into improving their waterfront area. There were lots of boats in the harbour and several sailboats out in the bay enjoying a sunny afternoon sail!
Mark and I have done a few walks around the neighbourhood. Even though the weather has been wet, it’s really nice to walk along the streets and down in the valley behind Matthew’s house. As I mentioned in my last post, many of the houses have very interesting ironwork on their porches. The houses also have front yard fences and gates – some of which are super fancy!!
This coming weekend we are heading up to a cabin owned by Margie’s sister. It’s in a town called Echuca and it’s on the border between Victoria and New South Wales. It’s about a 3 hour drive north so we’ll see a bit of the country side as we had north. This town is on the Murray River which is Australia’s longest river. The first time we visited Australia (back in 2000), we rented a motor home and drove from Queensland all the way back to Ballarat. The girls were young (7 and 5) and they got quite bored of the drive, so to keep them entertained, Mark kept telling them about the big river we would be crossing – the mighty Murray River. Well that winter Australia was having a severe drought and when we crossed the Murray River it was just a trickle in the centre of a wide riverbed. We’re expecting a much bigger river this time around because there have been flood warnings the past few days!
Ballarat in the late winter
Matthew and Margie live in a lovely town called Ballarat, located about 1.5 hours north west of Melbourne. We’ve arrived nearing the end of winter and the weather is cool – no shorts for Mark. The town is very charming and many of the older homes have beautiful iron work details on their front porches. I just can’t get enough of this beautiful ironwork on the homes.
We spent our first real day (Saturday, Aug. 27th) checking out the local farmer’s market which happens near the lake. It was quite busy – lots of people getting out in the nicer weather (we had sun and about 15 degrees). We looked around at the botanical gardens and had a bite of lunch near the lake. It was a relaxed day – we’re still getting used to the time change – 14 hours ahead of Toronto, so we’re taking it easy.
I’ll take some photos of the houses around town soon! For now, here are some shots of our market day!
A Little side trip to Australia
With the sailing season still several months away, Mark and I decided to take a little side trip to visit my brother and family in Australia. We’ll be staying with Margie and Matthew for 5 weeks and are excited to catch up with them and also see a few new spots in the country.
Our adventure started on Tuesday, Aug. 23 with our usual drive to Toronto. We had a great visit and lunch with Ted and then headed downtown to have dinner with Evelyn and Caroline. We spent the night at Evelyn’s. We were up early (5:30am) and Evelyn drove us to the airport at 6:30am (arriving just after 7am). I am very pleased to say that all the horror stories I’ve been reading about Pearson Airport didn’t come true for us. Evelyn was a great help as we navigated the WestJet self serve checkin kiosks and then the self serve baggage drop off!!
By 8am, Mark and I were through security and American Customs and Immigration and were seated at the gate for our 10:35am flight. Time for coffee and a bit of breakfast.
Our WestJet flight boarded on time and we departed about 15 minutes late (that seems pretty standard to me). It was a full flight to Los Angeles but didn’t feel crowded at all. This was our first WestJet flight and it was quite nice.
We made great time flying across the USA and when we arrived at LAX at 12:45pm (pacific time), our gate was still occupied by another plane. We sat on the tarmac for about 15 minutes before the plane proceeded to the gate. It was a very smooth first flight and with the aid of our newly purchased AirTags, I could tell that both our checked bags made it to LAX!!
So here we sit – an 8 hour layover before our big 14 hour flight to Melbourne. The departure gate for our 9:30pm flight was empty when we arrived at 2:30pm, so we found a nice spot by the window where we could plug in our devices and charge them up. We still have about 4 hours to kill but airports are always interesting places!! Next stop – Melbourne at 6am Friday morning!!!
We’re going home!
The 2021-22 sailing season has officially come to an end with the haul out of Crimson Kathryn on Monday, April 25! We spent 12 days at the pier getting the boat ready for storage and I can say without a doubt that this was the most thorough cleaning and storing job we have done so far. It’s always a process getting the boat in and out of the water but this haul out we managed to relax and enjoy (most) of the process.
The last few days have been a whirlwind of activity – sails washed and stored; dinghy motor lifted off the dinghy and secured to the boat’s stern rail; dinghy hoisted onto the bow; interior fabrics sealed in vacuum bags, etc. The inside of the boat was a bit of a disaster with stuff being stored in the v-berth and main cabin but we were still able to cook and relax!!
We moved the boat over to the Holland Marine haul out dock around 8am on Monday. This early haul out worked perfectly for us to get the rest of our storage jobs completed in good time. We were hauled at 9:30 and it took about 1 hour to get the boat secured on its jack stands. Once in place, we went onboard to finish packing up the last items. We took down the enclosure and the final job was to cover the boat with 3 tarps and our big shade tarp.
Now all that’s left is to drive home!! It’s been a great season!!
Storage Bound
Our storage work began in earnest just after our arrival on the Reynolds pier. The job list is definitely shorter then the launch list but there are still many things that have to be cleaned and stowed. A salty storage environment inside the boat leads to some nasty surprises when we return in November.
Probably the biggest job is rinsing the boat – outside and inside. The goal is to remove as much salt as possible to slow down the mold growth. This year I am treating all interior surfaces with a water and vinegar rinse and then a spray of Concrobium (a mold and mildrew killer). You might remember the photos from November – so much mold!! We don’t want a repeat of that!
Mark’s first big job was putting holes in the boat!! Our boat has drains on the deck with about a 4” wall beside the drains. These drains clog easily which is not a problem when we’re onboard but terrible when we aren’t here. So to help with deck drainage, Mark drilled 2 large holes in the side above the drains to help disperse water. Mark barely finished sealing around each tube when we got a really heavy rainstorm. The new side drains worked perfectly and we had excellent drainage for a change.
Unfortunately not all boat jobs go as planned! On Friday (Good Friday) I was cleaning our cockpit and it’s enclosure. I took off the dodger (it’s like the windshield in a car) to get better airflow into the cockpit to dry it out. I put the dodger on the top of the enclosure (which I’ve done many times before) and went inside the boat to work on cleaning the v-berth. There was a big gust of wind and that gust took our dodger over the edge and into the dirty water of the St. John’s River. It was about 2 hours later when I noticed the dodger was gone. Mark dove for it but visibility in this water is zero! So now we have to get a new dodger made for our enclosure!! Not what we wanted but that’s the way things go. There’s a woman right on-site here who does canvas work so we’ve already booked her for November.
We have now booked a haulout date – Monday, April 25th. There are lots of jobs to be completed by that date but we’re confident we’ll have them all done in time. We both have our lists and each day we’re ticking things off!! It’s not all hard work – Jane and Steve are still here and we’ve had happy hour with them. And yesterday (Monday), our friends Julia and Brad arrived so now we have more people to chat with!
Back at Reynolds Park
It’s been over a week since my last post and a lot has happened in that time. We’ve travelled over 400nm, leaving the beautiful Bahamian shores behind and returning to our safe harbour at Reynolds Park. There’s lots to share and I’ll try to get it all down for you.
Our departure from Great Harbour Cay marina went perfectly. We got off the dock at 8am and the weather was good for our crossing. As we got away from the island, Mark set-up all the lines for our spinnaker. This was the first use of our new to us spinnaker and we were able to fly it all day. We eventually took it down when it was getting dark – we were very close to West End, Grand Bahamas at that time. The rest of our night crossing went smoothly. Unfortunately we didn’t get the predicted wind so we ended up motor sailing most of the night. We did get a great push from the Gulf Stream and were seeing speeds in the high 11 knots. We even saw over 12 knots at one point – a new record for us!!
Our plan was to cross to Fort Pierce or if all was going well, continue north to Cape Canaveral. Well with the Gulf Stream push we decided to head for Canaveral! Why not – that got us even further north on the outside which meant less time on the ICW (intracoastal waterway). The only problem was that we arrived at the Port of Cape Canaveral during the restricted hours. There are 2 bascule bridges and a lock to transit to get from the ocean to the ICW. The bridges are closed to boat traffic for rush hour – 3:30 – 5:30 (roughly). It was a bit of a drag to be so close to our anchorage for the night but unable to continue (especially because we were tired)!! So we slowed down and starting looking for a spot to tie up to while we waited for the bridge to open. We got super lucky!!We had barely reached the free dock when a tug and barge radioed to the first lift bridge to open for it. The bridges must open on request for all commercial vessels. The tug was in the lock and heading east so after it went through the bridge, we were allowed to pass through going west!!! Excellent! The lock was all ready for us so we made it through both of these in great time. Now we were cruising along the Cape Canaveral barge canal, heading to the next bascule bridge and then to our anchorage! We came around the corner before the bridge and found out that second bridge was also on restricted hours!! So we dropped anchor right in front of the bridge and did our clear in to the USA with their app. Again we got super lucky because another tug and barge came along (this time heading west with us) so we were able to pass through the bridge right after them.
We had decided before we left the Bahamas that we would take our time getting back to Reynolds. We spent one night on a mooring ball in Titusville where we met up with our friends Julia and Brad Pilon. We had been trying all season to meet them in the Bahamas but it never worked out. It was great to see them and we ended up travelling north with them all the way to St. Augustine. We left Titusville on Friday, April 8 and as we headed north, we were able to watch a rocket launch from Cape Canaveral. Very cool and very noisy!! That night we anchored in Daytona.
The next morning, Saturday, Julia and Brad left early trying to get to St. Augustine that night. We decided to go as far as the Matanzas Inlet. The day started off very nice – sunny but a bit cool. It progressed to be one of the most windy days of our whole sailing season! We were seeing sustained wind in the 20 knots ranged with gusts in the mid 30 knots. As we got close to the Matanzas Inlet (and our anchorage for the night) we got a radio call from Julia and Brad. Turned out there was no room in the mooring fields at St. Augustine so they were anchored where we were headed. We had some fun anchoring in the strong winds – it was a bit stressful but within 2 hours, all was calm!!
Our next stop was St. Augustine. We travelled up the ICW on Sunday, April 10 with Julia and Brad and stayed on a mooring ball for 2 nights. It was Palm Sunday so there was a blessing of the fleet that afternoon. It was very interesting – boats were decorated and they paraded by the fuel dock to receive a blessing from the Bishop.
We had fun in St. Augustine but were eager to keep heading north so we left Tuesday morning and sailed on the outside up to Jacksonville. We had another good day motoring in the light winds, but by 2pm we were able to sail the last hour on the ocean and right into the St. John’s River inlet. We made good time because we came in with a flood tide and got all the way to just before the Main Street lift bridge in Jacksonville. We anchored for the night and left around 8am this morning – again with a flood tide so we made great time the rest of the way to Reynolds Park.
As we approached the pier, we saw our friends Jane and Steve waiting to give us a hand with our lines! It was great to see them and to have their help. Jane and Steve arrived at Reynolds Park last Thursday and have been working to get Daydreams ready for storage. That is our job now – get Crimson Kathryn all ready to be stored for hurricane season. Lots of work but we’ll take our time!!
Last day in the Bahamas
We’re almost at the end of our 2022 sailing season. One last night at Great Harbour Cay marina and in the morning (April 5), we’ll be sailing back to the USA. We went for a nice walk today into Bullock’s Harbour (the village just north of the marina) and enjoyed the Bahamian landscape one last time.
Next post will be a few days from now, once we’re back at Reynolds Park. No wifi for awhile as we make our way up the coast of Florida.
Here are some last photos of the lovely Bahamas!
And now the Photos
Crimson Kathryn and her crew 