After two days sitting comfortably in Newcastle the weather was looking a lot better. I made a decision to give up rough weather unless i get caught out there unexpectedly. with my new philosophy on cruising being that i dont have plans, i dont see any reason to sail to a schedule. If you want to rush then i figure that you may as well fly. It rained most of the day which had us go and see the latest film '2012'. It was a hilarious film that had me openly laughing at the screen. Problem was it that it wasn't supposed to be a comedy! oh well, what do i expect in a 'end of the world film'?! The town was not what I expected with the marina precinct being very modern with really friendly people. walking around the town every third shop seemed to be an adult book shop. would like to have known the population to number of adult book shop ratio.
I woke up at around 5 am and re checked the weather. 5-10 knots, variable, Perfect for our 25 mile hike to Port Stephens. By 5.45 we had cast off and motored out. Jim and Sam took sea sick tablets, paranoid that they would get sea sick again. within a few minutes they were asleep on the bean bags. What a contrast. the sun was out and the seas were calm. About four hours later we were entering Nelson Bay with our destination D'albora marina at Port Stephens. There are a couple of obstacles with the entry but between reading 'cruising the NSW coast' the chart plotter and distant inshore leads it isn't a problem. Biggest thing to watch out for is just inside the entrance it shallows and can break in even moderate weather.
Looking at the forecast there was a 25 knot Northerly for the next couple of days. I decided to leave the boat at Port Stephens before moving North in the next few weeks. I called ahead the marina and was allocated a berth. Great facilities and good for any sort of boat repairs such as Noaks marine. Once ashore we went to a local restaurant for Spicy Crab. Back to the boat and a big clean up and packing the bags.
at around 3pm we jumped in a taxi for our trip back to Newcastle to fly back home. As we arrived back in Melbourne later that night i was already starting to think about the next leg.
