After our nine day stop in Port Stephens, it was a relief to be on the move again. We had good conditions for sailing, with a steady ten to fifteen knots of breeze, and so were able to sail for six out of the nine hours of passage time. Although we encountered some big swell and a few squalls passed over, both the seas and the weather calmed down when we rounded the point at Seal Rocks. The bar entrance at Forster-Tuncurry was deep and calm and we entered Cape Hawke Harbour without incident.
On the Tuncurry side of the river we tied up to a berth owned by the Wallis Lake Fisherman’s Co-op. These little berths, each with an individual jetty, are spread along the length of the river up to the bridge, and although no power or water are included, it allowed us easy access to shore without having to pull out the tender. Most convenient!
Matt was particularly happy about finally arriving in Forster-Tuncurry, as he had ordered his new hammock to be delivered to the Forster Post Office. (After much research and visiting many shops he was finally able to find one that was not made in China.) When we need to have something delivered, we get it sent to a post office further up the coast, but it is always a guessing game of when we will arrive and how long the delivery will take (very hard to predict at the moment with the increased pressure on the postal system).
Matt had received notifications estimating Friday as the day for delivery, however that eventually changed to Monday. By the time we arrived on Friday afternoon, the post office had closed, and wasn’t open on Saturday, so we would have had to wait until Monday anyway. This meant that we wouldn’t be leaving Forster-Tuncurry til at least Tuesday, and as it turned out, with gale force wind warnings and four to five metre swells predicted throughout the week, we didn’t actually leave until the following Friday. So once again our plan to ‘put the hammer down’ was scuttled, and we resigned ourselves to a week long stopover.
The weather was cold, cold, cold, even on days when the sun eventually came out for a bit. Our routine developed into spending slow mornings on the boat, often with a late breakfast of bacon and egg sangas cooked on the BBQ and a coffee run, before heading out for a walk or a cycle in the afternoon when it was a bit warmer.
We walked and cycled all around Tuncurry and Forster; up Coolongolook River, around Wallis Lake and along the beaches and coastline. We often spotted dolphins frolicking in the river and the bar entrance. Matt went spearfishing a few times and had some success at Seven Mile Beach, spearing a blackfish which we cooked up for dinner, adding it to our paella. One day I cycled up to Cape Hawke Lookout via a very steep road and then topped the afternoon off with a swim at the ocean pool in Forster. I was ok for the first ten minutes or so, after the initial face freeze, but it took hours for my fingers to completely thaw out afterwards.
On several evenings we ventured out for dinner, and found some fabulous places. The Good Grub Shack in Tuncurry had delicious burgers and over the bridge in Forster we stumbled across Cafe Toscano, a great Italian restaurant, managed by an Asian, that rivalled some of the best food we’d eaten in Italy. On an icy cold evening we discovered the deliciously warm and cosy Black Stump Steakhouse. Pubs were allowed to open again so Matt went and hung out with the locals. He met many familiar personalities, if not faces; there was a Sully and a Garbo, amongst many others he recognised.
We found Tuncurry and Forster to be very pretty and quite lovely little towns. Here are some of our favourite photos.
The passage to Port Macquarie also took nine hours, although this time we had the motor on for almost the entire trip. The sun was out but it was still chilly and we were both rugged up in our full sailing gear. The seas had settled but we still had some pretty big swell rolling through. That swell was still there when we approached the bar entrance at Port Macquarie, and we nervously watched waves breaking near the entrance. It was a bit scary for a few minutes, but Matt timed it perfectly and we made it through between sets. We both heaved a big sigh of relief when we were safely in the river!
We tied up to a courtesy mooring in the Hastings River, Matt put up his new hammock and we sat back and enjoyed the pretty sunset and watched as the full moon rose. I chatted to my friend Amanda, who was up here in Port Mac working as a locum surgeon. She was on a 96 hour shift, on-call for the entire long weekend, so we made some tentative plans to catch up over the next few days.
The following day we were up early and headed over to Main Beach so Matt could have a surf while I did some yoga on the beach. We walked up to the Lions Park Lookout where we had a bird’s eye view of the bar entrance and watched in fascination as some small fishing boats negotiated their way in while some pretty big waves and swell rolled through. Then we wandered back into town, reminiscing on the last time we were in Port Macquarie, which was for the Ironman in 2018. What very different circumstances we find ourselves in now!
Spotting the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood building, we spontaneously decided to see if we could donate. ‘Why not?’ we thought, ‘we’ve sure got plenty of time on our hands!’ We successfully booked in for a plasma donation later that day; the first donation for both of us. The ladies at Lifeblood were absolutely lovely and the whole process was pain and hassle free. I can’t believe I’ve never donated before now, and it’s definitely something we’ll try to do again whenever we can.
Luckily Amanda had a few hours free that afternoon so we took her and Adam over to the boat for a tour. Then we went back to their apartment, where I delighted in a long hot shower before we went out for dinner. It was so lovely to catch up with Amanda and to meet Adam. Amanda and I had met back in our triathlon days and hadn’t seen each other in years, so it was great to reconnect!
The next couple of days were pretty low key, it was very cold and we mostly stayed on the boat, doing a bit of cleaning and running the watermaker. We did go for a walk up the river and along some of the little canals. We bumped into Bruce from the boat ‘My Prime Time,’ an old sailor we’d first met in Jervis Bay. He is based here in Port Macquarie and gave us some tips on anchorages further up the coast. It’s always nice to get some local knowledge and insights.
After our four nights in Port Macquarie we were ready to head off to Coffs Harbour. We had an early farewell breakfast with Amanda and Adam, who were also travelling north, up to Byron Bay for a well earned week off.
The forecast was looking pretty good, so we planned to take two days and stop for a night at an open roadstead anchorage halfway. This did not at all go according to plan. The forecast was wrong, very very wrong. We encountered some of the most challenging conditions of the trip so far. But that’s a story for the next blog!
Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.
Arthur Ashe
Cool Change 