We had an easy start and headed off late morning across southern Moreton Bay to Peel Island. The East South East breeze was fresh and blowing into our planned anchorage however we expected it to drop later and overnight. Peel Island is a low wooded, mangrove type island – much like most of the Moreton Bay area we have seen so far - and has an interesting history of former leper colony (they found that the leprosy here wasn’t contagious years later!) and as a quarantine station for migrants in early times.
The water cleared to blue from the murky shallow brown near the coast as we neared the island and it’s quite a nice anchorage – it has a long white sandy beach which didn’t really look appealing in the cloudy windy conditions - but the wind dropped on cue, the sea calmed, dolphins appeared around the boat, I think there was a dugong too, and also a few turtles. The cloud made for a great sunset which we enjoyed as we settled in and planned out the trip down the inland passage to the Gold Coast.
The trip to the Gold Coast this way involves lots of navigational markers, shallow passages, shoals, concentration and forward looking – all so we don’t get stuck high and dry. Neil (‘Billabong’) went through the other week and also gave us some information on the trickier bits. So we left at 6am to get the late morning high tide for the shoals - it was perfectly calm, the water glassy, the sun shining –a beautiful start to the day. We quickly slipped into a routine – nice talk for me double checking the Skipper’s direction using coordinates and markers from the map, while he relied on the GPS and eyesight... It was interesting to go this way past some of the southern Brisbane suburbs and then into the remote mangrove lined, mud bank labyrinth of waterways. Not my cup of tea – give me clear water and white rolling surf – Skipper can appreciate the crabbing and fishing opportunities for locals but suggests it resembles ‘Deliverance’ country.
We made it past the ‘ Kagarra W’s’ to the overhead powerlines and you had to shut your mind and say we will make it (and others have) – the powerlines are 23m high across the waterway (another reference book says its 20.2 m....)and our mast is 18m or so. A big optical illusion from the boat deck though suggesting you have no chance of clearing them! We meandered through the channels past Steiglitz, Jacob’s Well and the shoals – there are some really old boats moored around here and pretty casual living in places.....As Skipper said, deliverance redneck country, or maybe fisherman’s paradise.
The next turn was really sharp and caused some mild panic – the navigation markers not lining up with any charts – a red one missing(??) and looked very very shallow. So we decided to go up the other passage – the Canalpa Passage a small way and turn into Tippler’s Passage from the North for our overnight stop at Dux’s Anchorage. No problems getting here and we arrived around 12.30pm finding a good spot with 2.4m below the keel at high tide - tidal range here is only about 1.3m so all good. We went ashore walking through the closed Southport Yacht Club Annex to the beach which was wild, windblown and stunning- the only problem was that there were a lot of seabirds dead on the beach, sea eagles feeding on some. Skipper later put out the crab pots figuring there must be a few crabs around – we had been dodging crab pot floats set in the channels all day long.
Again the wind dropped and it was very calm and peaceful night – nice sunset, good night’s rest.
This morning the mosquitoes got me up at 4.30am – it was so light and I still have no idea why Queenslanders continue to resist daylight saving!. The stillness and sun rising later made for a wonderful sight – and Skipper rose early too to share it. Then by 6 am he was proudly showing off his crab pot findings – 6 in total but 3 not legal ones went back. After breakfast we went for a walk on shore to check out the buildings and ‘ resorts’ mentioned in books at Tipplers Passage. Basically good camping grounds and the Council doing up some of the buildings but there is no resort or shop or anything really.... It was so quiet but we were assured by two Maritime guys we met on the beach (only other people there...) that it does get busy during weekends and holidays. These guys maintain all the navigational markers in the Gold Coast waterways – boy they would have been handy to know yesterday (they removed that red mark that we were looking for yesterday about 12 months back). They gave us lots of information showing us the official Waterways charts and including advice to go to ‘Millionaires’ anchorage (‘North Bedroom in ‘Beacon to Beacon’ up near Jumpinpin Bar) – apparently crystal clear, very pretty and no depth issues – another time maybe.... we did need to keep moving while the tide was up and there were strong northerlies forecast for later. Skipper also discovered another crab in the pots – so dinner is set tonight!
The winds came as we made our way towards Gold Coast dodging almost all of the Gold Coast powerboat brigade heading up – well it is Friday afternoon – past the built up estates and huge canal homes. We arrived at Southport Yacht Club marina around 2 pm and after showers and cleaning up, the bar now beckons before our fresh crab dinner....