Blue skies and the promise of a warm, delightful 24 degree day made the idea of a coastal drive seem very pleasant. We had plans to look into slipping the yacht at the Ulladulla slipway so decided this would be the day to go chat with the operator and check out the feasibility of our plans.

As we drove up the Princes Highway for the half an hour it took we laughed about how, when we sail up it will take most of the day! Ah but when we sail we will be taking the very scenic route!

We pulled into the harbour area and sat for a while looking at the other yachts moored there and the fishing boats tied up to the wharf. What is this delight in boating we have found? I have been to Ulladulla so many times in the past, holidaying with the children at Mollymook, our favourite NSW coastal destination, but never before have I noticed yachts in the harbour! I know they must have been there, but boating never grabbed me before and I truly never even noticed them! Peter on the other hand used to stop at Ulladulla on his way from the Blue Mountains to the far NSW South Coast for family holidays as a boy and has vivid memories of stopping and looking at the boats in the harbour. For him boats and yachts have always been on his radar! Always been present.

It was a delight to meet Paul, the operator of the slipway, whose old-school no nonsense approach to boating resonated with all that we have learned since beginning this adventure. He was impressed with us as soon as we met him, that we had got past his dog without incident! That apparently marked us as good people and to be liked! When we started talking about Argos and our journey from West Australia it soon became apparent that this was a man who was no fan of weekend sailors, of the armchair variety! Satisfied that we relied on sight and the kinds of sound practices that kept sailors of old safe on the oceans and that we were not the sorts that just depended on wiz-bang electronic gadgetry, he was happy to talk with us about what we needed and very happy to fit us in whenever we were ready to slip.
We have only a couple of jobs to do, repacking the stuffing box and repairing the rudder after the self-steering ripped a chunk off it in the bight. We might need to anti-foul but that depends on when we get slipped. The stuffing box, I now understand is where the prop shaft enters the hull. Ours needs some small adjusting that can’t be achieved while we are in the water. These are small jobs and it seems a shame that we have to go all the way to Ulladulla to be able to get them done, and it is most likely that we will wait until we are ready to leave Batemans Bay before going, so that we don’t have to go up and back, but we are too big for the slipway here to handle, and at least we can enjoy some time in Ulladulla revisiting all our old haunts!

It was great to spend a little while in the harbour, looking at where we will tie up, getting a bit of a feel for the place. We drove then up to a caravan park on the headland where we might stay while the boat is being slipped – having learned when we slipped the boat in Albany that staying on board can be a little tricky!

After checking everything out we headed up to Mollymook beach and had some lunch at the kiosk overlooking the main beach. With the horizon before us, we sat soaking up the sun and the view for some time without speaking. You don’t get a strong view of the horizon in Batemans Bay, being further down the river it’s not so in your face.

The sea pulls us, teases us sometimes with its lure. The magic of the way the sunlight glistens and sparkles and the sheer vastness of it – it will always be this for us, I know. It’s a connection that is timeless and although our experience of the sea is different, we both have that sense of longing to be out there.

Just making the plan to slip the boat when we leave Batemans Bay has been enough for us today – enough to remind us of the journey we have been on, are on, and will continue to be on, even though there is no sailing at present! It has been enough to remind us. Enough to keep us going – for today anyway!