Coff's Harbour (again)

[Kyle]At first light, we went zinging out of the Lake Macquarie entrance right behind a bigger catamaran that had just come through the bridge. I suspected they would be getting smaller and smaller as our morning progressed. The occupants had the curious habit of returning a friendly wave with a country cow stare. We tried over and over again, just in case they hadn't seen us, but always with the same result - no smile (maybe they were having boat issues). It was like being in Wales again.

We left Lake Macquarie in calm conditions, and were soon crossing paths with the military ship HMAS Brisbane

The other sailboat stayed ahead of us until we got our sails up. Then we held our own for a while before finally overtaking them in earnest. We had good winds for going fast – twenty knots from our port quarter, but then so did they. We had expected to be facing a pretty big adverse current going up the coast, but it was the other way around. Perhaps they had found it and we were lucky enough to be in a favorable back eddy. It was fun getting to see Begonia kick up her heels a bit and break into a gallop. By the time they turned into Port Stephens in the afternoon, we were already thirty miles ahead of them.

Our speed continued through the night. Maryanne and I each saw occasional speeds of fifteen knots, with plenty of time in the double digits, particularly when added to the current. That was good. The wind was really supposed to drop off late the next morning, so it was good to eat up the miles before that happened. We then got even luckier when the decrease arrived three hours late. By then we were running so early that we were both having fantasies about arriving a whole day before we had originally expected.

Sunset at sea, and dolphins joined us again the following day off shore
Both making for a lovely passage

It was when we were about even with Forster that the party ended. We found the south-going current in which we were supposed to have been sailing and the wind also started to simultaneously die off. Soon, we were making only two or three knots over the bottom and it was really looking like we wouldn't finish covering the last twenty miles to Coff's Harbour until midnight. As soon as the wind hit the top of the range for the spinnaker, up it went. That brought our ETA back into the maybe-just-when-it-gets-really-dark range.

Twenty minutes later, there wasn't even enough wind to hold the sail up. That would have been a little disheartening in itself, but there was still a big swell, so rather than hanging limp, the spinnaker filled and backed and wrapped itself around anything it could touch. I tried my hardest, I really did, to be patient and wait for the wind's return, but after another half an hour of that, I just couldn't take it anymore and brought the thing back down.

Now things were much more peaceful, but we also weren't moving. The wind was supposed to return after dark. Then it would take us another four hours or so to get there. That is, of course, if the increase wasn't also three hours late also. Then there was the other secret Dark option. I locked the little rubber button in a stare for a long while, while I considered the alternatives of arriving at three a.m. or getting there for sunset and then both being able to sleep through the whole night.

Nope! I won't do it! Begonia is a wind-powered boat after all. We had already planned to be at sea for a second night anyway, which is nothing for us. These things happen sometimes, you know. It's no big...what the hell? My right thumb seemed to be ignoring me and was mashing down on the start button for the port engine. Damn thumb! Well, since it's already running...

We did make it into Coff's Harbour almost exactly as the sun set. Then the wind picked up. With it came a really big swell that crashed into both breakwaters and then still filled the anchorage with meter and a half swell that required us to hold on as if we were still at sea. At least we could both go off watch at the same time.

The new wind was propelling a strong cold front, which replaced the somewhat chilly air with really cold air. Between that, the idea of dealing with the breakers in the dinghy and our general need for time online to deal with boatyard prep, we soon found ourselves running out of time before the next cold front arrived and it was already time to be going again.

{Maryanne: It's a tough to visit a place and not get ashore, but thankfully we'd been to Coff's Harbour before - back in 2019, so it wasn't as crushing as it could have been.}