'Dad's Army' and the Battle of the Bar

31 May2010

Stayed in Camden Haven Sunday and today we set course for Port Macquarie. In order to catch the rising tide at Port (as everyone calls it), we left the dock at 07:00, also hoping for an early outgoing tide at Camden Haven. Due to the tidal lag however, we were still in incoming water and this contributed to an embarrassingly poor departure off the dock. None the less we got out in the open water to find a flat and still day that was not ‘sailing’ but was beautiful just the same.Under motor and with the main providing some lift, we made about 6 kts, arriving at the Port Macquarie bar at about 10:00.

With the conditions as they were , good, and the tide right, the bar should not have presented any problems however! As we ran in on the published inbound track we could not find the back lead. Distracted by the sailwork, it was not until Paul spoke that I became aware that things were 'not pretty'. Not dangerous due to the mild conditions but certainly not as things should be with steepening waves close to breaking, developing all around. We turned tail and headed back to open water to investigate.

Now prior to all of this I had asked VMR Port Mcq ( the local volunteer dad’s army) about the bar, to be told "no problems". Upon further enquiry after our turn around we were then advised that he approach had been changed!!!. Armed with the correct approach track this time we motored into the river. When I got time to call (by phone) to point out that I thought it poor from that we weren’t told in the first palce that he bar had shifted, the reply was “Oh every around here knows that”. When I also pointed out that we could not find the back lead, I was told in a similar tone that “Oh that’s was taken down a few months ago and hasn’t been replaced – anyway, you couldn’t see it when it was there as the Pine trees cover it”

Ahhhh!!!!!!.

With all that behind us we snugged into the local marina, a rustic but adequate place and will likely stay tomorrow as residual winds from the East Coast  low are likely all day.