Made it to Mooloolaba

17th Jun 2010

We departed Scarborough for Mooloolaba at a leisurely 09:45 as we had some things to do and needed to wait for the marina office to open. In any event, the pen we were in was showing zero depth under us at low tide when I first got up, so waiting was prudent.

Motoring across Morton bay in zero wind, I was surprised how shallow the entire bay is. In fact I needed to track a very specific course to avoid running aground and in some spots needed to be particularly careful as we crossed unavoidable shallows. This lasted almost all the way to Caloundra after which we stayed close to the main northern shipping channel as thre pic left shows. Arrival at Mooloolaba was straight forward from a purly technical point of view but made interesting due to the variety of traffic we encountered.

Just on entry, we had outbound fishing boats with nets deployed, runabouts and, to make it really interesting, an old block on a paddle board right in the middel of the entrance and about 15 young kids on surf borads not far away. All we could do was throttle back and see how it was all going to work without someone hitting, or running over, someone else. Of course, it sorted itself out in the end and finally slipped into our allocated berth almost like professionals! 

We plan to stay a few days and sort out some domestics but being here represents the completion of a significant stage of the trip as we are in Sunshine Coast. Next stop Wide Bay.