Feisty Flow on the Hawkesbury

May 02, 2021

Feisty Flow on the Hawkesbury

For our mooted adventure in the second week of school holidays, I'd floated by Mountain Dad the idea of a road trip. He considered it so briefly, I couldn't be sure he'd even paused to ponder. Floating forth on Feisty won the plan.

And really, what else should you be doing when the days are getting shorter and the nights cooler? You can feel a delicious crispness coming back to the air, but the days retain a warmth that allows for short sleeves or swimmers. We can gad about without the discomfort of summer's sweating humidity.

For this adventure, we took Feisty to the Hawkesbury River, putting in on the north of the system at a wave-dominated barrier estuary. That's fancy talk for a waterway whose only access is via a tight channel that is often swamped with crashing waves. We managed to get out of the channel in Feisty, gawping at the breaking waves just off starboard. Going into them, we reasoned, would be manageable (we were just clear of them). Trying to travel with them, could be dire. They were waves suited more to surfing than sailing.

Having passed that challenge with a sobering respect for the power of swell, we made what Shea will tell you was our "first ocean crossing." In reality it was simply crossing the mouth of the Hawkesbury River where it meets the Pacific Ocean; granted it was a very wide mouth that was open to the rolling swell of the ocean, but not really a crossing. Fortunately, it was a calm day and though we hoisted the sails, there was barely a breath of wind to fill them. Captain Dad might wryly observe that this is just how Mountain Mama likes it.

Our destination for this sail, or rather motor, was The Basin, a place I had sailed to frequently as a kid. It was just as beautiful as I remembered and we stayed two nights, a floating flea amongst a sea of mansions. The sheltered bay, though National Park, is in the north of Sydney and so, of the approximately one hundred moorings in there, only three were public. The rest were owned by yacht and motor boat clubs whose member vessels distinctly dwarfed our own. Sweet Feisty was smaller than many of the tenders of the other behemoths. Captain Dad, in usual nonchalant style, putt-putted his way in on Feisty and picked up a private mooring. For that night, we were honorary members of the Something Something Yacht Club. Albeit, on standby to move if a real member arrived to give us the gears.

Our time in the Basin was spent reading and swimming. Relaxing and eating. And dodging wildlife. The goanna's there are completely habituated to humans. One day, while having a picnic, one came galloping up to us in frightening charge. The kids and I scattered (I may have pushed them out of my way), and our Mountain Saviour continued to recline, calling out to us that, "they're more afraid of us! Look, you just have to shake something at them..." He violently brandished our picnic blanket at the beast, and it didn't stop coming for him. It was the most extraordinary thing, both for the scene of Shea startled into flight and for the fact of this wild creature not caring a jot for the threat of humans. It kind of felt like we were being attacked by a dinosaur (goannas are BIG and venomous). Captain Dad would like me to pass along to you that Goanna's, also known as Lace Monitors, are related to Komodo Dragons and this one was easily two metres long with HUGE claws.

No food was lost, but we continued our visit with a healthy respect for the wildlife.

After our few nights, we were due to head home. Back through the wave-dominated barrier estuary and to the waiting truck and boat trailer. That tight channel that we'd deftly navigated earlier, dodging the breaking waves, was manageable except in a southerly when waves can break suddenly and without warning right across the channel. You can guess the prevailing wind that blew us out of The Basin on our day of departure. We got halfway to the channel before changing our minds. With the wind feeling more than was forecast and visions of Feisty broaching on breaking waves, we changed course and headed upstream in the Hawkesbury River and found a boat ramp not far from a train station that allowed us to retrieve the truck and trailer. They were only parked a train ride, Uber trip and an hour drive away from where we ended up. A small price to pay, we reasoned, for a safe return.

We lived to sail another day.

We sailed from the channel at the top of the image (by Ettalong Beach), across Broken Bay to Coasters Retreat (aka The Basin) at the bottom left corner of the image.