water depth at Taplin park boat ramp Five dock bay

Go in on a late rising tide with the depth sounder on. If you stop it is too shallow.

There's a dark blue-hulled schooner in the Bay called Harmony. The owner told me that he had been up to the end of the wharf at high tide. He must draw 5 feet, surely. I never tried because I wasn't confident enough then. These days I'd do what MB said rather than lugging everything out by dinghy.

Hi HG

If you look in the how to section of their website there is a lot of interesting stuff that might be if some use to you

Regards Don

If you are planning it for this Sunday, l could give you a hand...?

Select to expand quote

DrRog said..

How co-incidental, the chap from Harmony is the previous owner of our Top Hat. A really nice chap from Croatia who really wants to travel intstead of work. When I first saw Harmony, she was a hulk with a motor and rails, not much else. Glad it's now finished and they can head off on their big adventure. Seems like the website hasn't been updated for a bit.

Oh right. Well, I'd reckon your Top Hat would have been in good order after he'd owned it. Gordon has high standards and has done Harmony up really nicely. We went aboard for a cup of tea when they'd basically finished it. Gordon and Myra were ready to go cruising but they decided to 4wd around Australia first. So they did that, taking their time. By the time they finished that trip one of their kids in the UK had twins so they went over to live there for a while to help. Harmony is still floating there, ready to go.

Well, yes end no, he had good ideas, and had originally planned to take the Top Hat cruising up and over the top, but his kids got bigger and there was no real room for them. Time got away from him I guess. His ideas on storage etc were good, but I just rebuilt the companionway steps because they were made of pine. As was the hatchway framework, that holds the perspex doors, which rotted out. I don't know whether that was his work or not, but it was pretty rough. I have since rebuilt it in teak as its exposed to the elements. The original ice box was removed and a food box was put in place with a chart table above it. Again, a good idea, but now there is no cold storage. The outboard was put on the transom on a lifting bracket, but wasn't re-inforced, so almost busted the transom. It was put on the transom because he purchased a motor too big to fit in the well. I think Gordon learned a lot from trying to re-fit our boat for his needs, but in the end gave up and bought Harmony, which was a much better choice for what he wanted to do.

We've had our Top Hat now for five years and she's been up and down between Lake Mac and Sydney a couple of times, and whilst i have every faith in her, weve not ventured any further afield yet.

I really hope Gordon and Myra are finally going to get going on their journey, seeing as how it's been so long in the making.