The Steamtug Blog

Well the past 2 weeks of life at sea, ended with an adventure like an episode from “Boys Own” annual. With all my crew either back at work or school, I ventured off single handed for the last leg of my jouney visiting places like South Channel Fort, finally ending in Rye.

The South Channel Fort was built in 1880’s as part of the defense strategy to protect Port Phillip against an attack from the Russian’s who were rumoured to be coming. The pier there was rebuilt as part of the museum strategy and I have wanted to visit here for the past 7 years but always had excuses like, nobody was available to come that day, or the weather was too rough, etc. So without the complication of a crew, not caring how rough it was, and the fact I was already down that end of the bay (as I had been staying at St Leonards pier for the past few days) I slipped out of the harbour early in the morning, into the moderate South Easterly winds that have plagued us this summer for the 2 hour trip to conquor another one of my goals.

The enterance to the island is shown on the charts as being surrounded by a big sand bar with entry only available by going in past the fort, turning back to enter from the North West. I had been planning this for years, pouring over charts and studying the enterance in preparation for this day. But when I finally got there the situation was completely different. I was fortunate that Jeff Wilson got the computer program I had which shows the marine charts for the whole world working with my GPS so that I could plot exactly where I was. So with confidence, I entered the deep water channel on the way in only to find that were the chart said there was 5 metres of water actually turned out to be 1 metre!  So after several U-turns I eventually worked my way through all these shallows towards the fort’s jetty only to be blocked again by shallow water. I figured this must be the way in even if it does look shallow. I carefully worked forward with my depth alarm going crazy, but was encouraged by the site of a deep water channel about 30 metres wide just ahead and around the jetty. So, I closed my eyes and edged forward. Well I nearly made it… but felt poor old Adaqua start bumping the bottom. I had no choice but gun it to full throttle and with a few more bumps made it to the jetty!!! Now how do I get out of here????

I tied up and went ashore and had a good look around. It was fascinating! I can’t wait to bring my mates here to see it and have a long good look; and maybe a BBQ with the best views in the bay. But I was concerned about the falling tide and how I would get out, so kept my visit short. From the jetty, it looks like deep water in a straigh line back to the main shipping channel, but that would be too easy, and the charts told me there was very shallow water on this route. Well… they were wrong before, so I headed straight back out the short way, and found 7 metres of water all the way!!! Somebody should update the charts I think.

I then cruised further from home, down the Rye channel which is a natural 5 metre trench through the shallows which leads down to a popular beach resort at Rye. When I worked as engineer on the old tugboat many years ago, we spent the whole of January here every year taking tourists out to see the seals on the South Channel pile light. It’s a large house in the water with the channel marking light on top. It was manned by a lighthouse keeper in the old days. Now it is not used but is home to a large group of Australian fur seals. I cruised over to see only 2 seals sleeping, not like the dozen or more that used to be there.

Next stop was Rye were I went ashore for “fish and chips” and slept the night before the 6 hour trip home today. It will be good to sleep in a bed that is not rocking!!!

For more information see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Channel_Fort