Sunday dawned a beautiful autumn day, we made our way down the M5 easily in the light Sunday traffic and picked the bus up at the Barker street entrance promptly at 8:00 am and met Debbie Charlwood our organiser and excellent hostess. We were soon underway, Debbie kept us entertained with a guessing competition and a music competition where you had to name the song and artist with sweets for prizes, later we had Champagne and Orange juice with nibbles of cheese, biscuits, chips, nuts and grapes (yum) time quickly passed and we were at Wyong for morning tea and a comfort stop.
Lunchtime found us at the Inner light House Tea Rooms, a delightful spot with panoramic views of Nelsons Bay and the Pacific Ocean. I chose Creamy Chicken and Corn Crepes with Salad, Elva had Steak and kidney Vol Au Vents with Rice, of course we shared, both were delicious. After lunch we wandered down to the beach and mingled with the bathers basking in the warm autumn sun, we wandered along to the fish cleaning tables where the fishermen were cleaning the days catch, we were entertained by the antics of the Pelicans and Seagulls vying for the scraps, the bus picked us up and we drove to the marina.
We boarded our vessel the Imagine a sailing catamaran and were welcomed by the captain Yves (who had a delightful French accent). Imagine had net slung over the bow, Elva couldn’t resist climbing down into the net and basked there for over half an hour.We motored around Nelsons Bay and cruised along until Yves found some dolphins to watch, we weren’t disappointed with the Dolphins coming to within 3 metres of the stern of the boat. Time to come home and the crew hoisted the 630 square metres of sail and we sailed back to our mooring with a light North Easter pushing us along at about 4 knots.
The trip home was made much shorter with more nibbles and guessing competition.
In short a wonderful day was had by one and all.
Jim Sullivan