Across the Bight

Destinations: Great Australian Bight

Roger McMillan ventures across one of Australia's most demanding stretches of water - the Great Australian Bight.

Joshua Slocum, the first person to circumnavigate the world single-handed, chose to avoid it. Yachting author Jeff Toghill described it as the most unpleasant stretch of coastal water in the world. And Jessica Watson experienced some of the worst seas of her whole round-world journey there.

But if you want to circumnavigate Australia or simply deliver a boat between the southeast and southwest seaboards, you have no option. You must cross the Great Australian Bight.

It will be an experience. It’s unlikely it will be a totally pleasant one, although some days will be magic. But with a good boat, the right preparation and a solid navigation plan, there is really no need to fear it.

The three key aspects are the time of year, the route and the preparation.

Pick your crossing time

The Bight’s weather patterns are dictated by a series of anticyclones (highs). In winter the highs are located in the interior of the continent and a series of lows and cold fronts pass below them, bringing mostly westerly winds to the key area. In summer the highs move south to around the 38th parallel, bringing predominantly southeasterly winds with only the occasional cold front producing a day or two of westerlies.

This means summer (from late October until mid-April) is the best time to cross from east to west. Going the other way, the best times are late September until late October, or early April until mid-May. You can cross from west to east at any time during winter. Just don’t ask me to go with you.

The bottom line with the weather is that no matter when you choose to go, you’re unlikely to get four to five days of ideal winds. Over a distance of 500 miles and in such a volatile environment, in this time frame you’re sure to get at least a few hours with no wind and at least a day or so of too much wind. You take the good with the bad.

Plan your route

A friend who has circumnavigated Australia says he and his wife spent only 14 days sailing at night. The rest of the time they could “day hop” — sail by day and anchor at night. Five of those 14 days were spent crossing the Bight.

If you’re short on time or just doing a delivery, you may want to race from, say, Portland in Victoria straight through to Albany in WA. If so, you’ll probably spend more than five days at sea and you’ll miss some magnificent cruising grounds along the way.

Racing boats from WA heading for the Rolex Sydney-Hobart traditionally hook to the deep south on the way over to pick up the westerlies that always exist below the highs, even in summer. For most cruising folk with standard marine insurance policies, that’s not an option. If you look in the fine print you’ll probably find you are covered for coastal waters up to 200nm from the Australian coast. In the Bight, that means you have to pass above 35 degrees south latitude at 130 degrees east longitude. And 35 degrees south is close to the rhumb line between Albany and Port Lincoln.

The shortest route

The shortest practical non-stop passage you can make is from Ceduna in SA to Middle Island in the Recherche Archipelago. That’s a journey of just over 500 miles, which means a cruising boat averaging 120 miles a day can do it in four days. It also means you will experience the wonderful hospitality of Port Lincoln and Esperance, and the stunning coastal cliffs of SA’s west coast and the amazing white sand beaches and rugged islands of the Recherche Archipelago.

Port Lincoln

Heading west, Port Lincoln is the obvious base for final preparation. It has a well equipped marina, good chandleries and an extremely hospitable yacht club. If you’re in no hurry, I’d recommend at least a week in Port Lincoln getting the boat ready for the big crossing.

The marina is commercially owned. Phone Malcolm on 0429 885 265 to book a berth or tie up at the visitors’ berth next to the main channel. Showers can be had at the gym for $3, there’s a tavern on site but the laundry, supermarkets and yacht club are in town, about 5km away. An alternative is to anchor opposite the yacht club (right in the town centre) and ask permission to use the showers there. Phone (08) 8682 3442 and you’ll be sure of a warm welcome and good local advice.

Whichever way you’re headed, though, take the time to day-hop up (or down) the west coast. The best guide I’ve discovered is A Cruising Guide to the Historic West Coast by Graham Scarce (ISBN 0 9589703 5 1). This was written in 1988 but it not only gives still accurate and detailed information on entering ports such as Coffin Bay, Venus Bay, Streaky Bay and Ceduna, but it also has some interesting historical notes and fishing information. These bays are all worth a visit and all contain at a minimum a general store, fuel outlet and liquor store for topping up supplies. Some chandlery is available at Ceduna and Streaky Bay but don’t count on them for more than common “bits and pieces”.

Tune to VHF Channel 81 for local weather forecasts.

Esperance — a cruiser’s gem

On the other side of the Bight, whatever you do, don’t by-pass Esperance. Like Port Lincoln, Esperance is a town of around 15,000 people that hasn’t forgotten its small town values. It’s a cruisers’ paradise in that the laundry, service station, supermarket and liquor stores are less than 500m from the yacht club marina. There’s an excellent coffee shop and restaurant less than 100m from the marina gate. And the hospitality at the Esperance Bay Yacht Club is second to none I’ve experienced anywhere in Australia. Aim to stop for at least a week.

Go to the club on Friday night for a meal and Saturday night for a drink after the day’s racing. If you can stay longer, do so. You’ll meet some real characters and you can take the time to visit some of the most stunning beaches in Australia. If you seem like “good people,” you’ll probably be offered the use of a vehicle to collect fuel or to visit the chandlery and any advice on local conditions will be happily provided.

The marina was built by yacht club members. It’s small and there are very few spare berths. However, at any given time there is usually a boat on the hard or away somewhere and the club will happily make a berth available for a ridiculously low fee that includes use of the showers. Call Susie at the club on (08) 9071 3323 at least a week before you are due to see if you can be fitted in. If not, the anchorage in front of the yacht club is well protected from all but the fiercest of winds and the holding is good once your anchor is dug in (see below). If you’re anchoring, the club will be happy for you to use the facilities at no charge.

There is also a commercial marina at Bandy Creek but it’s 10km from town, berths are limited and access at low tide is only about 2m. I’d opt for the yacht club every time.

There is often debate about whether to enter (or exit) Esperance via the archipelago or via the open sea. While a night time entry through more than 100 islands and 1000 rocks and islets may be daunting, there are two good reasons to use the archipelago route. The first is that you will see some of the most amazing beaches in the world. If you are going to use Middle Island as your first landfall coming west or your last landfall going east, you can anchor at such delightful spots as Duke of Orleans Bay, Lucky Bay and New Island Bay along the way.

Lucky Bay has officially been declared to have the whitest sand in Australia. The rocks, islands and coastline of the whole archipelago are made of granite which provides the super fine and super white sand that abounds. Tourist operators are often accused of “photo-shopping” photographs to produce the deep blue and indigo water colours. I can assure you no doctoring is necessary — when anchored at Esperance Bay, walk over the hill to Blue Haven or cycle out to Twilight Beach (recently voted Australia’s most beautiful beach) and you’ll see what I mean.

The second reason to enter via the archipelago is that in strong winds (which are usual rather than uncommon in the area, even in summer) the archipelago will give you some protection. Two yachts which arrived in Esperance on the same day last year bore this out. Of similar size and crewed by two men each, they were hit with 30 to 40-knot southeasterlies on their last night before making port. The two who took the inside route were shaken but no damage was done. The two who were standing out to sea were flattened and spent most of their first day in port making repairs.

In my journeys around the archipelago, which included trips to Cape Le Grande, New Island Bay, Lucky Bay, Victoria Harbour and Middle Island, I found my Raymarine chartplotter to be very accurate — all islands, rocks and reefs were within a few metres of where the plotter said they would be. The other point of note is that most islands and rocks go straight down, with deep water all around them — on the rare occasion when there are offshore rocks or reefs, they are marked on the chart.

When entering Esperance, you can contact Sea Rescue on VHF channel 22 or use the yacht club working channel, which is 72. You will also get weather forecasts three times a day on this channel. For the best cruising notes and anchoring guides to the archipelago and the rest of WA waters, buy a copy of the Western Australian Cruising Guide available from the Fremantle Sailing Club.

The right gear

Whatever you do, don’t take a crossing lightly. This stretch of water is every bit as mean as the Bass Strait, which means the safety gear prescribed for a Rolex Sydney-Hobart is a good place to start. Yachting Australia’s Blue Book has the Category One regulations and they should be the minimum requirement.

Obvious precautions include jackstays and safety harnesses which should be worn at all times, an in-date liferaft, spare water container (a catamaran which crossed recently split its water tanks and lost all its fresh water), adequate and in-date flares and EPIRB in a grab-bag, a good first aid kit (you will be tossed around the boat and sustain at least minor cuts and bruises when the inevitable big blow hits), tools and spare parts, plenty of torches and spare batteries, and an emergency tiller.

You should also consider a parachute anchor, if you don’t already have one. On a recent crossing my crew member became very seasick when we were hit with an unforecast northeasterly gale exactly half-way across. I wasn’t feeling too flash myself and the prospect of being on watch unrelieved all night was most unappealing. We had rigged the para-anchor prior to leaving Middle Island, so the sensible thing was to deploy it and get a good night’s rest. We awoke the next morning in much better shape.

A final word on gear. You will need either a Marsh or admiralty anchor. In Port Lincoln the Marsh anchor is very popular, while around Esperance the admiralty predominates. The sand around Esperance is very fine, which makes the bottom rock hard.

Two’s company, three’s better

On the subject of crew, if you usually sail as a couple consider an extra crew member for the crossing. With just two people doing three or four-hour watches each, you will be exhausted by the fourth day. A third person gives you the luxury of a decent break.

Provided you are in a sound, well prepared boat with an experienced crew you should be able to handle the conditions and reach the other side in good shape.