Island Life in Moteron Bay

Missing out on having a few days to chill-out immediately after leaving The Boatworks was remedied by a very pleasant stop-over opposite Lucas's Passage in Moreton Bay. By absolute luck we had followed Blue Tango to a very pleasant and sheltered anchorage on the north side of Karragarra Island. We had opportunity to visit 3 islands and 3 coffee shops but in the end only visited 2. Evidently each island has its own community and demographic.  In any instance, their populations are large enough to warrant very regular car and passenger ferries. Although it was suggested that this traffic might make the anchorage unpleasant, we found it no more disturbing than the fishing and other powered craft that zoomed past us in The Broadwater and associated channels further south.

  

Ferry terminals at Macleay and Lamb Islands

 

 

 The general area

 We counted 4 Real Estate offices plus a 'used car' yard 

full of abused rather than pre-loved numbers.

 

 Plenty of vessel movements involving passengers and freight

It's apparent that there is a substantial infrastructure overhead involved with maintaining these island communities. In addition to the ferries and associated ramps and jetties, community centres and so forth, there are the logistics surrounding the maintenance of law and order. We observed a police mooring being visited by a little maintenance barge during the day and being serviced and later in the afternoon the police arrived, at speed, in their custom built vessel carrying a paddy wagon. The ramp had been lowered even before they'd reached the shore and the wagon tore off with the lights flashing. The Police vessel then visited each of the other islands and seemed to be exchanging staff. If our coffee visits ashore were anything to go by, there were definitely some folks on the islands that are hoping to stay well 'below the radar'!

The highlight of our stay was uniting on the water with our friend George. He happened to be in a nearby anchorage aboard his lovely Nordhavn called Venture. We were invited for dinner and he motored around to meet us in his home waters. It's probably 2012 since our two boats were last in the same anchorage and it was Thompsons Bay, Rottnest Island!

 

MV Venture. 

A simply gorgeous 'little ship' belonging to George.

A busy bay settling down for the night