All Tied Up in Mandurah

We gave the folks at Mandurah Offshore Fishing and Sailing Club a call to let them know we were on our way in. Our night on the courtesy mooring at Doddies Beach was a bit bumpy when the wind and swell piped up and we were awake early. We had to wait for the rising tide to make sure we had enough water to get through the skinny parts of the channel and into the marina. As it turned out, we had nothing to worry about. We saw nothing less than 3.3m/11' beneath the keel on the way in. Greg came out to meet us in the club tender and directed us to our berth. Tim, the GM of the club facility, was on the dock waiting to catch our lines and invited us to the office whenever we were ready for a tour. Our first impression was “Wow, what an hospitable club.”  

We'd been in touch with Tim since Albany. He'd asked us to stop by and give a talk to the club members and, quite honestly, we're pretty chuffed that he did. We love being able to share cruising stories, bits of information and answer questions, especially with folks who are so enthusiastic and interested. We'll report back how it goes.

It didn't take us long to get tied up and settled in.

Even a welcome swallow, balanced on a dock line, gave us a tweet “hello”.

The club is pretty posh. The clubhouse facilities are very large, beautiful and well-kept with a classy, spacious bar, restaurant/cafe, meeting rooms, showers (HOT and clean), a washer and dryer. Tim showed us around and pointed out the chandlery and haul-out facility just across the way. We have electric and water on the dock immediately beside the boat … that translates to using computers to our heart's content and being able to wash all the built-up salt off Cups. We left Crown Marina about three months ago, so this is a real treat for us.

Tim had been kind enough to let us use the club address to have some parts ordered and sent in advance. Little did he know he'd be getting 7-8 packages, but he had them all stacked up and ready for us. It's always a little like Christmas when we get packages in the mail … albeit, they're all boat parts. An aluminum daytank replacement, a Navionics chart card for Africa, a replacement Raymarine GPS and various other bits and pieces.

We need to hit the ground running with chores and repairs. We're only here a couple of weeks and then we need to be on the move again to keep with our early July departure schedule.