Several members of the Mordialloc Sailing club (MSC) have been planning for several months to sail around the bay commencing on 28th February through to Friday 6th March 2015.
To replicate the Sail Around The Bay (Port Phillip Bay) by club members Ken Venn and Graeme Moore in a Heavy Weight Sharpie (HWS) back on 28th February 1965 – making it exactly 50 years to the day.
We have been lucky enough to borrow an original HWS from Sydney that is approx. 60 years old. The HWS (20feet long) was an Olympic class back in the 1956 Olympics and together with a family class – the Mirror (10 feet long) sailed by a Father/Son combination, will be leaving the beach at MSC at 10:00 am after a 9:30 am information session and the ‘Ringing of the bell” by the said Ken Venn who is in his late 70s now, to start the event.
A support car and a club motor boat will be monitoring proceedings along the way with constant contact with the Coast Guard for safety reasons.
There will be radio contact every three hours between the boats and the Coast Guard.
The two boats will closely follow the shore line as it heads off from Mordialloc Sailing Club down passed Chelsea in a clockwise direction following the course set back in 1965 and depending on the wind conditions (both direction and speed), we are aiming to stopover at particular clubs during the 5 to 7 day event. These include Mornington Yacht Club, Sorrento Sailing Couta Boat Club, Portarlington Sailing Club, Royal Geelong Yacht Club, Werribee River and the Royal Victoria Yacht Club which will be our last stop before home.
We have emailed most clubs around the bay that we believe we may need to call on for their hospitality for a stopover (30 mins/1 hour) or overnight stays. All clubs have been very positive and most interested and willing to assist in any way they can. This has been most helpful in bringing this to fruition and without their assistance it would never have got off the ground.
Assistance includes boat storage, car parking, a place to sleep and amenities etc.
– Colin White
