Pumicestone passage

[mjrandom Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close mjrandom]

If trip reports don’t have to be Prado trips or 4wd trips (eventhough the kayaks travelled to and from home on the roof of the 120!) thought I would post about our little kayaking trip down Pumicestone Passage on the lee side of Bribie Island last weekend.



The next bit comes straight out of the tourist information sheets.

Pumicestone Passage is a narrow, shallow estuary with a meandering system of channels, sand banks and islands between Bribie Island and the mainland extending from Caloundra in the north to Deception Bay in the south.

It is 35 kilometres long and has a surface area of 63sq kilometres. The passage contains a marine park which has 24 islands and is bounded by 240 kilometres of shoreline.

The passage is recognised locally, nationally and internationally for its significant environmental values.
Habitats within and adjoining the passage include:

* mangroves and salt marshes
* sand flats and mud flats
* Coastal dunes
* Sea grass meadows

Many aquatic and terrestrial species inhabit one or a number of these communities including significant species like turtles, dugongs and migratory birds.

We set off North of Coochin Creek (to the South of Caloundra) at dead low tide and paddled to Mission Point where we camped overnight. Mission Point is only accessible by water so we had to pack everything we needed, tents, food, cooking gear etc on the kayaks.



All up our journey was about 25km plus about 5km of side-tracked paddlings here and there.

Mission Point was a great place to camp for the night and would be a pleasant spot to base more exploration from. Took #2 son’s D40 with us for photographs but it didn’t have an SD card (oops, I never take the cards out of my camera so didn’t expect it to be missing ) so the few pics I have are from various sources including phones.

[mjrandom Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close mjrandom]

The paddle was very pleasant with a lot of wildlife around the place. The marine park prohibits fishing and crabbing so it tends to be very quiet through that pass.

The whole way down the passage is overlooked by the Glasshouse mountains which provide a very picturesque backdrop to the trip. Did I mention we forgot the SD card?

We tried fishing at a few (legal) spots along the way but apart from a few nibbles nothing was caught, probably something to do with fishing with soft plastics, I am not much of a fisherman under ideal circumstances and soft plastics just reduce my success rate from not much to no chance. Most of the boats we passed along the way were fishing and all claimed success! What a surprise!

I did not do any investigation into the trip (not the trip planner) and just went along so I was quite surprised at the number of sandbanks and shoals. The passage is hundreds of metres (up to 2 or 3km I believe) wide in places yet the channel is quite narrow and twisty. We opted to portage a couple of times, maybe 50m all up, in lieu of backtracking and paddling further. Not a big deal in a kayaks but certainly you would want to keep your eyes peeled in a faster boat.







I think we need to plan another run, this time from South to North to avoid the confluence of tides a few km North of Mission Point which meant we paddled the last 4km to the camp against the tide. Maybe a whole day at Mission Point to explore a bit more, do a bit of fishing and see if Donnybrook has a pub!

Then North on the right tide to Caloundra.

Michael

PS: there are a few phone pics to come so if I get better shots I will add some in, hopefully there are a couple from our lunch stop.

[AJ120 Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close AJ120]

Sounds like a nice place for a paddle. My poor kayak has been collecting dust for far too long, I must get it out when the weather gets a bit warmer.

Cheers Andrew

[Richoson Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close Richoson]

I grew up at Caloundra and spent hundreds if not thousands of weekends on "the Passage". When I was young there we used to put wire crab pots in the mangroves and not only catch mud crabs the width of a teenagers shoulders but bream at 1 kg would swim in the pots and couldn't get out.

Oh to be 40 years younger than I now

See ya on the tracks, Richo.

[rhs58 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close rhs58]

Hmmmm..... PP kayaking day or weekend in the Pumicestone Passage sounds a good opportunity....