Lady Musgrave Island advice

[pharaoh]

Hi,

I am looking at planning a trip out to Lady Musgrave island. My boat will handle a fair bit of bad weather but obviously I would like to avoid it if I can. I have a 23' hydrofield with twin 115hp motors. My questions are: are there better times of year to plan a trip? What sort of weather is considered "bad" up that way and at what point would you save yourself the drive up? I would want to camp over there and make a week of it.

I know this is like asking how long is a piece of string but, realistically how long can you expect the trip out to take? I can sit on 35 knots in good weather, but I could hardly expect that right? Just some other peoples experiences would be good.

[Noelm]

I suggest look in the meet and greet section, and look at the 2014 1770 thread, then plan a trip around September.....

[feral cat]

My experience in the past is don't ever plan to go up there, it'll blow its head clean off.
When the weathers good just go, it's much more enjoyable that way.
60km to musgrave roughly.

[FisHard]

Great place!
Look at early winter through to early summer as probably your best best. Bear in mind you have to book a spot if you're camping ON the island itself. A Google search will get you the website you need for that. You can store fuel in Jerry cans in the designated area onshore too, which is handy. There's only a composting toilet, not any sort of water supply.
It's 32 nm from Round Hill head to Musgrave, so like you say, it really depends on conditions as to how long that will take. I've had trips that take about an hour and another that was 3 hours of misery! There's a stack more info if you Google " camping lady Musgrave" or similar. Awesome place, great lagoon, well worth the effort to get to.

[Giffo65]

I was up there last September, I have a 570 Cruisecraft, our second trip out for the 10 days we were there, took about 2 1/2 hours, we woke the next morning to glass.The bigger boats we were with did the trip much easier though.

[stevemid]

From memory winter is a time of SE'ly trade winds over Lady Musgrave averaging 15-25 knots. This allows victorious Blues to sail north and steal sunshine and fish from cane toads. The gods generally allow the trades to ease somewhat around Oct Nov allowing the chosen people to motor home.

You will find days of calm any time of the year but you'd have to be poised to take advantage of these glassed out periods. So if you are planning ahead you'd have better odds, but no guarantees, after november 1.

Steve

[pharaoh]

What about my fuel consumption estimates. A 120km round trip in all my Moreton bay findings would require around 220L of fuel. Based on a 1/3 reserve rule, 330L should be fine? I don't plan on running around over there, mainly because I doubt I could carry the fuel. Just anchoring and enjoying the place.

[JulianDeMarchi]

That's half the fun there, traveling and finding new ground to fish. Maybe 400L would be a safer bet? As others have said you can bring the spare fuel over and store on island.

[FisHard]

What about my fuel consumption estimates. A 120km round trip in all my Moreton bay findings would require around 220L of fuel. Based on a 1/3 reserve rule, 330L should be fine? I don't plan on running around over there, mainly because I doubt I could carry the fuel. Just anchoring and enjoying the place.

Does your rig really use 220 l of fuel to cover 120 klms? That seems like a lot. I had 6.2m Seafarer with twin 115 2 strokes and it would have used between 120 and 180 l max for that distance.

[pharaoh]

Does your rig really use 220 l of fuel to cover 120 klms? That seems like a lot. I had 6.2m Seafarer with twin 115 2 strokes and it would have used between 120 and 180 l max for that distance.

Sure does chew through it. It is a heavy boat, around 2 ton (or so I have been told) & 7m, plus more hull in the water than a V hull. Motors are perfect height, got the trim sorted at optimal. The only thing left to do is pay for different props. 60km is the longest trip I have done, that took 110L but was pretty choppy one way.

The other thing is one engine is 1989 and the other is 2010 model. The old engine used 65L (Fuel flow meter) and the new one used 45L. So replacing the older one might save a lot.