I set off from the CBD at C̶i̶r̶c̶u̶l̶a̶r̶ ̶Q̶u̶a̶y̶ the Ferry Building.

The ferry set off across the water, C̶e̶n̶t̶r̶e̶p̶o̶i̶n̶t̶ ̶T̶o̶w̶e̶r̶ Sky Tower above the skyline.

The arch of the S̶y̶d̶n̶e̶y̶ ̶H̶a̶r̶b̶o̶u̶r̶ ̶B̶r̶i̶d̶g̶e̶ Auckland Harbour Bridge to one side.

Navy ships moored at the G̶a̶r̶d̶e̶n̶ ̶I̶s̶l̶a̶n̶d̶ Devonport Naval Base.

As we headed across S̶y̶d̶n̶e̶y̶ ̶H̶a̶r̶b̶o̶u̶r̶ Waitematā Harbour.

Before our arrival at the M̶a̶n̶l̶y̶ Devonport ferry pier.

There I realised I could catch a bus back to the city.

So I caught a local bus to the M̶a̶n̶l̶y̶ ̶V̶a̶l̶e̶ Akoranga busway station.

And jumped on a B̶-̶L̶i̶n̶e̶ Northern Busway double decker bus.

To the northern terminus of M̶o̶n̶a̶ ̶V̶a̶l̶e̶ Albany.

And then hopped on a bus headed back south towards the W̶a̶r̶r̶i̶n̶g̶a̶h̶ ̶F̶r̶e̶e̶w̶a̶y̶ Northern Motorway.

I found a separate set of lanes to one side, o̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶u̶s̶e̶d̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶r̶a̶m̶s̶ ‘cliped-on’ to the original bridge.

On the other side there was a tangle of exits from the W̶e̶s̶t̶e̶r̶n̶ ̶D̶i̶s̶t̶r̶i̶b̶u̶t̶o̶r̶ Auckland Northern Motorway.

And there it was – S̶y̶d̶n̶e̶y̶ ̶ Auckland!

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Trams

We start off with me being featured in The Age on the subject of a tram stop in Ascot Vale that kept being hit by motorists.

Also on the tram front, I spotted Victoria Police offices pulling over a motorist who drove through a tram stop on Swanston Street.

Meanwhile on Flemington Road I found buses driving along the tram tracks.

Route 59 trams terminating on Flemington Road due to the tram tracks along Mount Alexander Road in Travencore being replaced.

These works also isolated Essendon Depot where trams would park at night, so the route 55 tracks through Royal Park were converted into a temporary stabling location.

Which forced route 55 passengers onto replacement buses as well.

Trains

Regional Rail Link is an ongoing theme in this series, and in February 2014 the original tracks through Footscray towards Sunshine had been dug up.

With both V/Line and suburban trains diverted onto the new platform 1 and 2 to allow the new V/Line track pair to be constructed.

Privately owned automatic lockers were installed at the Swanston Street end of Melbourne Central station, only to be ripped out a few months later thanks to the ratcheting up of the national terrorism alert level.

But one thing that hasn’t changed is junk clogged up the entrance to Southern Cross Station – this month we had the ‘Exhibition of Lost Souls’ to promote the film ‘Wolf Creek 2’.

And a Victorian Government ‘use the Right Water’ promotion on the main concourse.

And something I haven’t seen for a few years – Metro Trains Melbourne at the Chinese New Year festival in Chinatown, giving away free balloons.

Down the pub

Remember the Savoy Tavern opposite Spencer Street Station?

The 1970s pub lay derelict for 15 years, until it reopened in 2014 after a minor refurbishment – only to close again in 2016 when the site was cleared to make way for the apartment tower that is currently on the site.

And a trip to Sydney

A friend invited me up to Sydney to visit, so I decided to turn it into a long weekend and spend the day on the train rather than fly. The XPT departed Southern Cross at 8.30am.

I jumped out for a quick photo at Albury.

Wagga Wagga.

Cootamundra.

And Goulburn.

Before we arrived into Sydney just on 8.30pm.

The next day I visited the usual touristy spots, like Circular Quay.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge.

And the Sydney Opera House.

Which was busy having the front steps replaced.

I can’t go anywhere without taking a photo of a train.

But I’m a fan of ferries as well – modern ones like the Sydney RiverCats.

And the classic Freshwater-class ferries on the Manly run.

I also headed past the since demolished Sydney Harbour Control Tower and the then-incomplete Barangaroo development.

My destination – Cockatoo Island.

A former shipyard.

Unfortunately I didn’t have another spare day to catch the train home to Melbourne, so I was off to Sydney Airport.

Sitting in a cheap seat with Jetstar.

Who luckily took me right over the top of the Craigieburn Train Maintenance Facility in Melbourne’s north.

Footnote

Here you can find the rest of my ‘photos from ten years ago‘ series.

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Melbourne is the mainland port of the ferry, with the ferry operating out of a terminal at Station Pier in Port Melbourne.

Loading of the Spirit of Tasmania for the overnight voyage starts in the afternoon, with dozens of semi-trailer loads of freight being loaded onboard the vessel.

The ferry arrives bow first into the berth, with vehicle access to the cargo decks via two sets of ramps – each at a different height.

Deck 5 on the upper level is loaded via a door in the forward deck.

Deck 3 on the lower level is loaded via a pair of doors in the bow, located just above the waterline.

Altogether there are five vehicle decks on the Spirit of Tasmania:

• Deck 1 and 2 are single ended, and are only accessible via a ramp at the front of deck 3.
• Deck 3 has the highest clearance and runs the length of the ship.
• Deck 4 doesn’t appear to exist.
• Deck 5 runs the length of the vessel, but has restricted clearances along the centre lanes.
• Deck 6 is a mezzanine level above deck 5.

Semi-trailers are the first to be loaded into the cargo hold.

Truck drivers drop off their trailers in the freight yard, with specialised ‘roro tractors’ being used to load them into the confined space of the cargo decks.

The passenger terminal is located next to the ferry, and is located over two levels.

Passengers bringing their cars along for the trip are required to pass a security inspection on arrival at Station Pier.

They are then sent to the far end of the pier to queue for boarding.

The stern of the Spirit of Tasmania has multiple loading ramps, which are used to unload the vessel at the Tasmanian end of the voyage.

As for passengers on foot,they much a much less salubrious entry to the ship – this austere looking doorway located just above the waterline near the stern.

Bonus footage

Some footage from YouTube.

First off, arriving at Station Pier in Melbourne and being loaded into deck 2, followed by driving off at the Devonport end.

And the view from the upper deck – being loaded onto deck 5 at the Melbourne end of the voyage:

And finally – dry docked in Sydney.

And another one

Turns out not all freight is loaded onto the Spirit of Tasmania by roro tractors – it appears that some owner-drivers take their own truck across the water to Tasmania, rather than just dropoff the trailer at the terminal.

So they can just drive off at the other end.

Further reading

• Checking in procedures at the Spirit of Tasmania website
• Loading the Queenscliff-Sorrento car ferry

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Founded in 1953 by local brothers Jack and Harry Farnsworth, the pair commenced operations with a 41 foot long converted cray boat named ‘M.V. Judith Ann’, transporting holiday makers between Sorrento the Mornington Peninsula with Queenscliff on the Bellarine Peninsula, with a stop being made at Portsea Pier in both directions. By 1955 the growing numbers of tourists saw them purchase a longer vessel – the 71 foot long ‘M.V. Komuta’ – and in the years that followed the fleet also grew in size.

In 1975 the operation was purchased by Sorrento businessman Warren Neale, and in 1984 he commissioned the largest ferry to operate on the service – the 80 foot long steel hulled ‘J.J. Farnsworth’. Able to carry a total of 300 passengers, there were two levels – the main deck, and a smaller deck hidden below the waterline, that had tiny portholes peeking above the waves.

The photo above shows ferry ‘J.J. Farnsworth’ – below is the slightly older timber hulled ‘M.V. Nepean’:

The commencement of the parallel car ferry service in 1987 took away passengers from the smaller passenger ferry, with it turning into a summer-only operation. Around the 1999/2000 period I travelled on the Sorrento – Portsea – Queenscliff ferry a handful of times, with only ‘J.J. Farnsworth’ in service and the Queenscliff berth having been moved to Queenscliff Harbour, next door to the car ferry terminal.

With the upgrade of the car ferry service to hourly each way in 2001, the passenger ferry went into further decline, with the last service operating in 2003. Today all that remains is a sign at Sorrento Pier, detailing the history of the the Sorrento – Portsea – Queenscliff ferry.

Another postcard

Here is an undated postcard featuring the timber bodied ferries ‘Nepean’ and ‘Hygeia’.

And another photo

Undated photo of ‘Hygeia’ alongside the Queenscliff Pier.

Weaver collection via Queenscliff & Point Lonsdale Days of Old on Facebook

Further reading

• Closer view of the sign above
• The ferries of Port Phillip by Mike Charles

Some photos from 1987

• Stern view of J.J. Farnsworth as she departs Sorrento
• M.V. Nepean arrives at Sorrento (note the incorrect caption)
• Packed rear deck of J.J. Farnsworth
• Loading a bike onto J.J. Farnsworth

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Built to the same basic design, each vessel has an opening door at the bow and a hinged ramp at the stern, allowing cars to drive straight through the ferry without needing to turn around inside the car deck. With the two ferries crossing each other in the middle of the bay mid-voyage, while one ferry is loading cars at Queenscliff the other one will be doing the same over at Sorrento.

On the eastbound voyage cars drive aboard the ferry at Queenscliff via the bow door and leave via the stern ramp at Sorrento, with the reverse applying for the westbound voyage. So lets start at the Bellarine Peninsula end.

Ferries approach Queenscliff Harbour at speed, only slowing when they reach the ferry terminal at the tip of Larkin Parade.

On arrival at Queenscliff the ferry makes a straight in approach to the berth, lining up the bow door with the concrete ramp along the wharf.

At the berth a number of concrete mooring dolphins are used keeping the ferry in place during loading and unloading operations: three on the port side along the breakwater, with a single dolphin at the bow on the starboard side.

Once the ferry is tied up, the bow door can be opened and the cars driven off by their drivers.

The next load of cars can then be loaded – but this time they face the stern of the ferry.

At departure time the ferry reverses out of the berth, with the captain swinging the stern end around towards Swan Island using the bow thrusters.

After the bow is clear of the breakwater, the captain can then engage the main propellers and head on towards Sorrento.

On arrival at Sorrento the captain slows some distance away from the pier, as a number of smaller boats use the nearby boat ramp.

By the time the ferry has passed the pier, the captain is using the controls on the starboard side of the wheelhouse, in order to get a better view of the berth.

The next step is to swing the ferry around, and reverse in: six concrete mooring dolphins surround the berth so it is a tight fit, with only a metre or two clearance along each side.

The reverse parking move is over once the ferry touches the rear set of dolphins, after which the mooring ropes are tied up and the stern ramp lowered, allowing the cars to be unloaded.

The next load of cars can then be driven aboard, facing the opposite direction to the cars that just departed.

When departure time comes it is a speedy getaway: up goes the stern ramp, and the ferry powers straight out of the berth, making a 90 degree turn and then heading back across the bay to Queenscliff.

It looks like it is home time for me as well!

Footnote

Loading the much larger Spirit of Tasmania ferry has always intrigued me – I’ll have to book a trip on it just to find out how they do it.

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Did this pilot land at the wrong airport? Qantas doesn’t serve Avalon Airport, only Jetstar.

This train belongs to Metro Trains, who operate the suburban railways of Melbourne. So what is it doing out in Ballarat where V/Line runs the show?

Car ferry ‘MV Queenscliff’ plys the waters between Queenscliff and Sorrento all day. So what is it doing berthed at Melbourne’s Docklands, a few hours away from her normal home?

In reality, none of the above planes, trains or ferries are lost, they are just away from their usual stomping grounds:

• Qantas uses Avalon Airport as a training base for their pilots, a location suited to the task because of the full length runway and the small number of commercial flights using it. Pilots usually spend a few hours at a time flying circuits and performing touch-and-go landings at the airport: my photo is back from 2010 and shows Boeing 737-400 rego VH-TJR.
• Melbourne’s new XTrapolis trains are being assembled in the railway workshops at Ballarat, where a new 6-car set rolls out of the factory about once every 4 weeks: my photo shows one of these delivery runs. The body shells for each train are built in Europe and shipped to the Port of Melbourne, then transported to Ballarat by road on the back of a low loader. Because the railways of Ballarat has no overhead wires, each completed unit has to be towed back to Melbourne behind a diesel locomotive before they can be tested under their own power, and if all the tests pass the train can then be placed into revenue service.
• Car ferry ‘MV Queenscliff’ was berthed at Melbourne Docklands for an open day held on September 25, 2011 to launch the new corporate image of Searoad Ferries, the operator of the Queenscliff-Sorrento car ferry. She was refitted at a dry dock in Tasmania over the past few months, and sailed back to Melbourne the day before the open day.

As for finding someone looking a bit lost, it appears I’ll have to try a lot harder to embarrass the professionals.

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Today marks the 24th anniversary of the first sailing of the service by Peninsula Searoad Transport, on the morning of September 19th, 1987. Today known as Searoad Ferries (they shortened their name in early 2011) the current pair of ferries carry over 110,000 cars and 600,000 passengers each year on the 40 minute, 5.6 nautical mile (10.3 kilometre) crossing of the bay, cutting the distance between the Bellarine and Mornington Peninsulas.

The ferry used in the early days of the service was the Peninsula Princess, a $2 million roll-on/roll-off vessel with a 35 car capacity built new for the company in Newcastle, NSW.

With this single ferry a 45 minute service could be provided between the peninsulas, with tight turnarounds during the summer sailing season allowing nine return trips to be made across the bay between the hours of 7am and 7.45pm. So how did the fares compare?

Back in 1987 the one way fare for a car was $25, with foot passengers charged $5. Looking at the current fares, a car is $54 with foot passengers charged $10. Given petrol has risen from 52 cents/litre in 1987 to around 130 cents/litre today, it isn’t that bad a deal!

As for the patronage on the ferry, over the next five years Peninsula Princess went on to make over 22,000 crossings of the bay, when continued growth required her replacement by a larger vessel.

This new vessel was the $5 million MV Queenscliff: she entered service in December 1993 and still operates today, albeit internally refurbished. With a much larger 80-car, 700 passenger capacity, the Queenscliff also had a much larger passenger saloon on the upper decks to cater for the increasing market of sightseers travelling without cars.

As well as a bigger ferry, improvements were also made to the ferry terminals at both wharves to cater for the larger number of passengers: the waiting room at Sorrento Pier opened in April 1992 with vehicle queuing area being expanded in 1995, while a transit lounge opened at Queenscliff in January 1990 and was expanded to the current size building and cafe in December 1993.

Over the next few years patronage continued to climb, so a sister ship to the Queenscliff was built. Named MV Sorrento and costing $12 million, she entered service in March 2001 and allowed an hourly ferry service to operate between Queenscliff and Sorrento. Whilst she is the same size as her older sister, the Sorrento received a more upmarket interior fitout for the enjoyment of passengers.

The deck configuration of the two ships is the same: three main decks and a car loading ramp at each end, berthing bow first at Queenscliff, and stern first at Sorrento. The bow doors are the most complex of the pair, with the lower portion dropping down to form the car ramp, while the upper half moves upwards to provide enough clearance for tall vehicles.

By comparison the stern ramp is simply lowered onto the concrete wharf.

The main car deck holds 56 cars, or a combination of 30 cars and 7 buses. Staircases to the upper levels are located at the bow and stern ends, as well as along the centreline.

A further 24 car spaces are provided by on the mezzanine deck, located above the main deck on the port side. Built in two separate sections and moved by hydraulic cylinders, the mezzanine deck is first lowered to enable cars to drive onto it (requiring the main deck beneath to be emptied first!) and then raised so the main deck below can also be loaded (the reverse applies to unload). Due to the time taken to operate the mechanism, the mezzanine is only used in peak periods when the extra capacity is needed.

Above the car decks is the enclosed passenger saloon with seats, toilets, and a small cafe. The front and rear of this deck also has open viewing areas.

Finally, the top deck has the wheelhouse and crew areas at the front, and an open sitting area to the rear.

Today MV Queenscliff and MV Sorrento continue to provide an hourly ferry service between the two peninsulas, with Queenscliff receiving an interior refit in 2011 to bring her up to the same standards of her younger sister. The new look will be launched at Melbourne Docklands on the weekend of September 24 and 25.

As for the older ferry Peninsula Princess, she occasionally stands in for either vessel when they visit dry dock during the winter off-season – but her story is one for another time…

Further reading

• Captain Jack: I’ll take the Searoad (Tony Murrell, Frankston Business Times, June 2010)
• Young skipper charts ferry service’s new course (Western Port News, April 12 2011)
• Searoad Ferries: corporate history
• Searoad Ferries: more information on the ferries themselves

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The ferry service to Raymond Island commenced in 1889, using a punt previously used at Bairnsdale to cross the river prior to the construction of the Mitchell River Bridge. In 1903 a larger punt was commissioned, with improvements made in the 1920s, but manpower was still needed to pull the ferry until 1956. A modern ferry took over on the service in 1969 – since retired from the run, it was refurbished and has been used as a floating restaurant in Lakes Entrance since 2003.

The current ferry entered service in January 1997, having been built by Crib Point Engineering at Hastings between March and December 1996 at a cost of $900,000. The level of service provided by the Raymond Island Ferry is intensive – it operates for over 15 hours each day, with an average of 125 trips made across the straight in that time.

The path across the water is surprising short when looked at from the air.

View Larger Map

The method of propulsion is very simple – a pair of submerged chains cross the water, running along the sea bed except where they pass through the ferry via guide wheels and drums, one either side of the vessel. The ferry is pulled against the chains by the two gypsy wheels, toothed drums which engage with the chain, being spun by hydraulic drive motors, powered by the onboard 2100HP diesel engine.

Cars drive straight onto and off the ferry, with folding ramps located at each end of the vessel, with the two ferry slips being simple concrete walls located beside the water. The journey takes around 5 minutes one way, including the time taken to align the ferry with the slip.

The vessel is 34.94 metres long, 10 metres wide: this allows 21 cars to be carried across three traffic lanes, as well as 50 passengers in the enclosed saloon. Car drivers and passengers stay inside their vehicle during the short trip.

Driving the ferry appears to be pretty simple: during the crossing both chains are used for haulage, on reaching the far end the rate of movement is slowed until the ferry makes contact with one of the fenders, with the remaining cable used to pull the ferry level with the berth to enable the car ramp to the lowered.

A control stand is located at both ends of the ferry, with the upper level walkway being restricted to the ferry operator. At deck level is the enclosed passenger saloon, and below deck is the engine room.

Unloading and loading the cars is a fast affair: the single ramp at each end is raised and lowered with hydraulic cylinder, and vehicle traffic is controlled by a set of traffic lights at either end.

Fare collection isn’t too involved, with gates or barriers are provided at the ferry slips – the queuing area at Paynesville is a simple line beside the road, on Raymond Island the queue forms along the main road because there is nowhere else to drive. There is also nothing stopping someone driving into the water if they are not looking where they are going!

Foot passengers and cyclists are carried free, while the majority of cars and trucks carried by the ferry hold season pass window stickers, which the ferry operator can inspect from the central walkway. Anyone without a pass can buy their ticket from the operator.

Further reading

• Ferry timetable
• Lots of facts and figures for the ferry
• Home page for the ferry – more about the construction of the current vessel, plenty of photos of the maintenance work to keep the service running, the history of the ferry service, and a whole lot more (the web design has a lot of “character”)

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