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ISLAND HOPPING OVER MORETON BAY BY PARAMOTOR

The Islands of Southern Moreton Bay

I launched out of a park at Redland Bay, into a north-easterly wind. I figured I wanted about 2000ft to make the first crossing to Coochiemudlo Island so I flew around the mainland coastline steadily gaining height. Up high the wind was slightly southerly and I realised the first crossing would have been easier if I had flown the other way along the coast. So I just gained more height and made the 2km crossing to the first island. From Coochiemudlo I crossed to Macleay Island, to Russel Island, then to North Stradbroke Island. I stayed high all the time as I didn't want to waste fuel making another climb for the 4km crossing over to Moreton Island.

The submerged scenery behind South Stradbroke Is.

The submerged scenery of outer Moreton Bay

Following the back side of North Stradbroke Island north was spectacular. Moreton Bay is so much more impressive from the air. Out here the water was emerald blue, and there were massive sea grass beds and submerged sand banks that looked like whole underwater countrysides. There were sandy channels that branch out thru the sea grass beds and looked like rivers and tributaries created by the tidal flows.

The crossing to Moreton Island

I climbed to just under the legal limit of 3500ft to make the last crossing over to Moreton Island. The sand banks, surf and waves on the bar between the islands were full of interesting and beautiful detail. The sandbank had stripes (caused by the swells acting as lenses) that marched steadily over it. There was a submerged wreck and even the sandbank itself seemed to be shaped into waves.

Frank Fontaine was in the air as well with his motor harness hang glider. He had taken off earlier than me From Wellington Pt, and flown over Peel Island directly to North Stradbroke Island. It was a shorter and much faster trip for him but he had to cross larger expanses of water on the crossings. With our aircraft you don't cross anything where you can't glide to a safe landing. So it makes it interesting working out how high you need to be to safely do the crossings. Frank can make larger crossings because his Xtralite hang glider has a better glide angle.

The bar between Moreton and North Stradbroke Islands

The crossing to Moreton Island

I landed later on a sandbank on the southern tip of Moreton Island.
When I was 20ft off the ground the wind went to zero and I had to run it out over an undulating sand dune. Just after landing I looked up the beach and there were sand devils picking up the sand about a hundred metres away. Frank had intended to land with me for lunch and fuel, but I radioed to him that it could go tail wind on him on landing. You wouldn't want to have that happen in a motorised Xtralite. The sand devils were caused by a convergence of sea breezes. Moreton island is a long thin island thirty kilometres off the coast. As a consequence it creates it's own local weather. Frank and I had both noticed that the wind was onshore on both sides of the island. Where I had landed was right next to the convergence zone of the two sea breezes. Frank flew over the sand devils and got a "thermal" that took him up to 3000ft at six metres per second (1200ft/min). It's amazing getting that sort of lift from down low over a flat sandy beach, and it would be there often when there is a sea breeze. I have also struck 4m/sec lift from down low at the northern tip of the island where the convergence crosses the beach there as well.

Considering that Frank has two fuel tanks and had saved a lot of fuel from his free ride up, he decided that he had enough fuel to make it back to the mainland. So he made the crossing to North Stradbroke and headed back. Frank ended up doing a round trip total of 175km, including making it to Cape Moreton at the top end of the Island. I disconnected my fuel tank and made the one or two kilometre walk to the fuel station at Kooringal (it has a hand pumped fuel bowser).

Moreton Island

When I returned the main sea breeze from the mainland had set in and it was already quite strong. I was forced to launch from fifty metres back in the lee of trees, and was thrown about on launch, even coming down from ten feet and having to run again. It was just as well Frank hadn't landed. On my climb up out of the sea breeze my ground speed into wind was only 5kph. It took about twenty minutes to reach my legal limit under the controlled airspace above, to make my crossing back to North Stradbroke. I just sat over the sand spit on the south-east tip of the island doing climbing 360's. The temptation to head across lower was very strong but I forced myself to take the safest option. I was making about a six kilometre crossing to follow a track that would give the best glide to landing options in the strong NNE down low and the strongish NW wind up high.

Up high the wind had picked up from the north-west into a strong cross wind for my return trip. I had trimmers up and speed bar on and was making reasonable progress but was having to keep a very high throttle setting to maintain level flight (because of the speed bar & trimmers).
Just as I was starting out on my last crossing from Macleay Island to the mainland, there was a cough then silence. I had run out of fuel. Hmmm, do I have enough height to glide to the mainland? Probably, but there's no point risking it. So I turned back and made a vertical descent through the strong sea breeze onto the Macleay Island golf course. In hindsight, I reckon I could have made it back if I had descended into the seabreeze for the trip south along the back side of North Stradbroke.

One of the golfers came over and we went into the golf club for a beer and the usual telling of stories. He then gave me a lift to the ferry terminal in his ute. I have run out of fuel so many times to have long ago lost count. I've even had it happen just a hundred metres from home on two occasions. Running out of fuel with a paramotor is no big deal. It's actually easier to get back than if you outland a hang glider when free flying. There is much more interest from the public in paramotoring than there is for paragliding or hang gliding. The motor with it's propeller is like a magnet for the curious. There's always someone with a ute or truck that is more than happy to get involved by driving me somewhere. There is no better way to get a conversation started with the captain of a ferry boat than to walk on with a bloody great fan on your back. No doubt Macleay Island will have been buzzing with stories of the crazy guy that ran out of petrol crossing Moreton Bay and had to land on the golf course.

Once back on the mainland I fired up my GPS and found that my car was only ten minutes walk away. So I put my motor on my back, slung my wing on my front and walked back. Yee Haar, Life is beautiful.