After spending four months close to the heart of Melbourne, it was time to say goodbye. Initially we’d planned to stay for three months but enjoyed ourselves so much we extended. During this time we caught up with friends, went to theatres and art displays, enjoyed live music, spent a day at the Australian Open tennis, toured the Royal Exhibition Building, went sightseeing, and generally immersed ourselves in the vibe that Melbourne offers.
When we left the Yarra River, we spent six nights on anchor at Portarlington, the subject of this blog.
Anyone for mussels?
Apparently Portarlington is known as the mussel capital of Victoria. Portarlington even hosts an annual mussel festival. Apparently it’s one of the most popular community festivals in Victoria, with over 30,000 visitors, live music all day, hundreds of market stalls and a whole lotta delicious mussels. If interested, you can read more about the Portarlington mussel festival.
In fact, the first thing someone asked me when I was at Wyndham Harbour was did I try the mussels? I must admit, mussels aren’t my favourite seafood. They’re OK and I’ve enjoyed a chilli soup dish with mussels, but give me a piece of grilled flathead, a bowl of prawns, some calamari, oysters, and just about any other shellfish or seafood.
So apologies to Portarlington, I didn’t try your mussels.
Mixed bag of weather at Portarlington
During our six nights on anchor, we experienced a real “mixed bag” of weather; sunny and calm, then high winds whistling down the bay, a few storms, and then back to calm again.
We anchored outside Portarlington Boat Harbour. Within the boat harbour, there are pile berths and some moorings. I saw quite a few fishing boats in the berths, some pleasure boats, and the Bellarine Express, providing a ferry service between Portarlington, Docklands and Geelong. We decided not to go into the boat harbour because information I’d read indicated you needed local knowledge of the depths, and the visitor pile berths were too narrow for us.
Here are a couple of videos contrasting the weather, then a few photos.
Where to next?
We’re heading to Wyndham Harbour to get fuel in preparation for leaving Port Phillip Bay and heading to Lakes Entrance.
8 Responses
Always love reading your blogs and hearing of your adventures, thank you. Pam and Graham
I really enjoyed the videos contrasting the weather, though I was sorry to hear that everybody was feeling a bit sick!
Stunning Pam 🥰🤩
Lovely sunsets! thanks for sharing.
Magic set of Sunset photos Pam!
Thanks Cheryl, and I just realised one of my daily sunset photos was actually sunrise! All fixed now, even though no one would probably ever notice!
I wonder when Port Arlington became Portarlington?
Hi May, according to a Wikipedia article and I quote…
“The township of Portarlington was formally surveyed around 1850 and was at that time named Drayton. It was renamed Portarlington in 1851, reportedly in honour of the English peer, Sir Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington. However, it is also suggested, and seems more likely, that owing to the number of early Irish settlers in the area, the town was named after the town in Ireland of the same name (founded by Sir Henry Bennet in 1666).“