Happy New Year 2012!

I spent New Year’s Eve on the Port Phillip Bay on the MUUC boat. There were seven of us on the boat plus one dog. We cast off at Williamstown, some way west of the city. As we were in the water well before main fireworks at midnight, we did a quick tour of the area while looking for a good spot to watch the fireworks. First, we went up Yarra river and visited Docklands near Melbourne CBD. This was one of the spots where official fireworks were to be launched and we did pass right next to one of the fireworks barges in the river. Unfortunately, you couldn’t leave your boat there for the fireworks, so we headed back out to the Bay and moved to somewhere along the St Kilda coast.

It was a nice and quiet spot to wait for the year  2012. Seas were calm enough and it was pretty warm night. At midnight, the main fireworks began. It was an impressive display with lots of well synchronized fireworks along the city skyline. Unfortunately, we were bit far from the launch sites, things would have been even more impressive close by. I did take some photos as well, but obviously trying to get good fireworks shots from a small boat is more or less impossible. And I really need to figure out how to import some Pommac to Australia, coke just doesn’t cut it for fancier occasions. 🙂

The fireworks display was actually quite short, afterwards we headed back to Williamstown marina. It was getting really crowded there and traffic was bit of a mess in the area. Luckily things got better as we got out of the marina and the return trip was pretty uneventful. Trams were running all night for New Year’s Eve, so getting home was also easy enough. Though to be fair, the trams were delayed quite a bit because of festivities.

In any case, it was a really nice and memorable way to begin the new year 2012!

• Open Water Diver