Page 647

Voyages in the Southern Hemisphere, Vols. II - III

Table of Contents On this day ... 23 August 1770 Endeavour Voyage Maps James Cook's Journal Ms 1, National Library of Australia Transcript of Cook's Journal Joseph Banks's Journal Sydney Parkinson's Journal Description of New South Wales Index Search Contact us

Description of New South Wales (continued) I shall now quit this country, with a few observations relative to the currents and tides upon the coast. From latitude 32°, and somewhat higher, down to Sandy Cape, in latitude 24° 46’, we constantly found a current setting to the southward, at the rate of about ten or fifteen miles a day, being more or less, according to our distance from the land, for it always ran with more force in shore than in the offing; but I could never satisfy myself whether the flood-tide came from the southward, the eastward, or the northward: I inclined to the opinion that it came from the south-east, but the first time we anchored off the coast, which was in latitude 24° 30’, about ten leagues to the south east of Bustard Bay, I found it come from the north west; on the contrary, thirty leagues farther to the north west, on the south side of Keppel Bay, I found that it came from the east, and at the northern part of that Bay it came from the northward, but with a much slower motion than it had come from the east: on the east side of the Bay of Inlets, it set strongly to the westward, as far as the opening of Broad Sound; but on the north side of that Sound, it came with a very slow motion from the north west; and when we lay at anchor before Repulse Bay, it came from the northward: to account for its course in all this variety of directions, we need only admit that the flood-tide comes from the east or south east. It is well known, that where there are deep inlets, and large creeks into low lands, running up from the sea, and not occasioned by rivers of fresh water, there will always be a great indraught of the flood-tide, the direction of which will be determined by the position or direction of the coast which forms the entrance of such inlet, whatever be its course at sea; and where the tides are weak, which upon this coast is generally the case, a large inlet will, if I may be allowed the expression, attract the flood-tide for many leagues. Voyaging Accounts © Derived from Vols. II-III of the London 1773 edition: National Library of Australia call no. FERG 7243, pages 648 - 648, 2004 Published by kind permission of the Library To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/hv23/647.html