Marina service
Batavia Coast Marina
About
Batavia Coast Marina at a glance
DoT-managed marina close to Geraldton's city centre, completed in 1995 and expanded from 84 to 118 pens in August 2025 with a new floating jetty capable of berthing vessels up to 25 m. A popular base for Abrolhos Islands charters, it offers a service jetty, three-lane ramp and pen-holder amenities; diesel is available at the nearby Fishermen's Wharf.
Service area: Mid West
- Marina type
- full-service marina
- Operator
- Department of Transport and Major Infrastructure (DTMI)
- Region
- Mid West
- Water body
- Champion Bay
- Wet berths
- 118
- Maximum vessel
- 25 m
- Berth types
- casual berthing, permanent berthing
Facilities and services
- power & water
- showers & laundry
- boat ramp
- diesel nearby at Fishermen's Wharf (Baileys Marine Fuels, fuel card)
- fishing platform
- universal access pontoon
- boardwalk
- pen-holder laundry
About Batavia Coast Marina
Batavia Coast Marina sits on Champion Bay within a short walk of Geraldton's city centre, and it is the closest thing the Mid West coast has to a civic marina: built in 1995, owned and managed by the Department of Transport and Major Infrastructure, and shared between recreational pen holders, charter operators and working boats. The marina took on a distinctly more capable shape in August 2025, when a $3.3 million project funded under the WA Recovery Plan delivered a new floating jetty and 34 additional pens, lifting capacity from 84 to 118 and adding berths able to take vessels up to 25 metres. The expansion was designed in part to serve the tourism trade: Geraldton is the principal mainland departure point for the Houtman Abrolhos Islands, and the new multipurpose pens ease the loading of passengers for the growing charter fleet that runs out to the coral atolls. One pen in the new development is reserved for the Batavia Longboat, the replica craft kept by the Batavia Coast Replica Boat Association, which keeps the region's most famous shipwreck story visible to the public beside the Museum of Geraldton. The character of the place is working-waterfront rather than resort. The fishing boat harbour and its wharves sit immediately alongside, live export and grain ships load at the port next door, and the marina boardwalk connects the pens to the museum, the Mantra hotel and the foreshore. It is a marina that reflects Geraldton itself: practical, wind-blasted, and oriented firmly toward the sea.
Marina facilities
The marina now operates 118 pens, including the new floating jetty completed in August 2025 with berths for vessels up to 25 metres; pen licences are administered by the Department of Transport and Major Infrastructure, with casual and permanent options and application through the department's Geraldton office. A service jetty provides power, water, lighting and a floating low-level universal-access pontoon, with published wharf load limits covering 50-tonne displacement berthing and an 8-tonne crane load. The launching facility is a three-lane concrete boat ramp with sealed car and trailer parking, and an 18-bay public carpark on Wiebbe Hayes Lane added in March 2026 eased the chronic parking squeeze; the ramp surface itself is scheduled for replacement in late 2026. Pen holders have their own toilet, shower and laundry block, while public toilets stand near the ramps. A universal-access fishing platform and small carpark sit at the shore end of the new northern breakwater, and the timber boardwalk along the harbour's eastern fringe links the pens to the museum, hotel and yacht club. Fuel arrangements are the one real gap: there is no fuel berth inside the marina, and diesel is taken at the nearby Fishermen's Wharf in the Mid West Ports Fishing Boat Harbour, where Baileys Marine Fuels Australia supplies fuel card customers. There is no travel lift or chandlery on site either, so haul-outs and parts are handled by the marine businesses around the fishing boat harbour and the port precinct, an arrangement locals are used to and visiting skippers should plan around.
Local sailing knowledge
Champion Bay is open roadstead water, and the marina owes its calm to substantial breakwaters; the entrance channel sits near 28.771 south, 114.593 east and is lit and marked, but the bay copes poorly with strong westerly swell and Geraldton's reputation for wind is well earned. Summer sea breezes here are among the strongest and most reliable in Australia, which is why the foreshore fills with kitesurfers and windsurfers and why reefing early is standard practice. The Abrolhos Islands, about 60 kilometres offshore, are the obvious cruising prize: coral reefs, crayfish grounds, sea lions and the wreck sites of the Batavia, which ran aground there in 1629 and left the mutiny story that gives the marina and the coast their name. Charters run out from the marina through the season, and private boats making the crossing should watch the forecast carefully as the islands offer limited shelter in a blow. Provisioning in Geraldton is straightforward, with supermarkets, marine trades and engineering shops in a city of around 40,000, and the foreshore precinct around the marina has cafes and restaurants within walking distance of the pens. The Geraldton Yacht Club occupies pens along the marina's outer wall, and the fishing boat harbour next door supplies the diesel berth, ice and the colour of a working rock lobster fleet. Stage two of the foreshore works will eventually stitch the marina more tightly to the CBD via the Station Square link, so the precinct is evolving; check the department's notices for ramp closures while the ramp surface is replaced.