About
Rowell Marine at a glance
Private waterfront marina in Newport built in 1991 to EPA requirements, with floating berths for vessels up to 60 ft including superyacht facilities and a 9 am-5 pm tender service; Rowell Marine Shipwrights based on site.
Service area: Pittwater
- Marina type
- private marina
- Operator
- Rowell Marine
- Region
- Pittwater
- Water body
- Pittwater
- Maximum vessel
- 18.3 m
- Berth types
- permanent berthing, casual berthing, superyacht berths
Facilities and services
- repairs & maintenance
- superyacht-capable berths
- tender service
- full refit facility
- teak decking
- composite repairs
- painting and varnishing
- wharf construction
- crane barge
About Rowell Marine
Rowell Marine is a family marina in the old Pittwater sense: a private waterfront complex at 1 Queens Parade, Newport, built in 1991 to the environmental standards of the day and still owned by the Rowell family, whose name has been attached to boats on this waterway for decades. Bill Rowell, the family's veteran shipwright, has been a fixture of the Pittwater sailing scene since before many of the current berth holders were born, and the marina's floating berths, taking vessels up to 60 feet with facilities pitched at superyacht-standard work, have long served as a base for serious yacht maintenance as much as for storage. The operation has deliberately renewed itself across a generation. In 2017 Oscar Rowell, who trained as a shipwright with Palm Beach Motor Yachts in its Australian and Malaysian factories, established Rowell Marine Shipwrights on site and has since become a shareholder and partner in the marina, while a sister business, Rowell Waterfront Construction, builds wharves, seawalls and pontoons across Pittwater from a 15-metre crane barge called Cobia. The result is a small marina with an unusually complete trades ecosystem around it, where refit work, teak decking and composite repairs happen metres from the berths. A tender service runs to moorings from nine to five, and the atmosphere is that of a working waterfront rather than a lifestyle precinct. The marina's low profile is deliberate: it has never chased the restaurant-and-retail model, and its reputation travels through the trade rather than through advertising, which is why many owners from outside Pittwater first hear of the place when a shipwright recommends the yard for a refit.
Marina facilities
Berthing at Rowell Marine is floating, secure and pitched at the larger end of the recreational fleet, with pens accommodating vessels to 18.3 metres, or 60 feet, including configurations suited to superyachts, and both permanent and casual berthing offered by arrangement through the marina office. A tender service operates between 9 am and 5 pm to ferry owners and crew between the docks and the mooring field. Power and water service the berths, and the site was engineered from the outset to environmental compliance standards, having been purpose-built in 1991 to EPA requirements. The defining service, though, is the depth of marine trades on site. Rowell Marine Shipwrights runs a one-stop operation covering full vessel refits, teak decking, structural composite modifications, painting and varnishing, and management of mechanical and electrical works, backed by a factory space in Mona Vale for larger projects and a client base stretching along the east coast and interstate. A wider group of marine trade specialists based at the marina lets the team manage complex jobs from haul-out to relaunch without subcontractors drifting in and out. Rowell Waterfront Construction adds pile driving, wharf and pontoon construction capability from its crane barge, with a 6-tonne lift capacity and a 1.2-tonne piling hammer. For an owner planning a refit, the practical appeal is continuity: the boat ties up, the shipwrights who will do the work walk the dock, and the same hands see the job through. Casual berths are limited and best arranged ahead by phone, since the yard's schedule often absorbs spare dock space when refit projects run alongside. Wash-down, detailing and routine maintenance are scheduled through the shipwright team, and project management of engine, genset and electronics contractors is part of the one-stop model, sparing owners the usual round of phone calls.
Local sailing knowledge
Queens Parade fronts Newport's main bay on the western shore of Pittwater, and the marina lies within the same protected water as its bigger neighbours, the Royal Motor Yacht Club around the point and the Royal Prince Alfred club further south. The run in from Broken Bay is as easy as coastal navigation gets: no bar, deep leads, and generous depths all the way up the estuary, with the mooring fields and weekend racing traffic the only things demanding attention off Newport. Being mid-Pittwater, Rowell Marine sits within a short motor of the waterway's cruising staples, Scotland Island, Church Point, McCarrs Creek and the national park bays around Coasters Retreat, while a longer day reaches the Hawkesbury's upper reaches or the anchorages behind Barrenjoey. For provisioning and parts, Newport village is minutes away by car, Mona Vale's marine retail strip is close, and the marina's own trades mean most technical problems never need to leave the property. Clients who use the place regularly cite the same reason: it is where you keep a boat you actually care about maintaining, in a family yard that treats a 60-footer's refit as normal work. Visiting owners on casual berths get the benefit of that culture too, with trades on the spot when something breaks mid-cruise and a tender to run them out to a mooring while the work is done. The Queens Parade shoreline is one of the oldest settled strips on Pittwater, and the marina's neighbours are boatsheds and waterfront homes rather than retail, which keeps the immediate water calm on weekdays though the bay fills on summer weekends. For crews mid-refit, Mona Vale's supermarkets, marine electricians and canvas shops are ten minutes by road.