Keppel Bay Marina

About the marina

Keppel Bay Marina at Rosslyn Bay is the largest marina north of Brisbane, with more than 500 berths spread across two basins beneath the headland of Double Head National Park. The original southern basin has been augmented since 2013 by the Northern Marina, which pushed capacity past the 500 mark and extended the marina's reach to vessels of 35 metres, including a run of multihull berths up to 17 metres wide. The harbour itself is an engineered oasis on an otherwise exposed stretch of the Capricorn Coast: dredged basins, wide fairways and colour-coded pile caps that make berth identification simple even for first-time arrivals. Just north of the Tropic of Capricorn and roughly seven kilometres from Yeppoon, the marina functions as the region's cruising crossroads, home port to charter fleets, fishing operators and a substantial liveaboard and long-term berth community. It is also a boatie village in its own right, with the Waterline Restaurant on the waterfront, a chandlery, brokerage, boatyard and Bayside Villas with private 16 and 19-metre multihull berths attached. Each June the marina hosts the finish line festival for the RQYS Brisbane to Keppel Tropical Yacht Race, filling the harbour with race yachts and their crews. The clientele is a genuine mix: southern cruisers staging for the reef, local trailer and keel boat owners, game fishers chasing mackerel on the shelf, and the Keppel Islands day-trip trade that departs from the neighbouring wharves. Staff make much of the marina's reputation as the friendliest stop on the coast, and the seven-day office hours and concierge desk back the claim.

Berthing & shoreside services

Berthing is the core product, offered as casual, short-term and permanent rental across berths from around 11 metres to multihull pens and 20-metre-plus arms, all with water and a 15-amp power connection as standard; 32-amp supply and air-conditioning use are available on request and attract additional fees. Bookings are essential and handled by an office open 7am to 5pm seven days, with VHF channel 21 monitored and an after-hours caretaker for urgent matters. The fuel wharf, operated in conjunction with the Rosslyn Bay Fishermans Market, sells unleaded and diesel from 7am to 5pm weekdays and 9am to 4pm on weekends, with further diesel available by arrangement at the Freedom Fast Cats wharf; gas bottle refills are handled through the marina office. The boatyard runs a 40-tonne travel lift with on-site marine services, and the marina chandlery takes orders and brokerage enquiries direct. Amenities are a step above the regional norm: ensuite shower facilities on the waterfront by the Yellow arm walkway plus additional showers, disabled facilities and a second laundry in the main marina building, with washing priced at four to six dollars depending on cycle and four dollars to dry. Free wifi is available to diners at the Waterline Restaurant, which serves breakfast, lunch and all-day coffee. Marina guests get use of a courtesy car once per stay for provisioning runs into Yeppoon, and airport transfers can be arranged. Parking is available for patrons with secure parking bookable for extended absences, and the berth map shows a public boat ramp, bus stop and bicycle parking within the complex.

Local context in YouSail

This is directory context, not navigation advice. Check current charts, notices and official boating resources before passage.

Rosslyn Bay harbour is entered through a dredged, beaconed channel between the breakwaters; depths are generous by Queensland marina standards and the wide internal fairways make manoeuvring manageable even for big cats, though a strong south-easterly can make the outer channel lively. Inside, the shelter is genuine in all weather, one reason the marina fills with cruising yachts each winter as the migration heads north toward the reef. The Keppel group lies barely 13 kilometres offshore: Great Keppel Island alone offers 17 beaches, and the anchorages around Great Keppel, North Keppel and Humpy Islands are uncrowded and tenable in most conditions, though skippers must respect the signed no-anchoring areas protecting coral. Provisioning is best done in Yeppoon, about seven kilometres north, where supermarkets, bakeries and a hospital serve the coast; the marina courtesy car helps, as rideshare coverage in the area is patchy. Closer to the berth, the Fishermans Market at the harbour sells trawler-fresh prawns and reef fish, and the Waterline Restaurant covers the nights nobody wants to cook. History lingers in the names: Cook charted Keppel Bay in 1770, naming it after Admiral Augustus Keppel, and the hinterland beyond the dunes was Darumbal country for millennia before that. Game fishing boats work the shelf for Spanish mackerel from May to October, and the short entrance is well marked compared with most Queensland ports. Rockhampton, forty minutes inland, is the regional centre for parts and engineering that the marina boatyard cannot supply. Visiting catamarans report nightly casual rates under one hundred dollars and praise the turning room between arms, a layout legacy of the 2013 Northern Marina expansion.