Friday wrap: Victoria on the cusp of a Crown land fishing bonanza

The change to the Land Act 1958 aims to “remove the prohibition on camping on licensed water frontages”, which equates to a minimum of up to 20 metres from a riverbank through to several hundred metres from the edge of a larger body of water.

The problem relates to landowners who over time have taken out state government-issued licences to use water frontages, but have since fenced off access despite a mandate that they cannot remove the public’s right to enter and remain on the land for certain recreational purposes.

A state government spokesman told boatsales.com.au that the change to the Act, currently before the upper house, would make access to Crown land easier for those who want to fish and camp at some of Victoria’s best rivers.

“This bill will help manage those activities and protect the environment, and will ensure a clear pathway is provided for more Victorians to enjoy more public land,” he said.

He said the Victorian Fisheries Authority would install gates and signs on Crown land to help people access areas.

The US-based Water Sports Industry Association has stumped up a new run of “Wake responsibly” signs aimed at calming the waters between wake sports boats and people who have to live with them.

The free aluminium signs, earmarked recreational boating businesses, encourage boaters to:

Tow and wake sports boats are facing increasing pressure in the US from landowners to minimise the impact they have on the environment, with various state and local governments threatening to lock boats off the water.

British diesel outboard engine maker Cox Marine has officially marked the first installation of its 300hp engines for a US customer.

The first application is a twin CXO300 installation on an Intrepid 345 Nomad fibreglass centre console normally powered using twin petrol-powered outboards ranging from 350hp to 450hp.

Cox is developing a range of diesel-fuelled outboard engines mainly aimed at commercial operators attracted by the big torque and low fuel use these engines can offer, but is also trying to break into the recreational boating market.

While an Australian market debut is planned, the US is expected to be the largest market for the company.

After six years in the wilderness and despite all the Brexit pains, Kawasaki’s Jet-Ski range is back on sale in Britain.

According to Kawasaki, the British jet ski market had become “very specialised”, and it needed the help of “experts” to help it re-enter.

The UK’s Jet-Ski range will include high-end Ultra normally aspirated and supercharged models, the new entry-level STX 160 and the kawasaki Jet-Ski SX-R stand-up model.

Kawasaki’s jet skis will be targeted at large boat owners wanting to add a personal watercraft to their tender garage, and first-time boaters.

Electronics group Digital Yacht has launched NAVDoctor, a portable plug-in diagnostics device that can trace and pinpoint faults in NMEA 2000 networks.

The NMEA 2000 standard allows all the electronic devices on a boat to tap into each other and share data so that, say, the VHF radio can broadcast a boat’s GPS position in an emergency by tapping into the GPS-equipped chartplotter.

However, with onboard electronics becoming ever more sophisticated, tracking down problems can prove difficult.

“NMEA 2000 networks are based on a robust Canbus architecture, but one bad device, cable or termination can have a detrimental effect on performance,” Digital Yacht said.

“Fault finding can be time-consuming and tricky, so having a diagnostics device in your toolkit will save you time, money and frustration.”

The device creates a wireless connection that users can then connect to and see the diagnostics in real-time.

NAVDoctor is priced from around $A620.