Palm Beach Water Taxi

Palm Beach sits at the northern tip of Sydney's Northern Beaches, on the eastern shore of Pittwater — one of the most protected and beautiful natural harbours in Australia. It is also the springboard for a string of jetties that no road ever reaches: Currawong, Great Mackerel Beach, The Basin, Coasters Retreat, Patonga, Ettalong and dozens of private waterfront homes. The scheduled Palm Beach Ferry runs a fixed timetable to a handful of those stops, but on weekends and public holidays queues build fast, the last service leaves early, and there is no way to reach a private jetty at all. A Palm Beach water taxi solves every one of those problems in a single booking.

You choose the pickup, the drop-off and the time. The skipper meets you at the Barrenjoey Boathouse pontoon at Palm Beach Wharf, loads your gear, and has you across Pittwater in eight to fifteen minutes depending on where you're going. There is no line, no timetable to memorise, and no shared boat full of strangers with wet dogs. For weekenders at Currawong, families heading to the National Park at The Basin, or a group meeting friends for lunch at Patonga Beach Hotel, the water taxi is almost always faster door-to-door and only marginally more expensive than three ferry tickets.

Palm Beach to The Basin is one of the most-booked jetties in our network. The Basin is only accessible by boat, and it's the launch pad for the Basin walking track, an overnight campsite in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park, and one of Sydney's best kid-friendly swimming lagoons. A water taxi puts you on the sand in ten minutes flat. Palm Beach to Currawong is the classic weekender crossing — a five-minute hop to the historic Currawong Beach cottages that most Sydneysiders have heard about but never visited. Palm Beach to Great Mackerel Beach is a hidden-cove crossing to a community of about a hundred waterfront cabins with no road access; if you're renting a cabin for the weekend, the water taxi is the only realistic way in with luggage.

The bigger crossings — Palm Beach to Patonga and Palm Beach to Ettalong — cover the mouth of the Hawkesbury and land you on the Central Coast side. Patonga is a tiny fishing village with a legendary pub, a boat-hire jetty, and easy access to the Bouddi National Park walks. Ettalong is a five-minute walk from the Ettalong Beach Club, cafes, weekend markets and the Central Coast ferry. Both crossings take around twenty to twenty-five minutes in a water taxi, versus an hour and a half by road via the M1 and Woy Woy. Once you factor in tolls, fuel and parking at either end, the water taxi wins on time and often on cost when you're travelling as a group.

The single biggest reason customers book a Palm Beach water taxi over the scheduled ferry is that they need to be picked up or dropped off at a private jetty. Pittwater is lined with hundreds of waterfront homes, weekenders and small boat sheds — many of which have their own pontoon and safe deep-water access. If yours is one of them, we can pick you up and drop you off right there, no walking to a public wharf carrying luggage, groceries and eskies. The booking engine has a drop-a-pin feature for exactly this: mark the location, add a short note (e.g. "grey pontoon south of Currawong, blue tin roof"), and the skipper will confirm before departure.

This is genuinely life-changing for owners and renters at places like Coasters Retreat, Elvina Bay, Lovett Bay, Morning Bay and the strip along the western foreshore between Currawong and The Basin. Instead of relying on a fortnightly ferry timetable or a private tinnie you have to launch and retrieve yourself, you get an on-demand licensed service — a proper commercial vessel with insurance, a professional skipper, and modern navigation gear. For contractors, cleaners and property managers, it is now standard to add a Palm Beach water taxi to a job quote for a Pittwater property; a fifteen-minute crossing costs less than an hour of billed labour lost to a missed ferry.

Short Pittwater hops such as Palm Beach to The Basin, Palm Beach to Currawong and Palm Beach to Great Mackerel Beach start from around $110 for up to twelve passengers. Cross-Pittwater and mouth-of-Hawkesbury runs such as Palm Beach to Patonga and Palm Beach to Ettalong are typically $160 to $220 for the same group size. Because you're paying by the boat rather than by the head, the maths gets a lot better for four, six or eight people than it does for a single passenger — a family of six travelling to Great Mackerel Beach usually pays less per head than the ferry once you include an infant and a car load of gear.

The exact fare is quoted on the booking engine before you pay, based on your pickup, drop-off and pickup time. There are no surge multipliers, no fuel levies added on the day and no cash-on-board haggling. Return trips are booked in the same flow — the engine pre-fills your reverse leg and lets you change the return time up to a day before. All prices include Stripe processing, dispatch, SMS updates, licensed skipper, commercial marine insurance and free cancellation up to two days ahead (see the booking help page for the current cancellation window on charter-length runs).

Pittwater is one of the most sheltered waterways in NSW, which is a big part of why the water taxi service runs seven days a week from six in the morning to ten at night. That said, a strong southerly or a serious sea fog will occasionally push a trip back by an hour or shift a pickup to a more sheltered jetty. In those rare cases the operator contacts you directly with the option to reschedule, switch jetties or take a full refund to wallet credit — see our cancellation and refund policy for exact terms. Life jackets are on board every vessel and are compulsory for children and non-swimmers on any run outside sheltered water.

What to bring is up to you — Palm Beach water taxis are private hire, so you can load an esky, a stack of surfboards, a couple of dogs, weekend luggage, a pram, a picnic hamper or a small piece of building material for a Pittwater renovation. If you have anything unusually large or heavy (a fridge, a mattress, a kayak trailer) mention it in the booking notes and the operator will confirm the boat and any extra time needed for loading. For general baggage, small pets and standard weekend gear, no notes are needed — just show up at the wharf five to ten minutes before your booked pickup time, wave down the boat, and go.