Apple Tree Bay

About

SuburbBobbin HeadTypeBayDetailsApple Tree Bay is on the western shore of Cowan Creek downstream from Bobbin Head and Cockle Creek, named by Surveyor Larmer in 1832. His map shows an apple tree on the bay's northern entrance. The early surveyors frequently made use of prominent trees as points of reference. In his notebook Larmer records that when working around Cowan Creek he made use of various 'oaks', 'forked gums', 'apple trees' and 'white limbs' as reference points.

The brothers, Francis and Alf Woodnutt, started a boatshed, in 1921, at Apple Tree Bay, located at a point where the track from Mount Kuring-gai meets Cowan Creek. This track was constructed by unemployed men as part os a government works program in 1903, two years after the Kuring-gai Railway Station opened. At that time there was no road from Bobbin Head to Apple Treet Bay and all supplies had to be picked up by launch from Brooklyn.
Many of the boats were manufactured by Gus Green an old fashioned tradesmen. Eventually Fancis Woodnutt took over the management of the boat shed from his brother. His fleet of hire boats was well known because of the highly varnished appearance of them. Powerboats were introduced in the mid-1930s and were in high demand.
Fresh water was available from the spring which still runs today. At the nearby Apple Tree bay boat shed refreshments were available and popular with bushwalkers during the Depression of the 1930s. Frank Woodnutt sold the business in about 1949 and today it no longer operates. The ruins of the boat shed, accommodation, retaining walls and slipway can still be seen but the bush has mostly reclaimed it.
CreatorPowell, John P. 1994, Placenames of the Greater Hawkesbury Region, Hawkesbury River Enterprises, Berowra, p. 2. 'Our Bushland Shire' (2021) p.201

Photograph

Woodnutt's Boatshed at Apple Tree Bay

Apple Tree Bay, Cowan CreekApple Tree Bay, Cowan CreekApple Tree Bay, Cowan CreekApple Tree Bay, Cowan Creek

LocationCowan CreekGeotag^[1]KeywordsApple Tree BayBoatshedsFrank WoodnuttCowan CreekWoodnutt Family

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Apple Tree Bay