I'm doing a trip in a few months to bring a boat back home to WA. For the east coast stuff I bought Robs Passage planner and an Alan Lucus books which name escapes me right now. Neither are cheap but the Alan Lucus book would be a minimum in my opinion.

Know your boat and have the right safety equipment. Take it out on heavier days in the lake. Then when your planning your coastal trip pick the right weather days. Once your confident in yourself and the boat it's all about the wind direction and speed when making coastal passages. You want to get to your destination as quickly as possible so you don't end up trying to navigate unfamiliar waters in the dark.
Secondly, and this is what we are finding having only made about a dozen coastal trips is the level of comfort. Our cockpit is wide open with no shelter and we don't have any form of tiller pilot etc. We need to address this before we did any serious coastal sailing like heading north to Whitsundays. Good luck, you will enjoy your adventures.

Completing a short coastal trip is (for me) very satisfying and rewarding.
i suggest you do as many day trips out to sea from the lake as possible, adding Sea State to sailing adds another dimension to it, add Single-handing to that and it's a new ball game.
+1 for Robs passage planner and Lucas's Cruising the NSW Coast.
one of the chart plotting apps for iPads/tablets make it easy to plan trips and look at various anchorages.

I too can vouch for the Navathone course mentioned above.]

I dont know where you can purchase said books on the east coast. I bought mine at the Chart and Maps shop in Fremantle WA. They have an online store and post free of charge for anything over $75 (the price of just one of those books)

www.chartandmapshop.com.au

Boat Books in Crows Nest has most of what you need. www.boatbooks-aust.com.au if you prefer online

BJRobinson said..

Ramona said..
Just download Rob's passage planner.

https://skipr.net/rpp/PassagePlanner2011.pdf

If you need to spend money buy an older version of Lukas's Coastal cruising off eBay. What ever you do they will always be slightly out of date.

Thanks Romana.

Great info in Rob's Planner.

While the 'guts' of the online version is there, the book (revised in 2104) has an additional 100 pages to it including diagrams and information of all the marinas along the cost and more.

I am not saying not to use the above link, but just to be aware that often 'free' copies based on current material is often not compete or up to date..

Download Navionics on your phone / tablet/ laptop. Pay the very reasonable price for the maps