Found St. Kilda Charters after Googling around and calling a few places...

Keeping a secret - Vicki's 30th was coming and I wanted to do something a bit special. Vicki isn't one to blow her own horn and she had told me that she didn't really want to have a big party. Months before her birthday she said it would be really nice to have something out on the water - so my master plan was to invite about 25 of her friends and surprise her with a cruise on the bay.

Looking for a good deal - There are a few operators that take boats out on the water. When it comes to how much you want to spend - the sky is the limit. You can hire corporate yachts if you have the need and have a three course sit down meal. That wasn't exactly what I was looking for. I figured most of the enjoyment would come from just being with our friends out there on the water and having a drink and some food. I checked out a few other operators and St. Kilda Charters had a good deal with some basic food and a bit of shelter onboard in case of bad weather.

The cruise - After pretending to get ready to go to a restaurant, having to do a few wrong terns to waste some time, bumping into a friend of mine in the carpark... we finally arrived at St. Kilda Marina where the boat was waiting. The boat is a good size and had a crew of four

Kyle - Skipper
John - Crew
Jayne - Crew
Jill - Crew

From the word go the crew were helpful and friendly - they started with a proper safely briefing, told us where everything was, were there to help, but also left us to do our own thing. The food on the boat was basic - with sausages and hamburgers. They had a CD stacker and I had brought some disks, which proved to be much needed relief from the Kylie CD they had playing. The boat had a bathroom on board, a built in 'esky' with loads of space and a decent stereo.

That bit extra - Even though I had written on the invitation to everyone that the food served was going to be a meaty barbeque, there was a family that came along unprepared and vegetarian. I thought they were going to have to sustain themselves on biscuits and booze - not good for a three year old boy. I was really surprised when the crew offered to drop them off somewhere where they could pick up some food and then come back later to pick them up. This made a huge difference to us all - knowing our friends were happy and that the crew had gone out of their way to make the night a success.

Lucky for us... - During our cruise I had a few friends tell me of their own boating experiences, far less pleasant than our night out on the bay. One friend told me how their skipper had bought all the food with 'URGENT SALE' stickers on them from the supermarket, told them to pee off the side of the boat and generally did as little as possible to earn his money. I then started to appreciate the good work the crew were doing for us.

Summing up... We had a really good time out on the water. Like I said the food was basic and the burgers could have done with some vegetables in them - I guess you could bring your own grub if you wanted something a bit more fancy.. Also I would have liked the operators to fill the esky with ice instead of asking us to duck over to the BP for ice - esky isn't much good without ice! The fact that the crew had a laugh with us and looked after our vegetarian friends meant the night was a success and I'd definitely recommend the cruise to others.