Sailing around the Whitsundays!

Hey Ho Folks! Wow the Whitsundays were AMAZING!

But I get ahead of myself. What did we do on Monday. Well basically we hit the shops in Airlie Beach straight after breakfast! I found a wide-brim hat in a pharmacy, but then saw a nicer, cheaper one up the road in the khaki-green colour I wanted. So Claire took the first one back for me (cos I'm a wimp) and I bought the second one instead! We later came across the Aussie Adventure Sailing office (the company we're sailing with) so we decided to go in and announce our arrival, and to save us wasting time checking in the next day. And we discovered that our voucher for our trip had been mislaid! We then remembered that at Fraser Island when we handed our voucher in, the sailing one was attached to it. So the only explanation was that the check-in desk at Fraser kept both vouchers by accident. So Aussie Adventure Sailing had to ring Palace Backpackers in Brisbane to confirm our booking and have them fax a copy of our voucher over. Which took about an hour. And since me and Claire had already exhausted the shops we went to Subway instead to calm down! It all got sorted eventually. Thank God!

That afternoon we just chilled by the pool and then had an earlyish night, watching some ridiculous reality TV first. We also went on the internet and it crashed just as I was about to send an email! Well annoying! Anyway, at about 2am the girls in our room came back from a night out, making SO MUCH NOISE! I've never heard anything like it; I think we must have been lucky so far to have considerate room-mates!

Woke up on Tuesday morning feeling quite groggy, checked out and made breakfast, then after getting some last minute bits (ie. underwater disposable camera!) we headed down to the harbour at about 11:30am to meet our yacht for our Whitsunday Islands sailing trip! The Whitsundays are called so because when Captain Cook sailed past them he thought it was Whitsunday - a number of sundays after Easter - but it actually wasn't. He had got his dates wrong due to the crossing of the date line. So the Australians certainly started as they meant to go on! (Har Har!). The group on our boat were a really good bunch, mostly ranging from mid-late 20s to early 30s (so we were the 'young uns'!) and really friendly. We first went to Hook Island and anchored in Nara Inlet, and to get there took most of the afternoon. Then we all piled in the dingy and boated (word?) to the land to do a bush walk. The lookout was pretty picturesque, especially with the sun setting, so I got some good photos, but the caves were a bit disappointing as the 'aboriginal paintings' were in fact "representative samples", and you couldn't tell what they were of! Once back on the yacht we got chatting to the people on the trip, had a delicious tea of thai green curry, preceeded by chips and dips, care of our capable hostess, Maya. It was lush! During tea a Sulphur-Crested Cockatoo came and perched on the back of the boat, and we fed him crackers! Even though he wasn't a parrot it made the whole thing terribly authentic! Then we indulged in a NEW drinking game called 21, and once that fizzled the deckhand, Brett (who turned out to be a bit of an arrogant ass) got us guessing lateral thinking questions. He was asking me to "share the drugs I was on" when I came out with my answers. I thought they were pretty reasonable!

Yesterday morning we were woken early by our skipper, Harley, with the promise of tea, coffee, and BACON up on deck, and that the sun was shining and the sky was blue. He lied to us! There was no bacon and it was cloudy! But at least it got us up. After brekkie we sailed off to Tongue Bay, where we took the dingy to the bay and walked the bush walk to the look out on the other side of the peninsula, which happened to overlook Hill Inlet and Whitehaven Beach (apparently the most beautiful beach in the world). Despite the cloud, it was clear and the views were fantastic. It looked so good, it was as if you could just take a spoon and eat it! Unfortunately, once we got down to Whitehaven Beach it had started raining. REALLY hard! We waited for it to pass but after 15 mins or so of getting drenched it became pretty clear that it wasn't going to happen any time soon. So we sadly trudged on back to the bay. Don't let anyone tell you the sun always shines on Whitehaven Beach! Anyway, me, Claire and a guy called Craig tried to wave to the yacht to send the dingy, but they ignored us until a few more people had given up and joined us. So by the time we got back to the yacht we were well and truly soaked! The worst was that my prized possession at the moment, my Da Vinci Code, had gotten wet. I was distraught!

After a dinner of hot dogs, cheese and onions we set sail for another inlet (the name of which I forget) where we were allowed to snorkel! I got the same canning-it feeling that I got in the plane before skydiving at this point, due to the proximity of killer marine creatures! Harley assured us that the only thing that was dangerous in the water here was a tiny jellyfish (half the size of your thumbnail) that was see-through, and it was only fatal to those with serious heart problems. Everything else was harmless. AND we were wearing stinger suits, so if we did get stung it would be on our hands or face. I still got the jeebies, especially when signing the waver! Once I was in though, I got a bit panicky at first cos I couldn't get used to the mask, but after a while it was fine. And anyway, I had lifeguard Claire to hand, and our other 'snorkel buddy' - a guy called Matt, who I could've sworn was about mid 20s but was actually 32! The coral and the fish were spectacular, it was like actually being in 'Finding Nemo'! But, sadly, we didn't find Nemo. Or any of his clownfish buddies :o( We did see oysters, brainesque coral, mushroomesque coral and loads of different colours and shapes and sizes of fish! (I apologise for my blatant lack of knowledge in the proper names of underwater flora and fauna!)

After 2 short hours of checking out the underwater civilisations and snapping pictures of a few fin-bearing critters, we were dragged out of the water kicking and screaming as we needed to sail to another inlet where we would stay the night. After arriving there, we had another tasty tea of spaghetti bolognese and garlic bread. Once over with, the party began! We cranked up the music, played massive drinking games (which included a waterfall - shudder! - where you all drink in a circle and can't stop until the person to your right stops), and after much philosophical chat and consumption of wine, beer, and other mind-altering substances, most of us fell asleep about 2am on deck, under the stars. Not the most comfortable (or most quiet! - Craig the olympic snorer!) night's sleep I've ever had, but that's not the point, is it?

This morning, we woke up very groggy, and I woke up feeling extremely ill! Not willing to blame it on the beer, I'm actually pretty sure I've eaten or drank something dodgy cos my stomach is spasming and lurching like a crazy monkey with an accordion! So, unfortunately, I didn't join in the early morning snorkel, but I enjoyed yesterday so much I didn't feel like I needed to anyway! After breakfast (where I ate nothing and felt extremely 'fragile'!) we set sail back to Airlie Beach.

So what now? Well, today is actually Miss Snowball's birthday, so we planned on going on a massive booze-up tonight, but then the boat has actually organised a reunion (teehee - we only said goodbye this morning!) at our hostel's bistro for tea, and we're all going out afterwards anyway. So that should be tres coolio. I reckon that I'll be on orange juice at this rate but we'll see how it goes. I think if I just lay off the cheap wine and fosters I'll be reet!

Then it's back on el Oz Bus in the morning for Magnetic Island, where we've organised to do a proper scuba dive on Saturday! I'm extremely worried about it though, as Claire confided last night(falsely) that asthmatics' lungs can pop when scuba diving, but I've been much assured that it's not true. I'm still worried though!

I'm also actually glad that we're gonna be travelling with Adventure Tours rather than Oz Experience once we hit Darwin, as the company is changing hands in about a month, and since the drivers aren't too happy they're supposed to be going on strike next week, or so we've heard. But I think we'll miss it. Hopefully.

So... yeah. That's it for now. I'm gonna go and retrain my sea-legs!