Boating the Whitsunday Islands

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I had an amazing two days cruising around the Whitsunday Islands. The Whitsundays are a group of 74 islands that are at the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef. Since they are islands, the only way to see them is to have your own boat or book a boat tour. There are some day tours but the most popular option is a 2 day/2 night trip; this is exactly what I did!


We boarded the boat at about noon on Sunday, Valentine's Day. How romantic it would have been had I not been alone! HA! Anyway, it was a perfect way to spend not celebrating V-Day. When we left land it was looking like it was going to rain, and it had been earlier that day. But as we got away from the mainland the weather cleared up a bit and we even got to actually see the sun! After a few hours we stopped to do a bit of snorkeling. I must say I didn't know what to expect from the reefs at the lower portion of the GBR, especially after seeing a good reef up out of Cairns. The reefs down here were still good, but I feel like there were fewer fish. But maybe it was just the day. The visibility was also worse because for one it's the rainy season so the waters are all stirred up and the reefs here get a lot of turbulent water because of the islands and something about the water currents. But anyway the sun was out and the coral was colorful so it was still good.


After the snorkel we cruised around for a little longer to our resting spot in a nice, calm secluded cove for the night. I helped drive the boat for a while, which was fun. We just hung out and relaxed the rest of the night. It gets dark early here, by like 7:30 so the stars came up early. What a sight! The stars you were really good, even though there were clouds drifting past every now and then. The sky is foreign to me; I barely recognized any constellations (not that I know that many anyway). One of the crew members showed us a dinoflagelate that glows in the dark when it is disturbed. He insisted that it was not actually plankton and that plankton refers to things like shrimp and krill. I'm insisting that dinoflagelates and other algae are plankton and that animals that float along are zooplankton, but can still be classified as plankton. The moral of the story is that it just depends who you are talking to ans what you are talking about! Anyway these floating plants are called Noctiluca, which translates to night light, by the Aboriginals. We could also hear a dolphin swimming around in the water near the boat. He was being somewhat illusive for a while. Eventually he came quite close to the boat and due to the Noctiluca you could see the silhouette of the dolphin in the water. How amazing! Then later I was just sitting there gazing up in to the stars thinking about how they reminded me of California and how much I miss California and blah blah my mind was wondering and then all of a sudden right in front of me the dolphin jumped about four feet out of the water! It was one of those times where you felt like that happened just for you.


It was really hot under the boat down in the cabins where the beds were so many people decided to sleep on the deck with the crew. It was cool and breezy and felt quite amazing outside so of course I was going to sleep outside in the open air. It was going alright for a while and then about 2:30 am the rain started. And it was not just a little bit of rain. The boat got soaked! I was having a hard time sleeping anyway so I went under deck and slept just a few hours.


On day two we visited Whitehaven Beach on Whisunday Island. It was awesome! To get to the beach we had to walk to the other side of the island so we had a short guided bushwalk on the way to the beach. We had clear skies and sun! The sand on the beach is an amazing shade of white and it almost pure silica. Since it's white it reflects the sun so it is not hot to walk on at all. The tide was coming in as we were on the beach so we saw the sand slowly disappear under the beautiful blue water. We also saw baby reef sharks and sting rays in the water there. We spent about 2 hours on the beach before heading back to the boat.


We did two snorkels on day two. It wasn't as good as the first day and a good deal of the coral was bleached. That means that it has lost its algae that lives inside the coral and the algae is what gives coral its color. So a lot of the corals had white spots where the algae was gone. Anyway it was still good snorkeling. We were able to put the sails up for a little bit on day two but because we were on a schedule and the winds weren't really strong we didn't go far so we had to use the motor most of the time during the trip.


We spent the night drinking goon (cheap wine in a box) and playing games. The second night it didn't rain so it was perfect weather for sleeping on the deck. Day three we woke up early to do another short bushwalk to some old caves that were used as burial grounds by the Aboriginals. After that it was time to go back to port. I would have liked to spend more time cruising around the islands. The Whitsundays were definitely a highlight of my trip so far.

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Photos

Whitsunday Rainbow
We saw this rainbow the very first thing on our first morning. It was a reward given the rain we endured overnight.

Whitehaven Beach
This was our first stop on the second day. What great weather we had in such a fabulous place!

Enjoying the View
We spent about three lovely hours exploring the island and the amazing beach.

Secluded Beach
A small secluded beach just over the rocks from the main beach. Scurrying around on the rocks gave different perspective of the beaches and water.

SV Whitehaven
The SV Whitehaven was our home for two lovely days as we cruised the islands.

Beautiful White Sand
The white sand on Whitehaven Beach is something like 99% pure silica. Since the island is protected, removal of the sand is illegal. The only time sand has been removed was for NASA's Hubble Telescope.