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Published: January 11th 2009
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Hello again!
Well, Kara and I made it back to Sydney this evening, but had an amazing past 2 days in the Whitsundays... I'll try to fill you in on all that we saw, but words can hardly justify how beautiful it was!
On Friday we were unsure of how the weather would be for snorkeling, so we rescheduled the tour for Saturday. After going out on Thursday night, Kara slept in late and me, being the person that never ever sleeps, woke up at 8:30 and after checking some emails and getting ready, I headed down to the Lagoon to get some sun... no reason to waste valuable sun time! We luckily had little rain, and the weather was absolutely beautiful! I laid out for a few hours, and also met another girl (again, traveling alone!) from Essex, England, named Claire. She was very nice and kept me company for awhile so it wasn't so quiet, which was nice. At about 11:30, I decided to head back to the hostel to see if Kara was up yet, since I didn't leave a note or anything about where I was going. When I got there she was up, so
we headed back to the Lagoon for a few hours and then went to Subway for dinner. When we got there, we ran into a few of the friends we made the night before-- a few Canadians and a nice guy from Switzerland. The Canadians had to catch a flight, but we sat for a while and talked with our new friend from Switzerland, Fabian. He was very friendly and nice-- he was also traveling alone so that he could learn to speak English better. After hanging out with him for awhile, we said our goodbyes and Kara and I went for a long walk from the lagoon out to the Marina. It was a beautiful night- the full moon was so bright that you could see a big circle of light on the ocean, lighting up the town. Gorgeous! The marina was pretty too, and we passed several holiday apartments and a resort, which someday I hope to own 😊 haha. After our walk we headed back to our hostel to get ready, and went back to Magnum, a local establishment we had been at the night before, just to stop by for an hour. We ran into our
other English friends that we met from the night before and talked with them for a bit.
The next morning we got up early to head out for our Ocean Rafting tour and snorkeling. It was SO much fun!! The boat was shaped like an ocean raft, except it was also like a ski boat, so it went fast over choppy waves but was still pretty safe. Kara and I sat up at the front for a bit, and it was so rough up front, that our hands hurt at the end from holding onto our chairs so tight!!!
First, the boat took us to the northern end of Whitehaven Beach and Hill Inlet (we were at the southern end a few days before). Honestly, probably one of the most beautiful places I have seen in my entire life. The sand was so white and fine, and I have never ever seen water so clear and blue. Normally, the tide is so low there that the white sand stretches across the ocean, but we were there on one of the highest tides of the season (because of the full moon from the night before!), so that wasn't the
case that day. We saw a few sting rays as well, but only Kara was brave enough to follow them to take pictures; I just watched! Whitehaven Beach was like heaven on earth... I'm not whether that beach or Heaven would be better! haha. After taking a million pictures of the beach, they took us on a walk through the Whitsunday national park, up to a lookout where you could overlook the Whitsundays/Whitehaven Beach-- the view was AMAZING! Took several more pictures there as well!!!
After leaving the beautiful beach, they took us to Hook Island, where we were able to do some great snorkeling. We saw a lot of really beautiful corral and colorful fish, and I was able to get a few good pictures on my underwater camera, which I'll have to show you later! They also took us to another area to snorkel, an area which they said was less snorkeled so the coral was not as damaged and the fish were more diverse. This was a great spot as well, although after all the snorkeling, I could taste and feel salt everywhere!! Once we were done snorkeling, they took us back home. The ride back
was beautiful as well-- we were lucky to have such a nice day after the weather we had had previously. We had blue skies and lots of sun-- couldn't have asked for anything better, and certainly got our money's worth out of that trip!
Once we got back from our trip, we grabbed some dinner, and then took the bus to Mackay, so that we could make our flight from there to Sydney today. By the time we got to Sydney last night, we were so exhausted, that we were in bed by 9:15 and didn't wake up until 9 am this morning! I think that's the most sleep I've had in a very long time! We were in a motel too, which felt like quite an upgrade from the hostel, since we had a room to ourselves with a nice bed, tv, fridge, micro, and bathroom-- not too shabby and great for sleeping! Since we had to check out at 10, we then headed to the market. I'll be honest... there isn't much to see in Mackay at all and when we walked past the markets, Kara asked me if it was supposed to be a market or
garage sale. haha, it just looked like a whole lot of useless junk! We then made our way to a coffee shop, had some coffee and breakfast, read for a little bit, checked our emails, and then took a taxi to the airport, where we headed back to Sydney.
We arrived in Sydney around 5:30 and Kara's boyfriend Andy was nice enough to pick us up... although he showed up squirting us with a water gun! Not quite the greeting we expected, but I thought it was funny, and I know Kara did too... although she acted like she wasn't amused 😊
When we got home we changed and then walked down to Darling Harbour. We then went to a place called Blackbird Cafe, where I tried some Kangaroo for dinner!! Yes, I know, you can eat kangaroo! Apparently kangaroo are overpopulated here, sort of like deer at home, so people are allowed to hunt and eat them. Sounds kind of gross, but it was actually delicious... better than both steak and chicken I thought! It's actually really healthy, too, it's a very lean meat with lots of protein and fiber... yum!!
We walked back home afterwards,
and next thing I know, Kara and Andy have fallen asleep on the couch behind me. So here I am, recapping the last few days for you.
Tomorrow we are walking around Sydney for awhile and then going to some BBQ that Andy's work is having. Should be fun. I can't believe I have to leave on Wednesday... I am having so much fun here and absolutely love this city! I also don't know how I'm going to handle the weather change, with it being over 90 here every day!
See you all soon! Take care!
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