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After a long over night bus trip I arrived in Airlie beach with nowhere to stay, I had this odd feeling that I needed to go to sleep I think it was because I had been sleeping sitting up all night. At the bus station there were minibuses to take people to their hostels. I approached the first driver who told me there were vacancies but it was $27 and 1km out of town, the next one was for Backpackers by the Bay only $25 and on the edge of town so I climbed on board and headed for the hostel, as I arrived I was relieved to see it was a nice quite friendly hostel. I went to the desk but they said we couldn't check in until after 10am and it was only 9.30am. To kill the half hour I started looking at the boat tours in particular a last minute booking board, I was doing this at the same time as a girl called Penny we got chatting and were both looking for a smaller boat with activities included, the first boat we chose was already full so we looked again and found an even better boat,
Summertime it had a spa as well as scuba diving, sea kayaking and sailing luckily this time there were spaces. By this time we could also check- in we decided to shower, change and go into town to pick up some supplies.
Once in town we had breakfast then headed to the shops, it was really nice we just hit it off Penny was a breakfast show radio JD for mix 96 in Aylesbury she also read the news. In the shops we had a fun trying on 100's of pairs of shorts, the shop assistant just kept bringing more and more, after a while I told him I had given up so we talked while Penny carried on trying on more shorts typical the pair I really liked but couldn't fit into fitted her perfectly and she bought them. whilst talking to the shop assistant he said so do you play hockey as well, I replied does Penny play hockey then, he looked at me funny and I said I only met her 2 hours ago, he couldn't believe it.
We decided at night to finish my box of goon from Fraser Island as I didn't want
to carry it any more and shockingly Penny had never tried goon (its a cheep boxed wine that all backpackers drink). I was convinced there wasn't much left so I kept telling her to just finish it, at 11.30pm I had to go to bed as I was really drunk Penny carried on drinking with the other people we had been talking to until 1am.
Saturday we had planned to go for a walk, we started at the market on the sea front and after buying supplies for dinner had to walk back to drop them off. As it was soo hot we decided to sunbathe by the pool and go for a walk later once it had cooled down. When we did walk we walked along the beautiful sea front then back around through town Airlie Beach is a small town so it only took about an hour and a half to do the walk.
Sunday we got up early and walked down to the harbour to catch our boat excited about this luxurious sail boat I was a little disappointed when I saw how small it was, it was a small wooden sail boat and the
spa was more like a big bath at the back of the wheel house. As we set sail they took us down one at a time to show us to our cabins, well that what I thought although I couldn't work out how there were cabins on the boat I just assumed it was some sort of tardis. Penny asked if we could share so they swapped people, when they took us down there were no cabins just shelves with a mattress on, Penny and I had a single and a half to share!! They called it a double, you couldn't sit up in with out hitting your head and it was right next to the toilets too. However I was too excited to let this bother me, I went back up on deck to look at the islands as we sailed to Whitehaven Beach, this is the most beautiful beach I have ever seen in my life of all the places I have been nothing compared to the white sands and blue sea. We were allowed 2 hours on the beach so we all played frizby, sunbathed and Penny and I went off to explore. Whilst exploring I nearly
stepped on a stingray I literally missed it by 3 inches, normally they swim off but for some reason this one didn't, I also saw a small shark and a big star fish.
After the beach we headed back to the boat where we were served sunset snacks whilst watching the sunset, later we had dinner and played games like having two people connected by a rope and they had to work out how to disconnect themselves, very funny to watch.
Monday, I woke up early to watch the sunrise which was beautiful bit I think sunsets are far better they have more colours and the whole sky is affected by a sunrise. It was yet another gloriously sunny day and also the day I was to scuba dive for the first time, after our talk I was a little scared as he told us not to hold our breath under water as if you do and you rise to the surface your lungs can pop, I was worried I would see a shark panic spit out my regulator and swim to the surface. I told out instructor this and he told me that I would be weighed
down, he would also be able to clear my regulator and put it back in my mouth is he saw me panicking so there was nothing to worry about. He took us over to the beach and in shoulder high water told us to drop down on to our knees. I did this and was fine, penny and Jodie both couldn't do this which meant he left me on the bottom while he spoke to them, this did me good as all the weights were so heavy I couldn't stand up so I had no choice but to sit on the bottem for 5 minutes until he cam down to get me. this gave me lots of confidence and I really loved the whole dive it was fab!!
After lunch we sailed out to another bay we had the option to scuba again but I decided to just snorkel this one as I was planning to do my open water license in Cairns and didn't want to spend more money on another dive here. The snorkeling was really good and I saw a squid, they are strange looking things.
Again we had sunset snacks and a lovely dinner
all the food on the boat was cooked by a brilliant chef and some of the best food I've had since I have been away.
Tuesday our last day we went sea Kayaking, I saw turtles and more rays, then we turned the canoes over (they were inflatable ones and ran along them I managed just about to run along all three. We went back to the boat had lunch and sailed for 3 hours back to Airlie Beach.
The Whit Sundays and boat sailing were brilliant but after 3 days in such close quarters I was ready to get off the boat. That night we Penny and I met up with a few other people from the boat we all had a nice fish dinner then hit the town. A really good night but after 3/4 bottle of wine I was very drunk and the hangover I had the next day was soo bad you would have thought I had drunk 5 bottles of wine, I think it was because of all the sun, sailing and scuba my body had just had enough well it certainly punished me so I won't be putting it through that again
for a while hehe!!
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