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Published: April 30th 2008
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Am still in the Whitsundays and it remains as beautiful as ever... The sun is shining and the water is perfectly still, so motor sailing it is for the time being. After spending the night at Airlie Beach Hotel, my suitcase and I dragged ourselves along the boardwalk to the abel point marina to re-board Windjammer. Felt ‘at home’ as soon as I stepped back on the boat, whilst wearing my usual boat attire of bikini and shorts (and always barefoot as I am on ‘barefoot cruises’ after all!).
We set sail from the marina and made our way past Noble Island, Daydream Island and made our way towards Nara Inlet on Hook Island. Took the dingy to shore and landed on a small beach with rocks that had ‘sailing graffiti’ on it - at first we thought it might have been the aboriginal paintings (joke) but we soon found the aboriginal paintings in the cave after a fairly sweaty climb up a very steep hill. Note to self: don’t over exert oneself when it’s 27 degrees and nearly 70% humidity! Had a lovely dinner and discussion on the boat and then it was ‘lights out’ so that we could
gaze at the millions and millions of stars - and also saw the milky way and a black hole. Wow, is all that I can say to what I saw. Maybe the next 3 days will turn me into a star gazer in the way that my first 3 days on the boat turned me into a turtle lover!!
Woke up the next morning to the sound of Captain Bob shouting ‘is anyone making a cake?’ (not too sure what that was about at all) - I guess that’s a fairly unique way to wake up. Left Nara Inlet fairly early and sailed to Layman Island and took the dingy to shore (effectively a large sand bank) for a spot of snorkelling. I was so excited as saw my first Nemo!!! Hum, yes I am back to my new nature-loving self... Then as was swimming back to shore a massive sting ray disappeared from right under me - no joke it was easily over a metre long, so in keeping with my usual habits that totally freaked me out (but progress has been made as this time I didn’t swallow any ocean water with the shock!). Windjammer then set
sail for the Great Barrier Reef, as the wind is still none existent and so are the tides too (for some reason to do with the moon that I can’t remember what it is)... Headed out on the ocean with the Whitsundays getting smaller and smaller in the distance. Moored on a buoy by Bait Reef and then spent many a happy minute throwing in English muffins to the huge fish (including a Maori Wrossa that was easily nearly 2 metres long!) that surrounded our boat. Dinner was ‘interesting’ as once we had finished there was a lot of large splashing noises by the side of the boat, so out came the torches and the biggest fish I had ever seen had surrounded our boat - and there were loads of them too. Kenny (the ‘second mate’ for this trip) decided to throw the mushroom sauce from our beef into the water, which had meat stock in it - well, needless to say that sent these huge fish crazy and was (if I’m honest) a little bit scary. Think that we all said a few silent prayers that we wouldn’t see too many of these huge fish tomorrow when we
go snorkelling... I know that I did anyway!
Went snorkelling very early in the morning on Bait Reef and it was absolutely stunning - words cannot describe how beautiful the coral and fish looked. It was just perfect. The conditions apparently are only like they were about 6 times a year; perfectly still clear water, gorgeous sunshine, tides at a level where you could swim over the top of the coral and more fish that your eye can see. Got greeted as soon as I got into the water by one of the huge black fish that we saw around the boat last night - and I wasn’t scared at all, so off we ventured across the ‘stepping stones’ that make up Bait Reef. Essentially they are large columns of coral and have huge deep ravines between each ‘stepping stone’ - swimming along the top of the stones you saw loads of beautiful coloured fish (and three nemos, woo hoo!!!) and then when you cross from one ‘stepping stone’ to the next you look down the ravine and see huge fish (and still I wasn’t scared). Then whilst swimming over one of the larger ravines, Helen (one of the girls on the boat crew) pointed down to show me a massive shark. It was beautiful, so elegant in the way that it moved and looked like silver. I can honestly say that I wasn’t scared at all, so unlike the ‘mr turtle’ incident this time none of the pacific ocean was swallowed inadvertently at all. I was even the one who set off first to follow the shark to see where it went! Back on the boat we looked at the fish charts to see what we had seen and it was a white tipped reef shark and obviously it goes without saying that it was loads bigger than the one Toby saw in Fiji (but I would say that wouldn’t I?!). The rest of the day was spent sailing back to the islands and to Whitehaven Beach. It was as beautiful as I remembered it and this time we moored at the north end so I saw another perspective of the 7.5km pristine white sandy beach. Went for a little walk along the shoreline and then just lay in the sunshine! Back on the boat we sailed around to Cid Harbour where we moored for the night, ate our ‘last supper’ and played scrabble - we are truly hardcore people... Tomorrow it’s back to mainland for the foreseeable future, but I have to say that I have enjoyed being ‘on the water’ a lot more than I thought I would.
Woke up the next day with a few bumps and bruises, as did a rather spectacular 'wipe out' on the deck of the boat the previous night - and landed quite heavily on my derriere! Oh and then in the middle of the night hit my knee on the ceiling of my cabin on the boat, which is easy to do given the small gap that you have between the top bunk and ceiling... Didn't take long for us to get back to Shute Harbour and then it was 'goodbyes' to the crew and the other people on the boat before heading into Airlie Beach. Treated myself to a last minute booking at an apartment in Airlie Beach (which is up a rather steep hill, but other than that is perfect) - and spent the rest of the morning doing my washing. Domestic goddess I am not, but I was so excited to find out that my apartment room had a washing machine and tumble dryer!!!
The past couple of days in Airlie Beach have been nice and chilled (and also allowed me to get used to being back on 'terra firma'). I have had a dip in the pool, sunbathed by the lagoon and even caught an episode of Big Brother Australia (which was baaaaad). Next stop is Brisbane and my first Super 14 rugby match, which I'm very excited about.
L xxx
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Debbie
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I'm enjoying reading your blog and I have to say how impressed I am that you weren't scared of all the big fish. I definitely freaked out when I saw a giant turtle!