Stuart and Carly hit the Sails!

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Days 121-124

After an overnight bus we arrived in Airlie Beach about 9. We couldn't check in until 3, which was so annoying as all we wanted to do was sleep! So, we checked out the town, had breakfast and made our way to the lagoon, which was really nice and tried to get some kip. You can't swim in the sea here because there are lots of dangerous jellyfish so the nice government of Australia make lagoons for people to swim in. You wouldn't get that in Blighty! Once we checked in we had another wander and popped into a shop to LOOK at some aborigonal paintings and ended up buying a custom painted top notch 4 ft didgeridoo! The guy caught us while we were too tired to say no! Should be good though! We had a lesson on it and Carly was digeripoo! In the evening went out for a drink and some nachos and then walked them off to find where we needed to go for our sailing trip tomorrow.

We checked out and walked down to the harbour in the rain to board our boat. We were sailing around the Whitsundays (a group of islands about 100km off the east coast) on a classic sailing boat called Ron of Argyle which was made in 1928 and includes guests such as Marilyn Munroe and King George V. And now they can add Disco and Rat to their list! We sailed out in the choppy water and Carly felt a little queasy. After a while we got past the choppiness and stopped in a pretty bay called The Blue Pearl and donning our sexy stinger suits, jumped in for a spot of snorkelling. The fish were really bright, and there were some massive ones called Bat Fish. The skipper threw in loads of bread around Stuart so they wouldn't leave him alone! We had some lunch, which was top notch and sailed on. In the afternoon we anchored at another spot for some fresh prawns and were dropped off on a little beach while the sun set just as it started raining again (bloody Australian weather - it's worse than ours)and then had some dinner and quite a few drinks. We gave up when it started raining again and retired to our little cabin.

A pretty early start, we were awakened to a feast for breakfast - croissants, fruit salad, cereal (pretty standard really but very exciting to travellers who live off economy everything!!) and set sail. The sea was pretty rough again and Carly was a lovely shade of green. We went for a snorkel but unfortunately the sea wasn't very clear due to the rain. Bums. We left there and sailed on to Whitsunday Island and had a walk through the bush to the infamous White Haven Beach. The sea was a gorgeous colour - different shades of greens and blue but the beach had loads of debris on it from the storms which was a bit of a shame. We hung around there for about 1/2 hour and then walked up to a lookout to see it in all it's glory. It was absolutely gorgeous. Another yummy lunch before a long old sail to Hamilton Island. We docked in a bay for the night and had a much needed shower. Hamilton Island was just so wrong - in the middle of these untouched islands was this high rise resort which was so out of place. We would have rather anchored in a bay but it meant we got a good nights sleep as we didn't have the noise of the anchor as the boat moved about. Had another quality meal and chilled out on the boat.

Another early one - first stop was Sunshine Cove where we jumped in for an early morning swim and snorkel. Again, because of the rain and lack of sunshine, the clarity wasn't too good. Had some lunch and sailed back on nice calm waters back to Airlie Beach. We picked up our luggage and sat by the beach to wait for our bus at 8.30. We arrived in Townsville at 1230 and had to walk to our hostel. We were shattered and just crashed out

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