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Published: February 8th 2007
Whitehaven beach in the rain
This is the view we hope no one else sees (no, not Sally in her fishermans raincoat). Bear in mind, this should be one of the most stunning beaches in the world, but was reduced to a view worse than a grey English day.Before leaving Townsville (blog:
Townsville) for Airlie Beach, we had breakfast at the highly recommended 'Ladah cafe'. They had lots of different breakfast options to choose from. Jason had sardines and tomatoes on toast (not everyones cup of tea for breakie), but apparently tasty all the same - and it prepared him for the long journey ahead.
We arrived in Airlie Beach and stored our rucksacs (the tall ship we were about to board had small cabins so big rucksacs would have taken up rather a lot of space). We had dinner before going on the ship, as we were told that only a light supper would be served that night. The Solway Lass was to be our home for the next three nights. It looked great when we got on board despite the rain and soon we set sail, cruising out into the sea. The
crew introduced themselves and set out the rules for our cruise, which included 2 minute only showers in combined shower/toilet facilties! We moored up for the night and had some lovely pumpkin soup before playing trivial pursuit (Australian Genius version!) with our new sailing companions. We weren't as bad as feared we might be at it and began to consider ourselves fair dinkum Aussies! Despite the heavy rain continuing to fall outside, the sea was calm and we slept quite well, anchored in a bay off Hook Island.
The Wetsundays!
Day 1 at sea The next day in the persistently heavy rain, we set sail for Whitehaven Beach, one of the most photographed places in Oz. As we sailed along the sea began to get a bit rough and before we knew it, the boat was rocking and rolling in directions we didn't realise gravity would allow. Jason started feeling seasick. We stood outside, Jason trying to focus on land. He held out for a while before being sick over board - not just once but several times. Before I knew it this had started a chain reaction, as the girl next to him was being sick and then
Damo takes us back to the Solway Lass
Returning from the rainforest walk on day 3. Damo (crew/barman) takes us back. "Sweet as" the guy next to her. At one point, there were about six people lined up all being sick overboard. Jason was feeling dizzy by this stage and was on his knees puking up (we found out later that they girl next to him thought he was praying!!!). Finally we reached our destination, a small beach on the opposite side to Whitehaven, from which we could do a walk to a viewpoint of the famous beach. Jason and I took it slowly, Jason relishing the fact he was safely back on land. We reached the viewpoint (in the pouring rain) to find that the tide was in and that Whitehaven beach wasn't very spectacular at all in the appalling weather. Jason was dreading being back on the boat but it was that or being left on an island with lots of midgies. So we got on board again only to head back the way we had just come, but this time using the sails rather than the motor. The sea didn't seem to be as rough and things were going well but then the sea decided to hit Jason with a double whammy and we were rocking about again. It wasn't
Solway Lass
View back to the Solway Lass through the rain on day 1 long before Jason was back on his knees, puking overboard again. This time I tried to take his mind off things by making images from the rock formations. This seemed to work (or rather Jason didn't have anything left to throw up). We eventually got back into calmer waters, where we dropped anchor for lunch.
Day 2 at sea The next day the torrential rain and growing winds persisted. The weather was so bad that the skipper recommended we moor at the luxury resort island of Hamilton for the rest of the day. Once he told us there were public showers with hot running water and everything, we were there! We disembarked, only to get soaked through again, so took shelter in the first shop off the Marina - which happened to be the Foot gallery (
http://www.foot.com.au/). This place has amazing sculptures (if you are on Hamilton Island, you must visit!)...good job, as we were sheltering here until the rain eased. It's one of those times you wished you could buy everything, although it does cater for the full range of budgets, from backpacker to those that have their own private yacht moored in the marina! Eventually we felt
Fed up!
I've been sick more times than I can count without a spreadsheet, I feel dreadful, I'm soaked (still/again), this boats stinks and it's still raining. we were outstaying our welcome without buying, so gave in...yes, we made a run for it through the torrential rain and eventually found the showers. We both had the longest, hottest most glorious showers ever! We then discovered the free resort bus service, so pretending to be hotel guests (just in case) made use of this to the resort. Here we caught up in the bar with the few of our shipmates that made it this far for some pool, table tennis, pinball and drinks. It was heaven being away from the smelly, damp boat; we'd almost dried off for the first time in over 2 days. Some of our shipmates took photos of palm trees leaning sideways in the heavy wind and rain whilst we relaxed.
Day 3 at sea The rain continued. It was unbelievable, I'd never seen so much rain fall out of the sky in 3 days and show no sign of coming to an end. By now we'd heard the reason for this - a cyclone brewing to the north of Queensland. By now we'd accepted we'd not see clear skies, seas or the sun and the Whitsundays were renamed the Wetsundays. We cruised
The rain stops!!!
Day 3 and the rain has stopped at last. The yellow coats come off and everyone is happy! up from Hamilton (where we'd moored overnight) to Cid Island, where we anchored for a rainforest walk. I was so sick of being wet (and had run out of dry clothes) that I stayed onboard and took to drinking (a Baileys or 2 helped!!). Jason, keen as ever to get onto terrafirma, strapped on the yellow raincoat and went ashore. The rain was not going to stop him. The 30 min walk was more of a trudge through a river...there were waterfalls going over and down the pathway in all directions. Anyway, he was able to get the photo of the Solway Lass through the trees...and there was increasing brightness in the sky above, even if the rain still refused to stop. But stop it did and we even saw a glimmer of blue sky. There were smiles all around and some even took to sunbathing on deck...there had never been so many people on deck (I think all 30 of us were making the most of it). The sails went up and we sailed back to Airlie Beach. This is what the 3 days should have been all about - day 3 of the sailing was superb. We even
Relaxing (at last) on the bow
Watching the hoisting of the sails which went up at last...there was plenty of wind from the cyclone developing to the north of Queensland! saw a Dolphin following us and leaping out of the water, although something had taken a big bite out it's fin.
That evening we went to Beaches Backpackers/bar/restaurant with all of our shipmates. It was a very lively bar, the atmosphere helped by large screens of England actually beating the Australian's at cricket that day (I'm still not convinced they didn't dig that up from the archives)! A great time was had by all.
Reality hit the next day though...we were stranded in Airlie Beach.
Stranded in Airlie Beach
No buses were getting in or out of Airlie. The airport had even been closed. Airlie Beach had had it's heaviest rainfall in 10 years. In 3 days over 480mm had fallen - yes, almost half a metre!! There was confusion all around for sometime, but it became clear that parts of the Bruce Highway were under over 2 metres of water and were inpassable. The river that runs through the centre of Townsville (which seemed barely a trickle, with metres of room to swell whilst we were there) was close to bursting point and engulfing the town. We could not get away from this rain!
Sally
The sails are up!
Let's go sailing at last. contacted Greyhound directly, who confirmed our bus was cancelled. The next earliest bus might be on Tuesday (3 days later). This meant we would be stuck with this weather for a further 3 days!! Worse still, we'd miss Hervey Bay/Fraser Island and have only two days in Noosa before going on, as planned, to Brisbane. Even worse, we'd have to resort to junk food - as that was about all Airlie had to offer!! In desperation we searched the web for cheap flights. It seemed many others were doing the same, but eventually we found some Jet Star flights out of the little known Proserpine airport just 26kms from Airlie on the Sunday (1 day later). It blew the budget at AU$200 but we snapped them up quicker than you can say "I'm a celebrity, get me out of here!". Then, as a matter of urgency we searched for some accomodation for that night as we were only booked for the previous night : Airlie Waterfront Backpackers was decidedly average, but it would do for one night. And so we escaped to Brisbane, arriving in the city 4 days earlier than planned and poorer! (Blog:
Brisbane)
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Alix
non-member comment
yummy!
Damo looks nice to me! ha ha ha xx