Whitsunday Island - January 10, 2010

As Colin mentioned in the last post, we were a bit frustrated with trying to book a tour at The Whitsunday Islands. We decided against going to Cape Tribulation and drove the 6 hours from Mission Beach to Airlie Beach yesterday to make sure we had enough time to go out onto the Islands and the Reef.

We awoke bright and early after a decent night’s sleep in a 10 person dorm room. Three of our roommates were Brazilian girls, there was also an Australian, a Bulgarian, and a few Irish. We didn’t really hang out with anyone because we were pretty tired from the drive and had to be up at 7am to decide on a tour.

Last night, we found out all the 2 and 3 day overnight cruises leaving today were sold out. So, we arrived at the tour booking office at 7am hoping to find a tour that would have a cancellation. Unfortunately, no one had cancellations, so we decided on a back up option of a day tour today and a day tour tomorrow, staying overnight at Airlie Beach. Though we were a little disappointed to not sleep out on the ocean, as Colin mentioned, we knew that any experience on the water here would be amazing. The hostel upgraded us to a private room and a bathroom for booking the tour with them, which was an added bonus.

By 7:45am, we had a ticket in hand, beach towels, sunscreen, bathing suits on and were making our way to the bus stop for a sailing excursion to the beautiful beach called “Whitehaven Beach” on the largest of the Whitsunday Islands – called Whitsunday Island. The weather forecast called for sporadic showers, and we experienced beautiful white puffy clouds followed by light rain showers in the first 20 minutes on the bus ride.



The day actually turned out to be amazing! We did have a few showers at the beginning and end of the sail (coming into and out of the harbor), but the bulk of the day gave us crystal clear blue skies. I think we actually got wetter with the sailboat hitting choppy waters than we did with any rain showers. The first hour of sailing was decent, but the second hour had us in some pretty serious swells. The sails were up, but the motor was on the whole way to the beach going against the wind and current. A few people on the boat got sick with all the rocking. Colin and I felt fine, but decided to take a Dramamine before coming back after a filling lunch on the beach.



The ocean waters were so blue and Whitehaven Beach lived up to its name with fine, white sand.



Because of the stingers (aka Jellyfish), the crew gave us all stinger suits to wear in the water. The suits are pretty much just lightweight protective wetsuits. I put mine on, but took them off on the beach because I decided not to go in the water, while Colin never put his on (and also never went in the water).



The crew advised everyone to wear them, but did add that no one has gotten stung in those waters before, but the chance existed. There were a few people in the water without suits, but the air temperature had a nice, cool breeze where we didn’t need to go in the water.




After about an hour or two on the beach and a filling lunch, we got back on the boat and had a wonderful sail back to Airlie Beach.



Going with the wind and current was so much better than heading out there in the morning. The captain had both sails up and we were “surfing” the waves. Colin and I even got to help unfurl the front sail! For a solid 45 minutes we were completely relying on the wind to move us with the motor completely off.




We arrived back at Airlie Beach around 5pm and desperate for a shower checked into our hostel room. The upgraded double is really nice – it’s a hotel style room with a balcony, full bathroom, and TV – things we have not experienced in awhile. After freshening up, we went out for dinner and decided on the backpacker special at the Italian Restaurant here. I had a roast beef with summer vegetables and mashed potatoes, while Colin had a vegetarian pasta with summer vegetables as well. The meal was satisfying, but neither of us would call it amazing.

We finished the night with another trip to McDonalds to use the internet and research our plans once we leave The Whitsundays. We also have another early morning planned for tomorrow as we plan to take a cruise boat out to the Great Barrier Reef to snorkel!!