Whitsunday Islands

On Friday we made the trek from Mackay to Airlie Beach. A trip of about 150 km.

More massive sugar cane farms along the way and then some rolling hills as we approached Airlie Beach. We arrived shortly after noon on a blistering hot day. There was very little breeze and temperatures in the mid 30's with high humidity. We had made arrangements to go sailing for a couple of days so we took a bit of time to go and get the paperwork in order at one of the tour brokers before waiting for our 4:00 pm departure.

We did a walk down the main street and to the beach but that was just too hot.

Time to use the public toilet in the park. An interesting Aussie style trough urinal....

We did find a really nice man-made lagoon in the heart of downtown that had some shade and a bit of sea breeze. It had a large pool of deep water for adults and a huge children's area. This is here because for half of the year, you cannot use the beaches because of the poisonous jelly fish. Note the lack of bathers in the previous beach photo!

After lunch, we killed a bit of time checking out a new marina across the street from where we will be staying when we return from sailing. After that, we took the car to the Abel Point Marina where we were to meet up with our charter boat.

At 4:00 pm we met Captain Scotty and his helper Melanie and were welcomed aboard "Blizzard", a Beneteau Oceanis 50 for our two day cruise of the Whitsunday Islands.

This was one of the newest boats in the Whitsunday charter fleet and has a relatively small number of passengers which was appealing to us. They had sold all of the berths aboard so we ended up with a crew of 10 which sounded a bit too many but did work out OK. Three couples and four single girls. They were all very nice people, six from the UK and one German couple.

The Whitsundays are a fairly compact island group inside the Great Barrier Reef.

 As we were leaving the marina, Cap'n Scotty set the A-Sail (asymmetrical spinnaker).

We sailed to Butterfly Bay at Hook Island where we picked up a mooring for the night just before sunset. It was a little cloudy but a nice sky none the less.

We had a great chicken dinner and some drinks which helped in getting to know our new crew friends. Captain Scotty gave a great briefing on the Great Barrier Reef and the ecosystems. Things were not cooling off and the wind went to zero as we headed to our berths for the night. I would have to say that in 35 years of sailing, this was absolutely the hottest we have ever been on a boat. We had an aft cabin with opening ports but with no wind, it was stifling!

Somehow we managed to get some sleep but with daylight happening before 6:00 am, it made for a short night as breakfast was served at 6:30. No sleeping in on this cruise!

After breakfast we had our first snorkelling experience.  We got introduced to the "stinger suits", a Lycra body suit that will minimize the risk of getting fatal jellyfish stings from the box jellyfish or the irukandji jellyfish. Don't we look stylish!

I had a good chance to try out my GoPro camera underwater but haven't had a chance to download the videos yet so nothing I can show you here. The live coral was some of the best I have ever seen and there were multitudes of colourful fish. The visibility was not the best I have encountered snorkelling which is in part due to the algae living in the 30C water.

After an hour or so of water activity, we dropped our mooring and made our way through the passage between Hook Is and Whitsunday Island bound for Whitehaven Beach. This is a 6 km stretch of pure white very fine silica sand. We took the tender ashore and had the chance to walk the beach and relax in the shade under some of the trees.

There are a large number of old retired maxi racing boats that have ended up in the Whitsunday's. Some old Whitbread around the world competitors, Sydney/Hobart, Americas Cup and Admiral's Cup contenders. What the charter companies do is fill them up with bunks, booze, music and young people for either day sails or short overnight "cruises". Here is the old Sydney-Hobart winner ex-Drumbeat that is now aptly named "Spank Me"

After our beach time, we got back on Blizzard and did a short hop to Tongue Bay for a hike to a lookout of Whitehaven Beach. This gives a fabulous view of the spectacular beach.

And here is the crew of the "Blizzard"!

As we were leaving, we saw sea turtles and a Dugong (similar to a Manatee). Unfortunately the camera was down below.

Back on the boat, we set the A-sail and made our way to our mooring for tonight on the north side of Hook Is. A little better sunset tonight.

Another nice supper in the cockpit tonight and we were entertained by Captain Scotty's "rope tricks". A little better sleeping conditions tonight but still hot and with a lateral roll to the boat due to the surge in the bay.

Morning came early again.....

After breakfast, it was off to Blue Pearl Bay on Hayman Is.

Back into the damp Lycra stinger suits for today's first snorkel stop. This was a very colourful coral "wall" with a multitude of reef fish. We spent about an hour and a half in the water before departing for our second snorkel stop at the Langford Reef.

Captain Scotty had guaranteed sea turtle sightings but I was only able to see some from the boat. A couple of our crew were able to get nose-to-nose while in the water!

It was now noon and time to head back to Airlie Beach to end our two day charter. We had a great sail and crossed the bow of the Queen Mary 2 which was making its 4th visit to Airlie Beach.

Monte The Moose also had a great time on his first sailing adventure!

After bidding farewell to Scotty, Melanie and fellow crew, we made our way to our motel for a well deserved shower, swim and snooze by the pool.

We walked dow the street to a fish restaurant and rum bar for a nice dinner of local Barramundi. I still had a little bit of life left in me to post the blog of the last few days adventure.