Ah, the Whitsundays... a stunning group of islands that share part of Australia's famed Great Barrier Reef, it was the destination for my next big adventure. Wayyy back in Nepal, I blatantly picked my fellow trekker John's brain for any recommendations for three weeks in Australia. After living there for 6 months, he had a good sense of what were the must-do's vs. “nice if you have time”, and he sketched out an awesome itinerary that I pretty much followed verbatim – John, you rock!
#1 on his list was a sailing trip to the Whitsundays, so I did some research and booked myself on the Alexander Stewart, an all-wood tall ship. Our itinerary? Three days and two nights of (in no particular order) sailin', snorkellin', and the odd bit of drinkin'. Good times were definitely in store...
A funny quick aside – the Stewart was originally a joint family venture in the 80's, as nine Aussie families came together to build a boat that would serve as an escape route in case of nuclear war. A s they were planning on taking refuge in hopefully fall-out free Antartica, they built in strong, uber strong, with no just one, or even two layers of Australian hardwood in the hull. Nope, they went for FIVE. This boat was STRONG.
Plus big... instead of the common room of bunks I was envisioning, we each shared double rooms, and two rather space-efficient bathrooms:
The other plus side of the tour was that it attracted a more chilled-out group of 15 to 20 travellers, from the late 20 to mid 30's, so there were no horror-stories of all-night drink-a-thons keeping everyone awake.
Right – so we met up with our intrepid crew, and headed out... we'd mix up sailing and using the motor, but we made good time to our first stop – a protected bay for some snorkelling, home to a massive and very friendly Maori Mauss (sp?) fish who is so accustomed to snorkellers, that he'll even let the odd person pet him.
We had to wear stinger wetsuits on the off-chance that there were jellyfish even in the winter offseason, but we saw 'nary a one.
Beyond the swarms of fish and coral, my roommate and I got a great sighting of a large sea turtle. For a few minutes, we were able to just swim above him and watch as he cruised effortlessly over the grass and coral:
… just awesome.
Our afternoon stop was an hour or two on “One Foot Island” - a low-lying spit of sand that barely peeks above the waves at low tide. We got some sun in, and wonder of wonders, it turned out that we had another pair of ultimate players aboard – from New Brunswick of all places... so throwing the disc and getting some wave layout practice was essential:
Then, after our oh-so-arduous day, it was back aboard for a drink at sunset:
Garlic/lemon fresh fish for dinner, with a whisky to wash it down, and then Josh, our captain gave us a surprisingly detailed overview of some of the wildlife in the area, and a bit of trivia behind the name of the islands... turned out that Whitsunday is the name of the UK holiday being observed on Cook's Endeavor when it first sailed into these waters.
And, more quiet taking in the brilliant night skies (why, or why can't it be easier to get a picture that does them justice??)... then being rocked to sleep, listening to the waves against the hull right by my head in our room in the bow - a great start to a great trip.
No comments:
Post a Comment