Whitsunday's Sailing Trip

Hanging Off the Edge of the Boat

We woke up bright and early on Monday morning (Oct 18) to be at Abel Point Marina by 8:30am and were super happy to see that it was going to be a great sunny day! We got our stringer suits (same thing as a wet suit), met the crew and hopped on the boat! I don't know why, but we were surprised to realize how tight 25 people plus the crew is on a sailboat! Really tight I'll tell you! :) By default, Dev and I got one of the worst beds in the boat because we had been sitting on it during the briefing. Pretty funny, maybe hard to describe but the top came down across half the bed, leaving about a foot of space (and virtually making it unuseable) so we had to sleep head to toe for enough room. We were in the back of the cabin where there was no doors to the outside (therefore no ventilation) leaving everyone melting there during the night and to boot, it was right beside one of the two bathrooms on the boat! :) But apart from getting almost no sleep either night, it was fine :) I'm not sure that many people got much sleep, it's just the nature of the trip I guess :)

Striking a Pose....Under Water!

It was a huge sailboat and a pretty windy couple of days, so when they put the sails up, everyone had to sit on the deck along one side of the boat with their legs over the side. We were pretty nervous sometimes when the boat would go almost vertical on the wind! The first day they took us to a spot near Hayman Island to snorkel and do our intro dive. It was our first time seeing the Reef and it was pretty incredible! So many crazy colours of fish and some of the reef was still those pretty colours of blue, purple and green. We outsnorkeled everyone for sure! Spent a couple hours in the water. The intro dive was also really cool, fairly easy although we didn't have to worry about setting any of the gauges, just concentrating on breathing, swimming and popping our ears. It's crazy how loud your breathing sounds to yourself down there, just like on the movies! :) We maxed out at just under 5 metres of depth. The instructor wouldn't let us take our underwater camera so we could focus on the task at hand - hence no diving pics.

Getting Our Snorkel ON!

Catching Fish with Bare Hands!

After that, our boat headed south along the islands to stop for the night and we saw a crazy sunset across the water! Then the bar was open (they didn't let us drink while diving and snorkelling was happening) and we had some beers at our resting point for the night. :) The next day we woke up to find we were right in front of Whitehaven Beach, the most famous of the beaches on the islands. After breakfast, they took us out on the dingy to the island for a few hours until lunch. The weather was gorgeous so the water was a crazy colour of blue and the sand is like white flour, crazy white and soft and powdery. Our camera temporarily broke so we didn't get many pictures. It was just like the postcards tho! :) After lunch, they took us to another snorkel spot and we anchored again for the night.

Sunset on the second night of the trip

Finally, the next morning the weather had finally given up and it was pretty rainy and chilly, luckily it was the day we were going home! They dropped us off at a sand bar for some more snorkelling but we think they were tricking us because there wasn't much to see and they didn't come get us for a while, we think they were cleaning the boat and didn't want anyone on it. So the two of us, a British guy with his Swedish girlfriend spent an hour or two staying warm in the water and trying to signal the boat :) We had lunch and the boat headed back to Airlie Beach. It was a great trip, but we were both exhausted! Megan ended up having Swimmer's ear (in both ears!) and a cold sore so we both took long-awaited showers and checked into our comfortable hostel room and went to sleep! :)



At Whitehaven Beach - best beach ever!

For the end of the week, we booked four nights at Nomad's in Airlie Beach and divided our time between lounging, sunbathing, eating, drinking and even a little bit of job searching. It's a competitive market out here in the fruit/vegetable industry! :)