Today we are off to the Whitsunday Islands on a boating excursion, a day out on the water amidst 74 tropical islands that make up the Whitsunday archipelago, we are visiting Whitehaven Beach, known for its stunning white sand and oh my goodness this was a massive a massive understatement as you will see. Warm Tropical waters, what is not to like?

I could work from home very nicely here.

The Whitsunday’s are in the heart of the Great Barrier Reef. The plan is to go snorkelling today where we will see a variety of brightly coloured marine plants, coral and beautiful tropical fish, a walking tour and some time on the beach.

We are still in stinger territory and so we need to wear the delightful stinger suits, there will be an opportunity to do some paddle boarding. Will I at last manage to get up and stay up today?

Our Skipper is Shannon with a lovely lad Reece and the very beautiful Katie looking after us and providing us with information of where we are and quite importantly treats and lunch.

Katie takes us on a small outboard raft to the reef from the boat, no fins/flippers allowed here to ensure the coral is preserved due to its proximity to the surface. I really have taken to snorkelling and the reef here was more alive and beautiful, however, there were a lot less fish. There were some Green turtles out in sea as we travelled out and then one on the reef which some people saw and photographed they are very lovely creatures.

Top Top: Buy a Go Pro. Luckily a couple of people on our tour had one and they were able to take and share pics of our under water adventures, which I for one was very grateful of.

Next we headed to Whitsunday Island which was lovely on first arrival, however, nothing but nothing could have prepared me for the views at the look out, I have never seen a more beautiful view in my life, simply stunning. When you look down on these beautiful ever changing (due to the swirling sands and 6 hourly tides) you can see the stingrays in the waters of the beaches below.

The movies, Fools Gold with Matthew McConaghy & Kate Hudson was made here, and some of the Pirates of the Caribbean (they spent an obscene amount of money for about 10 mins of movie time mainly due to the Islands not bending to their demands so for eg they chartered every boat in the area to keep it clear for filming! Planted Palm trees on the beach which were then re-planted at Airlie at an outrageous cost. Hollywood clearly used to getting its own way paid very dearly for it hear with the unbending (quite rightly) Aussie’s.

We walked back down to the boat which had lunch ready for us and we sailed round the one of the beaches we could see from the lookout. What is amazing regardless of how hot the day is this lovely fine white sand is warm never hot, so no hopping or running required! It is made from silica making it very unique indeed.

There are a few choices re: exiting the main boat, go with Katie or Reece in the dingy, dive/jump off and swim or dive/jump off and paddle board, I chose the latter.

When I booked this trip i was determined that I would try everything and even if I didn’t manage or do something well I would have no regrets as at least I had tried! Whilst there is no photographic evidence of it, I managed to get up and paddle twice! Was it pretty & graceful…….No! Another new skill acquired I was feeling pretty good about myself lol.

Time to head back and the Skipper was blasting out some great tunes everyone singing us home. All the usuals, Sweet Caroline, Queen with Don’t touch me now, Dancing Queen and many more. We had a 10 year old boy at the wheel enjoying the vibes singing and dancing, he was so pleased with himself, a round of applause given as he relinquished his duties to the Skipper as we came into the Port.

Kit & Jay our American friends have organised a restaurant tonight for the group and it was so nice to be in a restaurant that actually served you. I had the Barramundi a beautiful white fish with Broccoli and mash it was delicious, you will have to take my word for it I forgot to take a pic!

Airlie Beach has a beautiful lagoon which I didn’t get a chance to go into just nice to know it is here I guess.

Tomorrow we have the morning to enjoy in Airlie, we leave at 12.30, flying to Brisbane at 3.30pm and then have a 4-5 hour commute to Byron Bay, the flight was delayed by about 40 min, we lost an hour going from Brisbane to Byron Bay when we crossed the State line and ended up getting to BB at around 11.15 pm local time, this was a wasted day with very limited options for food, truck stop for dinner where the choice was KFC who were running out of things or McDonalds, a lot of tired cranky travellers tonight, hopefully everyone will be in better form with a nights sleep. An earlier flight would have made all the difference.