Right, this is going to be a long one so get yourself a coffee, a slice of cake and get comfortable

After the drive up from Mackay we arrived in Airlie Beach which is the gateway to the Whitsundays. We were both really looking forward to this so we checked into the Big4 camp site which happened to be themed for frogs so Emma was well chuffed! Frog stuff everywhere!!! Nice site but the only bummer was Andy wasn't feeling well at all and hate to say it but he had all the symptoms of a mild case of the flu, or as most likely over here, Swine Flu! No big deal as he got over it after a few days of us taking it easy.

Monday, our first full day in Airlie Beach, we drove down to the marina and then did a walk around the coastline for about 3km into the main area of Airlie Beach where we just mingled round the shops for a bit, got lots of tour info brochures of which there were tons, before heading back to the camp site to take it easy as Andy was feeling a bit rubbish. First impressions of Airlie Beach though were really good, well nice place and really hot!!!

Tuesday. Andy was still feeling rubbish but we walked to the local Woolworths to get some food for the next few days, before driving to Shute Harbour. This is the main harbour where all the ferries etc leave to the Whitsundays so we wanted to see where it was before booking anything. Bonus was the scenery on the way was really cool with lots of lush green mountains surrounded by aqua blue water on all sides. On the way back from Shute Harbour we stopped in Airlie Beach and found a cafe on the main strip called The Village Cafe with a gluten free menu, so we stayed there for lunch. After this we had a revelation!!!! Next door was an ice cream store, part of a big chain over here called Baskin Robbins. Andy had been keen to go and get some ice cream every time we passed one but till now we never went in, but over lunch Andy was looking on the web on his iPhone and turned out Baskin Robbins do gluten free ice cream so we went in for dessert. OH MY GOD!!! Its the best ice cream ever!!!!! Everything is labelled with what's in it so Em was totally safe and WOW, its awesome!!! How sad is this, we even got a loyalty card so keep getting free ice creams now as we have been going back to them so often. AWESOME!! Anyway, we digress, this place is still awesome, 26c in the middle of winter, how cool is that!! Last thing, at night when we came back to Bolt we saw a Possum in the tree next to us. Really cute fella but not knowing too much about it we gave it some distance in case it tried to kill us

Wednesday, not much happened. We booked the tours we were going to do, lounged round the camp site, ventured into Airlie for a Baskin Robbins (hehe) and then saw a MASSIVE spider in the camp site reception. Body the size of a cream egg, big hairy legs....urgh.....thats enough of that!

Thursday. We're going to the Whitsundays!! We were booked with FantaSea to go to Whitehaven Beach, with a short 2hr stop over at Hamilton Island, which is actually the island that formed part of the "Best Job In The World" campaign a few months ago. We arrived in Hamilton nice and early and spent a couple of hours exploring the island. Quite nice, just heavily developed, but we did see a really cool art place where the lady makes sculptures out of marble. Amazing to see and we have some pictures for the blog also. After Hamilton we boarded the ferry for the 40min trip to Whitehaven Beach, but once we boarded the crew told us it was going to be rough and they weren't kidding! Christ the seas were choppy, lots of people being sick, but after 20mins we made it to Whitehaven. No other word for it but WOW! Its officially known as the whitest beach in the world as the sand here is 98.9% pure silica which is found no where else in the world, and as its national park its protected so there is nothing here apart from day trippers like us. Totally amazing to see, such soft pure sand. We spent 3 hours here, only went in the sea a bit because there were some stingers (jellyfish) around, before the boat ride back which was rough but not as bad as the way out. Still it was an amazing experience though!

Friday we decided to wash Bolt so took him to a car wash and gave him a good pressure wash down which made him feel much better After that we lounged round the campsite, played a game of basketball and also went on the kiddies jumping pillow! How grown up are we?!?!?

Saturday. Oooooohh this was a good day. We were going to the Great Barrier Reef today, but as this was a once in a lifetime trip we decided to do it special and booked a seaplane trip for our journey out to Reef World, which is a floating pontoon at the Great Barrier Reef where we would spend the day. The plane only seated 8 people but it was an awesome experience. The pilot took us over the Whitsunday Islands as well as Whitehaven Beach and the Hill Inlet which is an amazing sand formation. We then headed out to the Great Barrier Reef which was simply mind blowing! We only saw a small part as it runs for over 1500km but it was just astoundingly beautiful to see. We also got to see the most photographed part of the reef which is Heart Reef, a natural coral formation in the shape of a heart. Brill!! After this the pilot flew us to Reef World where we landed on the water and had a dingy pick us up and take us the rest of the way. YEAH!

Reef World was an amazing place. Its a pontoon anchored right next to Hardy Reef and you can snorkel right up close to the reef. When we first got off the boat we saw a massive Grouper fish which the crew told us was 1.5m long and can weigh up to 288kg!!! As we flew out we beat the main boat coming out so had time to sort all our snorkel equipment out before the rest of the people arrived, at which point we went on a submarine trip which is part of the price to look at bits of the reef. Great experience! Once that was over though the fun started as we donned our wetsuit, flippers and snorkel equipment and got wet! WOW! The water was crystal clear and there were fish everywhere, hundreds of them everywhere you look! We spent nearly 2 hours snorkeling which was amazing to do, before it was time for lunch and then we had to leave on the boat back to the main land. After the rough trip the other day we had brought sea sick pills and we are glad we did as the ride back was horrific! Almost Deadliest Catch / Perfect Storm we reckon The seas were 3m so that means each wave you go up 3m, but then its 6m down! My god the boat was rocking so bad for over 2 hours that half the people on the boat were throwing up. So glad we sat outside even though we go soaked but at least we got back safe.

Sunday. Finally time to leave Airlie Beach (boooooo) so we headed north at 10am for 275km to Townsville. On the way we went via a town called Bowen which is where they filmed a lot of the film Australia with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. Again, another ghost town. The only good thing was we found a cafe which served gluten free fish and chips and Em was able to have the first crumbed fish and chips since she was diagnosed as a Coeliac in June 2004. She loved it!!!! The only other reason for coming here was a famous pie shop which Hugh Jackman recommends and its part of the Tourism Queensland Must Do List. But, being a ghost town it was shut!! Stupid eh as loads of tourists/travellers like us were left standing outside like idiots. Anyway, after this we carried on to Townsville which was a humid as hell and luckily got the last unpowered site at the campsite we found (phew!).

Thanks for reading, you can move around now, we are finished waffling