November 22nd-26th

Day 6- Airlie Beach to Dingo Beach to Hideaway Bay (30km)

We woke early as per and headed to a travel shop to book ourselves onto a boat to the Whitsunday Islands. The Frauline (german woman) we booked with helped us out immensely and squeezed us on to a boat leaving in a few days. We knew we would have to wait but weren't that fussed about the odd night. The beach at Airlie isn't the best, so, like Cairns, they had built a gigantic lagoon. The lagoon was packed full of teeny boppers as Airlie Beach was still suffering the effects of 'schoolies week. The Frauline recommended that we should drive up the coast a while and go see Dingo beach if we wanted some peace and quiet. We stocked up the camper and went north along the coast. We made it there just in time for lunch and ate by the beach. Including us two the grand total of people on the beach was three! We sunbathed and read until the sun went down. It was only after the sun had gone down that we thought about staying somewhere. Unfortunately for us, the lovely Dingo beach park was off limits so we headed out back towards Airlie. On the way out we spotted a wallaby as he crossed the road. See if you can spot him (see pictures). As we sped down the road we saw a sign and ended up at Hideaway Bay on a campsite. The campsite was slap bang in the middle of nowhere and the owner told us it would soon be full of animals. He wasn't wrong, within minutes of us setting up for dinner two green birds were stalking Mel. As we finished eating a family of ducks/geese waddled past and helped us clear up. We soon went to bed in our boiler room camper. About half four we were woken by a very loud noise from outside. Usually we leave or rubbish underneath the camper so it doesn't smell out the van. Every night we had done it with no problems at all. This particular night however, it had attracted the attention of a large animal. We carefully peeled back the curtain in the van and startled the animal rummaging at our front tyre. Declan shouted 'Mel look' just as a Kangaroo ran off with its bag of swag. He obviously didn't like any of it though and he had strewn it all over the campsite for us to clean up the next morning.

Day 7-Hideaway Bay to Airlie Beach (30km)

After our visitor in the night we were both tired the next morning when we were woken by the sheer heat inside the van and the intensity of the sun through the paper thin curtains. We took full advantage of the surprisingly pristine bathrooms, and then headed back to Airlie Beach. We parked up the van a headed down to the lagoon. The 'Schoolies' had all left but sadly, travellers quickly took up the baton of being massive douche bags around town. However we found a nice spot by the lagoon and set up shop to finish our books and bronze up. Again we spent the day sitting about doing little.

Day 8- Airlie Beach to Whitehaven beach (by boat)

So the morning of the sailing adventure had finally come. We packed our things for the overnight trip and walked down to the pier. The other 20 soon to be shipmates all sat eagerly at the meeting point while Fergus checked us all in. We headed down along the pier and spotted 'The Hammer'. Our new quarters was formally a racing boat that had been converted to cater for tourists. While racing the ship needed a crew of 20 to speed along the east coast, it now ran smoothly with just 4. We were introduced to the crew, Captain Micko, Chopper, Fergus and the new boy Bram. Bram had never been with this crew before and Micko decided to call him Fabio for the whole trip because of his model good looks. As a meet and greet we all had to introduce ourselves, our country of origin and tell people our jobs. Looking around at the rest of the people on the boat we could tell some were German, the Chinese obviously stuck out but the rest were a mystery. The boat was a total mixed bag. Dutch, Swiss, Korean, Chinese, German, Austrian, Finnish and Swedish. Apart from team Asia it really did feel like we were in the Eurovision song contest, and that doesn't ever turn out to good for the Irish and Brits. The jobs were equally as diverse as the people on the boat. One woman developed cakes, another proudly stood up and declared she was a meat packer!! The crew did the same and it turned out that the only two Aussies were Mick and Chopper. Fergus was a toff from Kent and Bram was Spanish. After our safety briefing we were sent below for our bed allocation. Fergus sorted out his own kindred here and gave us the biggest double bed right at the front of the ship. Back up top the Swedish and Dutch 'youth' had commandeered the front of the ship and were busy singing 'My heart will go on' and flirting outrageously with each other. One of the Swedish lads looked strangely familiar and after a serious mind search we decided that he must have been a love child of Bjorn from the 70s super group we know and love as ABBA.

The Whitsundays I hear you ask, what are they? Well the 90 plus islands were found by Captain James Cook in 1776. The Captain and crew stumbled across the islands just after Easter on Whit Sunday, a catholic event, and were given the name of the Whitsundays. The warm nights, white sands and pristine blue waters make the whole area a natural beauty. Of the 90 islands, only 4 are inhabited and the rest are national parks with only a set amount of people per day allowed to sail the seas.

As the sea and wind was calm we motored all the way to Whitehaven beach. Whitehaven is on the largest island in the Whitsundays. It has been voted Australia's best beach for many years and the whole region is under strict government control. Many signs convey the motto, 'Take nothing but photos, and leave nothing but footprints.' The company we were with were quite strict about this and reminded us all not to take any shells or sand back when we returned to the boat. After dropping us of at 'backdoor' to the beach we headed up to the lookout point. The lookout point gave us fabulous views of the pure white beach below. We had arrived at low tide and the view of the inlet was amazing. The sand at Whitehaven is the purest in the world. 99.89% silica, all the impurities have been eroded away by the unique island currents. The sand is so pure that NASA paid an extortionate amount of money for a tonne to make the glass that is used on the Hubble telescope.

We walked through the forest until we came to the beach. Even though it was high noon, sun blearing, with not a cloud in the sky, the sand was cold. It is so fine and white that it reflects nearly all the heat of the sun. We stringer suited up and headed out into the serene blue waters. As we were walking out to the sea we came across a crab pool the size of a swimming pool. As we approached we noticed that a grey cloud was moving over it. As we got closer we realised that the grey cloud was actually millions and we mean millions of crabs scuttling towards the deeper water. The group enjoyed chasing the crabs into the pool then headed for a swim. After a few encounters with some fish we spent the rest of the day on the beach secretly trying to fill up a bottle to take back with us.

The boat roared into action and we headed off to find our place to 'park' for the night. Along the way we finally captured a picture of a sunset worth mentioning as we had made sure the SLR camera had fully charged batteries! We parked up the boat by a small island called Hayman Island overlooking Blue Pearl bay. The crew made us a lovely dinner and even helped pour drinks. Mel and Chopper became best buddies as he helped her squeeze wine out of a bag while not falling over board. The moon was out in full force that night and we soaked up the sea air in between a few glasses of goon!

Day 9- Whitsundays to Airlie Beach (by boat)

Life onboard a ship seems to start just as early as on terra firma. Fergus roused us all roughly at 7 by banging around in the kitchen/galley like a child looking for cookies. Being directly underneath another bunk we waited for the people in our section to file out before we got up. The two girls opposite us decided this would be the perfect time to pretend they were 90 year old degenerates and took what was literally an age in putting on some sun cream. The one girl actually applied it at times with 1 finger. We think by the end they could see we were waiting so being mainland Europeans (ignorant, inconsiderate and ugly) they took even longer. After a lovely bowl of soggy cornflakes we took up a great position on the deck and battled to keep it all day. The Captain turned up and told us about snorkelling on the reef before he dived in and left us with the rest of the crew.

The snorkelling was really good. We had about 20 meters visibility in the water and the high tide kept us from breaking anything. In the small boat, Fergus patrolled making sure we were safe and telling us where to avoid and where Elvis was. Elvis was a 2 meter long barramundi fish. He was the dominant player in these waters and swam around with a harem of 5 lady friends. Fergus explained that when Elvis dies the dominant woman of that group will grow another meter and become a male. This apparently is the norm for a lot of coral fish. We saw a raft of different coloured fish and even some sea cucumbers and starfish, all dotted about on the different types of coral. After a while it got a bit samey and cold, so we headed back to the ship before the others to reassume our position and have first dibs on the biscuits.

After the group had returned we ventured around to another section to do some more snorkelling, we opted to stay put and sunbathe. The boat was close enough for us to be entertained by the fish surrounding the sides. We then ate a nice lunch and powered home towards the bay. Along the way home Declan got involved in hoisting the sails (see pictures). Just as we could see the mainland the Skipper told us we were going to have good wind to end the trip. The good wind meant that we spent the last hour gliding through the water at an impressive speed. Every so often the Captain would change course, this led to the boat tipping to one side quite severely. He told us the ship could incline to angles of 45° and he made sure it did. We were literally clinging to the railings as we shot past a cruise liner with the main sail inching towards the water.

When we finally got back to Airlie beach we went to collect the van and get some dinner. We spent most of the evening with sea legs, bobbing about as we walked through the town. After an easy meal we set the van up ready to watch a film, we were both asleep before the credits had rolled.

Day 10-Airlie Beach to Yeppon (498km)

We didn't mess around waking up and leaving Airlie beach. We had shopping to do after eating all our supplies before the Whitsundays trip. Shopping done, we went to fuel the van to the brim. We had a mammoth journey ahead of us and didn't want to get stuck somewhere with no petrol. We rejoined the Bruce Highway and headed south. We had initially decided not to drive so far in one day and stop 120km south of Airlie, in a town called Mackay. After speaking with the Skipper on the trip he advised us to miss out Mackay and head to a place called St Lawrence. He had told us St Lawrence is a lovely place near the highway and the beach. We saw this as win win. After driving for 2 hours we drove past Mackay and saw it disappear in the rear-view mirror. After another two hours driving we stopped for lunch. We didn't know how far St Lawrence was and knew it wouldn't be well signposted. After some more driving and even some roadwork's we pulled off the highway down a thin road leading to St Lawrence. Upon our arrival we discovered that it was a ghost town, this seriously made us question Micko's taste in exciting towns. The beach was another hour's drive from the town so we had a decision to make. Do we stay in the ghost town or continue heading south to the next town another 120km away? We opted for the continued drive and headed outta dodge.

The town we were looking for was Yeppon, and as the title of this days driving shows we made it there. However this last leg of the drive was not without its tribulations. After passing a small local petrol station we decided the van had enough to make it without stopping to fill up. When we turned off the highway and saw a sign saying 'Yeppon 30km' we gulped hard. The needle was on 'empty'. We assumed that when the light came on that we would have a 20mile reserve like most cars. After a quick conversion from miles to kilometres we knew we'd be fine. That's when it got worse. The road we were taking was full on hills and dips. In an automatic neither is good. The engine struggles up the hill and then engine brakes for the dips. Upon surmounting our first hill the needle was now firmly placed on the wrong side of the E. We essentially held our breath for the next 15 minutes of driving as the power was waning from the vehicle and the hills kept coming. Eventually we got on to a nice flat piece of road. It looked almost perfect for a push start..........Chug........Chug........Chug.

We rounded the last corner and that's when it happened!!

(Gasping sounds)

We saw a petrol station!!! Cheers and whoops filled the van and the cold sweat was wiped from tense brows.

We found our campsite, situated next to a lake. It was windy but the breeze would be welcome by morning. We rounded the night off with some chicken burgers that shouldn't have been fried in a pan and gave ourselves a lovely bout of food poisoning. Yay!

So far we've travelled 1400km plus however many we sailed. Were still in Queensland and are just about half ways down. The longest stretch of driving is over but there are many more miles ahead.