With three days remaining in Airlie Beach we were hoping for some nice weather and luckily that's what we got.. well we did on Monday and Tuesday.

We had to be up relatively early on Sunday as we had a diving medical booked for 10.30am at the doctors. This was necessary for us to take part in the Open Water Dive Course we are booked onto this Thursday in Magnetic Island. Still feeling a little ropey and tired from the previous night we made our way down to the medical centre.. thankfully we all passed and received our certificates of approval.

After some lunch I did a bit of shopping and had a look around. In the evening I went out for some dinner with a friend to a lovely restaurant overlooking the ocean and Whitsunday Islands.. an Italian restaurant called Sorrento. It was a great evening and definitely the best meal I've had in Oz so far.. chicken salad to start and lamb shank for the main.. ridiculously good! A few drinks followed the lovely meal before making it back to the hostel around midnight.

The sun came out to play on Monday so after a much needed lie in from the lack of sleep over the previous few days we headed down to Airlie's beautiful lagoon which sits inbetween the coastal edge and the main street.

If the sun doesn't shine in Airlie there isn't much to do.. there is one street where everything is based and then there's the harbour.. it's main purpose is to provide access for those wanting to sail around the Whitsunday Islands.

Anyway, we topped up our tans for the majority of the day which was nice and relaxing and met up with the girls who were on our Fraser Island trip. We made some tea at the hostel and had a very chilled evening getting an early night to catch up on some more sleep.

It was another nice sunny day on Tuesday so we did more of the same and sunbathed by the lagoon with the girls from Surrey and the girls from our Fraser Island trip again. We decided to make our tea using one of the public BBQ's by the lagoon which was a nice change then it was back to the room to chill out and try get an early night for yet another early start.

The 7.15am bus will be taking us up to Townsville where we will catch a ferry over to Magnetic Island. We'll be spending five days and nights on the island taking part in a four day Open Water Dive Course. The aim.. to become a qualified diver. Should be interesting since I'm still not comfortable with being under water but my dive in the Whitsundays has given me more confidence. We shall see..

xx