Whitsundays, more like Wetsundays

On the way to the Whitsundays we stopped for a couple of nights in Mission Beach - mainly to chill out on the tropical beach and walk through the rainforests (along with quite a few enormous spiders).We booked ahead for a luxury Whitsundays weekend sailing trip and a camping trip to Fraser Island and journeyed our way down the coast to Airlie Beach.

The tropical weather seemed to have followed us from North Queensland and we spent the hours before our boat trip sheltering in Mcdonalds with hundreds of other new age travellers (and their laptops).Our fears of the trip being cancelled were put to rest when we arrived at the marina.As we watched the GAP year kids piling onto a large boat with bags of beer and alcopops we were soooo relieved we'd stumped up the extra cash to go on a small (4 double ensuite cabins) catamaran with 2 crew.Greeted on board with the first of lots of delicious food we started the very choppy journey to the Whitsunday Islands and a calmer spot to spend the evening.The clouds passed so we could gaze at the stars before retiring to our private cabin to watch a DVD.The next day the weather wasn't so bad with bursts of sunshine - We were dropped off at Tongue Bay so that we could walk over the hill to Whitehaven beach.The sun managed to stay out for a little while we wandered around the white sands and back onto the boat for yet more food (a bit above the backpacker's standard we've become accustomed to).

In the afternoon we managed to do some great snorkelling with beautiful coral and hundreds of fish.Sam developed an interesting technique when he was scared of the larger fish - simply lift your head above the water and they won't be there any more.More snacks and dinner of steak which was perfectly complimented by the red wine box we'd taken aboard - the cheapest in the bottle shop at 4 litres for $16 (good ol' Stanley Cab Sav) - also not quite the standard of the other passengers' beverages but ours lasted far longer!

Our final day on the boat included a bit more snorkelling and spotting turtles - we also spotted the winner of 'The Greatest job in the world' from last year filming an advert on a tiny island.The journey back into the marina was pretty choppy as the cyclone threatened to arrive in Airlie Beach.We sat on the netting at the front as the concentration of holding on and the constant splashes seemed to make us less seasick.We arrived back we realised how lucky we'd been - the boat wasn't going back out and all seasickness tablets had sold out!

Just an afternoon to kill in the rain before getting the overnight bus all the way down to Rainbow Beach.

Liz