Airlie beach was a cool little town along the East coast and it was where everybody caught their boats from for the Whitsunday islands trip. This place had a lagoon even better than Cairns so the next morning before catching our boat we finished off the remainders of the previous night's Domino's pizza and soaked up some sun before heading to the docks. We were relieved to find out that the bus load of Chinese tourist complete with the obligatory camera and sun visors were not part of our boat trip and we boarded our catamaran boat 'Wings 2' with 23 others and set sail for the Whitsundays!

After a dodgy start of sitting down in the hull of the boat for an hour briefing we all emerged looking slightly green, but we soon recovered once we set sail and got our place on the front deck while we sailed out to the 74 islands! Luckily we had landed a good boat and a wicked group of people so we were pretty certain it would be a good few days at sea. Rich was ecstatic to discover that not only was the food delicious but that there was also usually enough for seconds! After a feast up on deck we cracked open a few cans of cider (very missed during our time in China!) and watched the sun set over the sea!

We were lucky enough to have our own double bed!...unfortunately it was converted into a booth dining area during the day so the next morning we were up bright and early so they could set up for breakfast! We arrived at the first of the bays we were to snorkel at and all once again squeezed into our stinger suits to hit the water. The dive site was wicked and we managed to see a turtle, angel fish, clown fish and hundreds of others we had no idea what they were! Luckily we met a couple with an underwater camera so we managed to get some brill pics! We also moored up near Whitehaven beach and took a walk up to the lookout point....This was the beach you see on the front of all your holiday brochures, it was perfect. The sand was pure white and the finest sand you can find as it is made from 95% silicone that comes from a crack in the earth's crust just off shore....they have made lenses for space telescopes from the sand it is that pure! They really weren't kidding about the sand...it was like walking on cotton wool it was that soft! We all played Frisbee and football on the beach for a good few hours before building a human pyramid and taking some tactful pics with Santa hats on....a must have for any OZ Christmas! As the sea started to come in we took a wonder along the sea front and spotted 10-15 stingrays all sitting only a few meters away in the shallow water, some of them were well over a meter wide! We also spotted something we thought was a stingray with a fat tail but after some closer looking we realised it was a sand shark! After a good few hours we were all sufficiently burnt and so we set off for the other side of the island where the boat picked us up...this was unfortunate for us as the one thing about this island that was not paradise...the March flies! These are the most disgusting thing you've ever seen, there absolutely massive...MASSIVE flies about 6x the normal size- bigger than a bee! Not only are they disgustingly big but they can also bite and are the most persistent bloody things you've ever known! So after fighting our way back to the boat using our flip flops to try and kill as many as possible (Rich had this pretty nailed and was single handily trying to wipe out the population!) We made it back on board with sand everywhere it was so fine! After another night of too much food and a bit too much goon we woke up at our final site to take a snorkel. We had another excellent morning in the water and then it was time to head back to the mainland...we attempted this on the front of the boat but after some ridiculous waves we retreated to the back for the return journey!