From the amazing trip on Fraser Island I took another fantastic night bus journey of 12 hours (after watching England getting pummelled by the All Blacks much to the delight of my kiwi friends who kept texting me all match!) north to Airlie Beach. There is no beach at Airlie Beach, however there is a nice lagoon complete with a bit of sand and some grass to lounge around on in the glorious sunshine. After a bit of paranoia about bedbugs at the hostel (I was so tightly wrapped up in my sheet that there is no way they would have got thro!), some sunbathing by the lagoon and purchase of beer and water, we boarded Tallarook III for a 3 day 2 night trip around some of the Whitsunday Islands. The scenery was absolutely stunning, the water was clear blue, the beaches were pure white. Whitehaven beach was stunning, tried to go for a swim in sexy rash suit (to guard against the jellyfish that weren't there!) but the further out you got the shallower it got due to all the sand bars, it was ridiculous! Spent a fantastic time eating lots of food and snorkelling around some amazing bits of reef, probably not the ideal combo but hey...! I didn't see Nemo but I did see all of his friends including a huge Maori Wrass which was about 4 1/2 feet long complete with cleaner fish attached! Chris swam down besides him anhd it was only then that you could see how big this fish was! The coral and the fish was beautiful bright colours and I just wanted to stay there all day. There was a free scuba dive but to be honest I chickened out but the others really enjoyed it. The second night I opted fopr sleeping on the deck in preference to next to the smelly diesel engine and it was great looking at the stars and chilling out, until just before dawn it was too cold and too damp so I clambered back downstairs but took great joy in getting up early and then waking everyone else up with lots of ice from the freezer (tee hee!!) which got me in a bit of trouble!!! When we got back to dry land we went out and had a bit of a party, found the bars with the free beer and free champagne, well I was on a budget you know! Met up with some of the people that were on Fraser with then had a very silly evening which I think is best kept between those of us who were there! (Lynette / Kathrine / Chris, have you got Sarah's email address??!!).