Wowed in the Whitsundays

Day 1
On Friday morning we boarded the "Siska", an 80ft maxi sailing boat which in it's heyday smoked a bunch of records and even had Prince Charles on the crew. Joining us were 19 other guests and 3 crew members. The sky was crystal clear and there was a light breeze in the air. It was going to be a scorcher you could tell. What better way to spend it than sailing on a sick boat in the tropics.

The Siska!

We set sail an hour or two in and got up to 12 knots by wind power as the boat hiked way over. It was cool. After continual reminders by the crew not to be "that guy" and pretend like we won't get burned Ben and I donned some sunscreen around 11am. This however was not early enough and later that evening to our horror we deemed ourselves "those guys" and had to ask around for some aloe. I also torched my lips. We pulled up to Whitehaven beach in the evening which is 98% silica (really high %) and it squeaked when you walked on it. Apparently they used that sand to construct the lenses for the hubble telescope and the Chinese keep asking the Australian government to buy a bunch of it for their stuff. So after a game of cricket and soccer on the beach we headed back to the boat for a great meal. That night I slept on deck after trying to sleep in the cabin which must have been 40 degrees.

Ben on deck

Day 2
I woke up at 5:30 to a turtle coming up for air and a beautiful sunrise. We headed up from Whitehaven beach to a sick lookout overlooking hill inlet where all the nice white sand from the beach heads inland or something like that. Anyways, it looks spectacular.

Wow


My footprints.

Then we had a few hours to wander around, go swimming if you dared (jelly fish season). Everything was so beautiful it was nice to be able to wander around and check it out for yourself. We saw stingrays, birds and a turtle stuck in a tidal pool. (it just had to wait for the tide to come back in) As the time to head back to the boat came Ben and I saw the ground moving ahead of us. As we moved closer we saw it was zillions (yes, zillions) of tiny crab running around. So of course we chased them. They were definitely subscribers to "strength in numbers".

Later we went to a tiny island/cay and watched the sunset. Initially this sounded lame but it was actually really fun.

Day 3
I slept on deck again and at 7am it was already pretty hot. We hung out on Black Island then did some snorkeling then raced another boat home and heckled them when they got close. It was really fun. I think the other boat was full of librarians or something b/c they were pretty lame.

Black Island
The Siska in action
The enemy