Sail away - Airlie Beach, Whitsundays

We have decided to spend less time on Australia's east coast, in favour of its west coast. One simply can't see the whole of the country in 3,5 months. We therefor are slightly short on time for our drive down from Cairns to Brisbane; we've got a fortnight, including time to spend in Brisbane. Our dilemma now was: Whitsundays yay or nay?

Whitsunday Island

The Whitsunday islands are a group of islands off the coast of Airlie Beach, on the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef. They are famous for their idyllic beauty and calm waters. To really experience them it is best to do a multi day cruise, with of course some diving on the reefs. But we've just came back from our liveaboard, and have neither budget nor time for a multi day sail cruise. So do we settle of a one day cruise, that most likely will not do it justice, or skip them all together? We asked my brother, who lived in Oz for a year, for advise, and decided to go for that 1-day cruise.

Setting sail

We arrived in Airlie Beach around 15:00, and before finding a place to camp that night, we walked into one of the travel agencies to see if any cruises  were available for tomorrow. It turned out that there weren't that many day trips, and of those, some were already fully booked. It looked like we had a choice of three: Manta Ray that took divers, a speed boat cruise that did multiple stops, and a sailing cruise that did fewer stops. Our first choice was Manta Ray, but too bad... fully booked. The speed boat had exactly two seats available, but we decided we preferred the sailboat. Luckily they had some spots left too! We spent some of our birthday money and happily went to search for a campsite for the night. 

Prepping to snorkel

The next morning our alarm rang at 6:30. We had a quick breakfast and drove to the marina where we parked for the day. We boarded our sailboat. Southern Cross was 20-year old, 68-ft former racing yacht, now modified for tourist comforts. We motored out of the marina, and once out, the sails went up! Calm waters with a good breeze; in the next 2 hours we sailed to Hook Island. Because it was a bit overcast I did put on a jacket, but it was a lovely trip, and we were really happy that we did actually set sail.

Hill Inlet

In the last stretch to our snorkelling spot, the sails were lowered, and the boat lay flat in the water again, so we could put on a our very sexy stinger suits! Even though it is no longer stinger season, we were obliged to wear them. We didnt get fins, the risk of damaging the reefs with fins is pretty big. Therefor only a few companies are licensed to hand out fins, our tour operator wasn't.  Very solid reasoning, but still awkward to snorkel without fins. The snorkelling itself was lovely, and quite similar tot the shallow diving we did in the reef up by Cairns. By the time we got out, lunch was waiting for us, and the sun came out!

Track to the look out

After lunch we cruised to Whitsunday Island, and got a dinghy ride to the beach at Hill Inlet, where Whitehaven Beach begins. They say Whitehaven Beach is one of the finest in the world, and it sure is gorgeous. The finest silica sand I have ever seen or felt!

We walked up to the lookout and enjoyed the views over the mangroves and sea. Down on the beach again we walked a bit when we suddenly heared a sort of clicking noise... We looked around and saw hundreds of little crabs running! The disappeared in their little holes when you approached them, just as quickly as they had appeared, but it was an interesting encounter. And they had really lovely colours too, that kind of emphasised their movements. 

Gorgeous little crabs

Back on the boat, we headed back to the shore, and sailed for another good 1,5 hours. Sunburnt, wind swept and salt covered we came back. We had a really wonderful day and were very happy we decided to have a day trip. So thanks again for the advise Chris! 

Whitsunday Beach, picture perfect

A spaceship named Nostromo - from Cairns to Brisbane

Since we got a really good deal on a Spaceship campervan, we drove from Cairns to Brisbane. We had planned to do this by coach or train, but a campervan allows for so much more freedom. Plus we were hoping to save on accommodation by sleeping in it. So what did it cost us in the end?

Rent incl. insurance AU$ 30 per day	AU$ 360
Petrol (2150km - 239L)	AU$ 288
Accommodation (7 nights paid)	AU$ 193
Total 12 days	AU$ 841

Greyhound bus tickets cost AU$ 320 per person, but since you have to pay more for you beds, it probably costs about the same. And the campervan gave us so much more freedom! We now could visit places we would otherwise never could've gone to. Most notably Eungella NP and Cape Hillsborough. When we picked our spaceship up, we heard his name was Nostromo. This was our route.

Our route from Cairns to Brisbane 

We started in Cairns (A) and drove directly to Townsville (B), about 4 hours/375km. We had decided to park at the BP Truckstop for the night. Staying there overnight is free, and renting a private bathroom with nice hot shower for 35mins costs $5. It felt a bit weird at first, but being surrounded by so many other campervans and caravans made it a lot easier. The 2nd day we did a daytrip to Magnetic Island, so spend our second night here too.

Very exotic: BP Truckstop in Townsville 

Our next drive was to Airlie Beach (C), about 3,5 hours/300km. This is where we did a sailing trip through the Whitsunday Islands on our 4th day. We spend both night 3 and 4 at Flamtree campsite ($25 per night). The campsite was a bit out of town, but lovely. It felt like caking in a big aviary, both the number of birds and their noise...  The campsite had a very good clean camp kitchen too, so we didn't have to bother with our own little stoves. It was the first time we used the Aussie barbie!

On our way to Airlie Beach

On day 5 we used our freedom to drive up the hills to Eungella NP (D), and specifically to a little creek famous for easy platypus spotting.... We had to give that a shot. Nostromo was really struggling uphill, boy was that last bit steep... The transmission got a bit smelly, but he made it! (Nostromo was not the youngest of spaceships, and has a mileage of almost 400.000km) 

We had planned to stay at the bush campsite for the night to have a better chance of seeing a platypus, but when we parked there, the sign read that we needed a permit. We could get one on the phone, but the campsite had no reception. We decided to walk to the viewing platform, may be we got lucky, and if not we would drive a bit down again and phone for a permit. 

View on our way to Eungella 

And did we get lucky! We didn't see any platypuses at the first platform, even though we waited quietly and patiently. Be at both the 2nd and 3rd platform we saw two of them! Quickly surfacing for a few second to breath and chew, and then quickly diving again. But they're so small! These four measured maybe 25cm, tail and bill included. We had expected them to be a lot bigger, but then again Wikipedia tells that there is a large variation in platypus length depending on environmental factors. Who knows. But now that we did see them, we decided to drive down again (poor Nostromo!) and drive to Cape Hillsborough (E) for the night. We did and slept at the only  campsite there ($35!), we drove about 5hours/300km on day 5.

Yes, this is a platypus 

The next morning we had to get up early to see.... The kangaroos and wallabies at the beach at sunrise! 6am is when the sun rises, and we've been aware of that most days here in Australia. Either because we had to get up for a tour, or because the birds wake up, and they make some noise when they do. Works better then any alarm I've owned! So, bright and shiny, or maybe not, we walked up the beach. And it was pretty special to be honest. 

Sunrise at Cape Hillsborough 

After a walk down the beach, some sun salutations and breakfast, we did a short walk round the cape. We started Nostromo and day 6 was a long day  of driving. We drove almost 500km in about 7 hours and stopped for the night near Calliope (F) at a bush campsite. A bush campsite has minimal amenities, but is free. This one had toilets, but no showers or drinking water. It did have a good view! And it was busy! We were the only little tourist campervan. The Aussies have impressive motor homes, especially the 'grey nomads': retirees that pride themselves in travelling around. Most drive real homes, including satellite, solar panels etc. Of course all 4WD, and either ridiculously big ('big rigs') or super expandable. Of course always completely self reliant. 

Calliope bush campsite

On the morning of day 7 we made breakfast, and drove to Hervey Bay (G), 4 hours/300km. We stayed at Scarness beach campsite. It cost us just $15 per night, and we weren't charged for Nostromo during our overnight trip to Fraser Island.  Unfortunately we were about a month too early to see the whales in Hervey Bay proper, but we did see lots of migrating humpbacks off Fraser Island breaking and blowing. 

A campervan with a view

On day 10 we left Hervey Bay and headed for Noosa (H), some 3hours/200km. Noosa is very touristy and crazy full of roundabouts. We didn't walk through town , since it was too busy to find a parking spot. It is a very popular resort town, and we were there during school holidays. Ah well. We stayed at the Big4 campsite for $40. And.... We slept without the awning: it's getting cold! 

On our way to Hervey Bay

Our last drive was to Brisbane (I) on day 11, about 2 hours/150km. We drove on an actual motorway! Up until now all the roads have been 2 lane (onein either direction) with sometimes an overtake lane. It was weird seeing so many cars at once! We stayed at Newmarket Gardens for $43 for one  night. The next morning we drove to a hostel, unloaded our bags, drove Nostromo up Mt Coot-Tha, and then to and then the rental company where we handed him in. Back to public transport for now! 

Cuddly Koalas - Magnetic Island

When we were at home loosely planning this trip we intended to make our way down from Cairns to Sydney by public transport. Since the east coast is the busiest part of the country, with many hostels and most of the activities are or on the ocean, it seemed the most sensible option not the blow our money on expensive car or campervan hire. We just hadn't decided on bus or train yet.

The start of the Forts Walk

But when we got in our hostel in Cairns, we saw a sign for campervan relocations; basically you hire a van for $1 a day and even get money for petrol, but you have to get to the new location very quickly. We asked our receptionist about this deal, but it gave us only 3 days to get to Brisbane. We had planned to do that route in 2 weeks. Three days would be just driving and sleeping with no sightseeing on the way. She then offered to make a few quick enquiries to see what the prices were for renting a campervan, and we got a great deal: renting a Spaceship for $30 a day including full insurance! That meant we just had to pay the insurance fee. That's the same price as 2 bus tickets, plus we could save on accommodation costs. Monday morning we picked up a Spaceship named Nostromo, and drove to Townsville. 

First koala spotted!

Because we now had a campervan we opted for a day trip to Magnetic Island, instead of staying there overnight. After we got lunch at the supermarket, we drove to one of the two ferries and bought return tickets. And then came to the conclusion we had preferred to take the other ferry that went 18 times daily instead of 8... Well, nothing to be done about that now! 

We looked into the information leaflet and decided that we would bus around the island. Our main objective was to do the Forts walk, where it was rumoured you could very well spot wild koalas...

Sleepy face

Hat on, sunscreen applied, and off we went. And just after a few minutes we spotted our first koala up in a tree, neatly seated on a branch, nice fluffy ears and all!  After a few minutes of snapping photos we walked on, and just a few meters further was the second koala. We felt really lucky now. And the good thing about koalas, even the 'wild' ones, is that they hardly move. They just sit and doze, so playing paparazzo on them is real easy. The 'hard' part is that since they don't move, it's also really easy to walk past them.  Which we nearly did, when we saw a koala about 1 meter off the ground, probably just came down for a poop. 

Koala just 1 meter off the ground

Of course this was reason for a few close ups, and then... A tiny second head peekabooed around the side: she had a joey! How cool is that? Now that was really an unexpected treat. What was pretty strange is that the joey seemed really awake and alert, while the mother just appeared dozy. Though at a certain point mum did think all the attention (of course when we stopped to watch, so did a couple of other tourists) was a bit too much. When Rodie ran back for our water bottle, that we forgot in all our excitement, she had climbed up another tree. 

Just look at that face...

We walked back, in order to catch the bus back to one of the other bays to see the rock wallabies. When we arrived at Picnic Bay we clambered up the walking trail and had a wonderful view. But no wallabies. Odd. Now of course it's nature, so that can happen but still... When we walked back down I took another look into the leaflet, to discover that we were at the wrong bay! We should've gone to Arcadia Bay.  We considered taking the bus back there, but then opted out.  I'm sure we'll see lots of wallabies in the coming months and we had done quite some walking. We took the ferry back and drove our trusty Nostromo to the truck stop for a good nights sleep. 

View from the look out at Picnic Bay

In search of Nemo - Great Barrier Reef

Going to Australia, Queensland, where the Great Barrier Reef is, and not diving? Not an option!

After some consideration we opted for a 3 day / 2 night liveaboard with Pro Dive. That looked like pretty hardcore diving and the 11 dives in 3 days might be a bit too much for me, but this was the way to dive at the outer reefs. Financially it was quite a thing too (A$800/€500 per person) but hey... Once in a lifetime, right? 

That's what we looked like!

So, what did we do? We were picked up at 6:15am(!) at our hostel, checked in at the dive shop and then boarded our vessel in the marina. There were 32 divers on board, about halve of them in training, 4 instructors, 1 cook and 1 skipper. What we really liked is that this company does not send you down in groups with an instructor, but you go down independently as buddy pairs. That gives you so much more freedom.

Spot the spotted fish

We got breakfast on board while the crew loaded the stuff on board, and then headed out to the reef, where we arrived about 3,5 hours later and at 11:30am we had our first dive! But oh boy... What a current! This wasn't fun, is was about a 50m swim to the reef, but by the time we got there halve our air was gone! After 10 more minutes at the reef we surfaced and got a dingy ride back to the boat... Uhoh... After a reprimand from the dive master that we got way out off the area we went to the upper deck to catch our breath. And wonder if we really were that out of practice? But all the divers that surfaced had had the same problem, and lots of dingy rides that morning.  Turns out there had been some type of freak current (or so we were told at the next briefing). 

 

One of the anemone fish

The next dive at 14:30 was also at Flynt Reef, but this time on a reef closer to the to the boat: like swimming through an aquarium! Lovely colours and so many fish species. You could not avoid the parrot fish, and we spotted our first turtle! I just love turtles, especially when under water. They're every bit as surf dude as in the Nemo movie. We also spotted our first giant clams.

 

Like swimming through an aquarium 

We both skipped the 16:30 dive in favour of the night dive at 19:30. That was some serious underwater disco! Of course that's not very good for the wildlife spotting, but rather funny. We dove in groups as many of the divers had not done a night dive before. We did spot a parrot fish in a mucous bubble, that was rather special. And of course every small fish that you put a spotlight on was instant dinner for the bigger hunting fish. We also saw a flash of a reef shark. 

 

Look at that face...

The next morning we had a lay in, our first pre breakfast dive was at 7:30am. Unfortunately Rodie's night had not been very good. Our beds were 1.80m long, slightly on the short side for his 1.93m frame. Since they were 65cm wide and with 60cm headroom, he simply did not fit. The second night we put his mattress on the floor, left the door open and his feet slept in the hallway. Much to the amusement of our shipmates. 

The dive was at Tracy's little Bommie, a deeper dive to start the day with. This was a dive where we savoured all the smaller wonders of the corals and fish, and of course another turtle! We saw our first stingray and some more of the giant clams. 

 

Pretty amazing dives

For the second dive (at 10:30) we had moved to Milln reef and we decided to hire an underwater camera (thank you sponsors!). It was our first time ever and we had fun with it. And isn't it fun to see what we look like in the big blue? And of course it makes for a better blog post.  We met up with some turtles again, saw some anemone fish, angler fish, the ubiquitous parrot fish, so many fish I haven't got a clue what they're named. Rodie even made a some pretty cool videos of our dive!

The afternoon dive at 15:00 was similar to this, but without the camera. I skipped the night dive on their second day; simply not hardcore enough! Rodie did dive and saw one side of the sleeping Brian sticking out from underneath a rock. Who? Oh Brian, that's just the 2m turtle living there...

 

Tiny fish at one of the corals

The third day was again an early wake up call. The knock on the door was at 6am so we could be in the water at 6:30....  Who said this was vacation? We had a quickie briefing and changed into our gear in the black of the night, plunging in the water at dawn. That was quite special though, we saw the reef waking up. Slowly more and more fish emerged from their sleeping places. We also swam into a few reef sharks (black tips?) that just came back from their night's hunt, some turtles, (yes again, and I still love them!) and a badass barracuda. 

Parrotfish all around 

I decided to skip the second dive at 9:00 but Rodie went in and yes: he found Nemo's family! They lived in an anemone just a few meters from the boat. 6 cute little clown anemone fish. He also saw a moray eel, and some sharks. And of course those innumerable other fish.  For our last dive at 11:00 we were not assigned a specific itinerary at the briefing, so we first swam to the Nemos and that had a nice swim around, just to bid our goodbyes to the reef. At noon the boat headed for the shore again, and our diving trip was over!

Bye for now!

Cape Trib trip - Australia

One of things on our to-do list in Cairns was a trip to Cape Tribulation, a tropical national park north of Cairns. We decided on an overnight trip with Jungle Tours.  We were picked up at 7:15am at the hostel and then arrived at the Wildlife Habitat at around 8:45.  This is a small zoo with mainly birds, and some crocs and wallabies in three enclosures based on habitat. It was a bit too commercial for our liking, you could hand feed the wallabies and have you picture taken with koalas or crocs. But the animal presentations were informative. 

Oh oh....

Then we drove to the Daintree River ferry, and after crossing were in the Daintree National Park. One of the few places where the endangered cassowary lives. Unfortunately we didn't see one. When we arrived at our hostel we had lunch and the day trippers went on, while we chilled on the beach. A lovely looking beach with jungle right up to the water, but not a swimming area, this is where the salties roam! 

Cape Tribulation beach

The hostel really was a collection of bungalows at the path from the reception area down to the beach. Since we really have to mind our spending we slept in a dorm room here. That meant a 4 room bungalow with 5 beds in each room. We shared our room with 2 German boys. 

At 7:15pm we were picked up for our night walk through the forest. The walk itself was rather nice, but we were disappointed that the only wild life we saw were some spiders; not our favourite animals. 

At 9:45 we returned and were knackered! Let's use our jetlag as an excuse, not our age.... We went straight to bed. 

Our bungalow at Beach House

The next morning we woke up just before 7 and enjoyed a walk on the beach before the crowds arrived. After lunch we joined the day trippers for the drive back. The guide this second day was very knowledgeable aboriginal guy, that shared his knowledge of the forest and some of his people's legends. We stopped on our way for a short walk, and saw a Boyd's forest dragon during the board walk. Twice! Gorgeous creatures. 

Boyd's forest dragon

 

On our return we had a river cruise planned while crossing the Daintree River. Time to do some croc spotting! We saw the alpha male basking in the sun. An impressive 4,5meter long specimen, probably some 65 years old. 

Impressive 65 year old salty

 

The rather cute 14 week old on top of a broke log, in the vicinity of its mum Lizzy, and a two-year old hiding in the mangrove roots. Of course there were loads of birds at the shores too. Egrets, herons and kingfishers! Too quick to snap a photo off, but at least we saw them. When we arrived back at our Cairns hostel we went into town for some grocery shopping and then back to bed! Oh such rock and roll lives we live! 

Rather cute 14 week old salty

 

And so it starts

After months of waiting, preparing and thinking, finally the first week of our vacation is there! Our plans were: Friday party prepping, Saturday Rodie's birthday bash, and then just some packing and cleaning to do before we hand over the keys to our renter in Wednesday, then 1 night at Rodie's mum before we catch a plane on Thursday, arriving in Cairns Saturday morning. That were our plans at least...

It started out really good, had a lovely party with talks and hugs abound. But then came Tuesday morning... And bad weather. When I was packing our clothes into boxes a I suddenly heard the sound of cascading water... Inside the house? A quick run revealed the source of the clattering: we had a major leak in our kitchen! Rain just poured in! Of course a day before our renter would move in.  

Some quick phone calls and lovely helping friends further, it looks like we solved that problem. Luckily our renter was very understanding, and now there's just some painting left to do, but what an adrenaline rush! Not the most relaxing way to move out, I can tell you that.  

Anyway... We slept at Rodie's mum that night, and after an early breakfast headed to Schiphol Airport. We booked a flight that would leave at noon, and arrived at 9:15. And then couldn't find our flight at the departure overviews... Oh oh... After franticly checking our flight number it turned out our flight was scheduled to leave at 11:15. Whoops. Good thing we arrived early!

In the end our flight was delayed and we left at 12:15. After a 13 hour flight with lots of turbulence, we arrived in Singapore just in time to see the sunrise. 

Sunrise at Changi Airport

We have a 20 hour stopover in Singapore, and we had decided before we left, that if we felt like it, we would book a room at one of the transit hotels. After all, we're not that youthful anymore and love to sleep in a proper bed.  And oh boy, we were knackered when we came out of the plane! Although it was 7am in Singapore, in our biological time zone it was 1am. A room was available at 8:30am, so we booked it for 8hours.  What a good choice! It costs S$20 per hour, but so worth it. We got a nice room with two good beds, a clean and spacious bathroom and after we checked out of our room we got a complimentary meal and unlimited access to the lounge area (with free coffee!) and the rooftop pool. That is where I'm typing this little blogpost just now. 

If you haven't been to Singapore before you can always choose to do one of the free city tours, but we are happy with our choice so far. 

Counting down to take off

It's now the first week of June, and we'll leave the country mid June.  We've reached the countdown fase! I've got another week to work, I'm getting into the spirit now...  At my job people keep asking "When is your last day?" "Will I see you next week?" and "Will you be here next meeting?"

The answer to that last question is "No" ever more frequently! I'm handing over projects and saying my goodbyes. 

Getting in the mood

Now it's time to think about what we still need to do and who we want to see before we leave... we have planned a little birthday/bye bash in the last weekend before we go, so that's when we'll say most of our goodbyes. The house is mostly taken care off: just a few little things left to before the renter moves in: get our personal stuff out (clothing and administrative stuff) and a extra thorough round of cleaning. 

Off to Cairns

I think we have bought and decided on the stuff we want to take with us, though I am considering to buy a bikini.... Really! Booking that diving trip last night might've played a part in that sentiment.  As said before, we will start our trip in Cairns: one of the main gateways to the Great Barrier Reef. Now think about this; we've both been diving since our mid teens (see how I just avoided telling you how OLD we are?) and this will be our first trip to the GBR. So we decided to splurge: we have booked a 3 day/2 night diving trip! This does mean we can't afford to eat the week afterwards but hey... we all have to make choices. 

Let's just hope that there's enough alive of it to make it memorable in a good way, the headlines thes past few weeks have been frightening.