Wednesday 5th August
In the morning Lil got her hair coloured, with some of her bday money! We had fruit and bananabread for breakfast, yum! We sat round the pool for a bit nd then me and lil went on the ScooterRoo tour. It's this bloke, that looks like a skinny Hulk Hogan, who has loads of scooter bikes but all done up too look like proper hogs! We went and got our leather jackets and helmets, n then got our bikes. There was about 25 people on the tour, we all rode in convoy was so good! At the start you get a bit scard doing 20kph but by the end we were doing over 70 kph, it was so much fun!! We went round the little town of Agnes Water and Town 1770, we stopped to see some kangaroos on the way, and take pics of ourselves on the bikes, of course! Then we watched the sunset over Town 1770, whilst eating wedges. A few of the girls fell off so were riding with the guides, but dont think they hurt themselves that much, luckily they are such little towns there arent many cars! We went to ride back after the sunset, and my battery was dead! So I had to ride alongside the guide as I had no lights in the dark! Lil was behind me being very careful in case I hit the brakes! We had such a good time, it was a really different way to see the towns. I sang 'Wild Thing' full volume a few times whilst zooming along at 70! I don't think anyone heard me over the scooters! They would definately think i was a loon! We then went back to the hostel and had some $5 Spag Bol, and got ready for our bus ride. The bus came at 9pm and we began our 10 hour journey!
Getting ready for our ride!
Me on my hog!
We arrived in Airlie beach at 7am, at least we saved paying for a night in a hostel! I had a bad headache from the bikes so I didnt have a great trip, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, we all had 2 seats so we could spread out a bit! Luckily our Hostel in Airlie Beach - Magnums, let us check in at that time. I went straight to sleep for a couple of hours! We then sat around the lagoon, big man made pool in the town, where everyone sits round, really picturesque! The hostel was also very nice, a bit like our favourite hostel in Byron Bay. We had an 8bed cabin with own bathroom. There was little pathways through tropical trees to each part, and it had it's own outdoor bar area and restaurants etc. It ended up all girls in our dorm and they were all really nice, we went out for a few drinks with them and ended up all dancing in a club (Mama Africa) until 2am!
At Airlie Beach Lagoon!
Girly Dorm night out!
The whole dorm room slept in till about 11am! We spent a lazy day by the lagoon reading our books (We are all addicted to reading the twilight books! But we have to take it in turns so gets frustrating sometimes!) We then made sure we were ready for our Whitsunday Islands sailing tour the next day! No zipped bags allowed (because of bed bugs apparently!) so I had to buy a fabric carrier bag thing. We then went to 'Opal's' for a free didgeridoo lesson, was really funny! We were rubbish! Then we packed up for the boat and had and early night.
Me trying to play a didgeridoo and failing miserably!
Saturday 8th August
Lil's birthday! We got up and checked out. Me and Rachel gave lil cards and then Rach took Lil to the Lagoon while I got the rest of her pressies and sat on some random steps wrapping them up! She was really chuffed, loved them! We got her loads of her favourite sweets, two vest tops and a voucher for CityBeach (cool shop we like). She loved it, even tho it was a low budget Backpacker Birthday! I also had to make her a sash to wear on the boat, the post office only had 30th, 50th, happy retirement or merry christmas! We stored our backpacks, went and got some goon (we got 2 boxes for $16, that works out a pound a litre!), and headed for the marina. We boarded our boat - The Atlantic Clipper, at 2:30pm. It was a lovely boat, about 50 people on it and no shoes allowed so we all had barefoot! As we were getting on I didnt think there would be enough room for all of us, but there was lots of space in there! We sat around on the top deck as we pulled out of the marina (me fully stocked up with travel sick tablets!) and had a talke about what we do etc. We then got designated cabins, we got the one right next to the crew! It was a seperate bit to all the other passengers and we had to walk through the cockpit to get there! Felt very special! We decorated lil up with her makeshift sash and Rachel wrote on her arms in eyelinet 'It's my birthday 23 today!'. Everyone was really friendly and she got lots of birthday wishes! The crew even bought out a cake with candles after dinner! We anchored in between Hook Island and Whitsunday Island for the night. We then played some drinking games and chatted to people. I even watched a bit of Oceans 13 with some of the crew! Was really good night, although one scottish bloke threw up down some stairs! Luckily I didnt see it!! Us three then squeezed in our special little cabin and went to sleep!
On the Atlantic Clipper (with birthday decorated Lil)
I woke up early to take a travel tablet! Unfortunately I couldnt eat much breakfast as I felt a bit sick! We then anchored up again and got taken on little speed boats to an island. We did a little bush walk and got to a lookout point over Whitehaven beach, It was beautiful, the sand was white with bright turquoise water, and islands of green in the distance, it was amazing! We then went down to the beach, had a walk and then went in the sea! It was so clear it was lovely, bit chilly, I got in quite quick! We then got back on the boat and headed to Blue Pearl Bay. We squeezed into some stinger suits and did some snokelling. The coral was a mazing, so colourful, and the fish came really close. At one point one of the crew was throwing fish food at me so they were right in my face, theat freaked me out a bit buit it was funny squealing through a snorkel! We were really lucky and saw loads of fish. I had a little waterproof disposable camera, so I hope some of the photos come out! Rach and Lil then did a scuba dive, I didnt fancy it so I went to the boat and had a hot shower. Plus when the dive instructor knew I had asthma he assumed I wasnt doing it, so I took that as a bad sign! They said it was brilliant, they went about 5 metres down, although lil said she kept floating to the top! They got to stroke a big grey fish that the crew called Elvis! When they got back I was sitting with a group of girls chatting and stuffing my face with cake and cookies! (What else would I be doing?! haha!) We then had another good night, drinking goon and chatting. The crew then started the bite the box game (Where you have to pick up a box from the floor with no hands, every round it gets smaller) the twist was that if you couldnt do it you got smacked on the arse with a diver's flipper! The girls got out on the 2nd round and had to hit each other, I got one futher but then face planted the floor, I had the sick scottish guy hit me with the flipper. It hurt so much I can't even explain it! It was like a teatowel whip x 10! It was a really funny game though, and everyone was it stitches for most of it! Later a few of us were below deck in the saloon/eating area. And the crew bought out some ballons, so we made balloon animals!
Lookout point - Whitehaven beach
In the clear sea at Whitehaven
Ready for snokelling at Blue Pearl Bay. The beach was all hard coral rock - hurt your feet soo much! Also I look like a giant in this photo - not sure why!
Monday 10th August
They woke us up at 7am again (they like you to have full days which is good!). And I found I had a massive bruise accross my left bum cheek from the flipper! (It has since got darker and is currently nearly black!) We were due to go to a different bay for some snorkelling/diving but the weather was bad and the sea was too rough so we went back to blue pearl bay. Most of us were too chicken to got out in the cold so we sat on the top deck chatting and looking at the amazing scenery! We had hotdogs for lunch and got back to land at around midday. We spent the afternoon getting our backpacks back to normal and chilling out at Magnums backpackers again. We then met up with the boat passengers and crew in Pheonix bar and had a few drinks, we then went onto Mama Africa again and had a dance. Was a good night, althoI think I had a few too many!
Group pic on the boat - we are over to the left kneeling.
Tuesday 11th August
We got up to check out (my head thumping), and got our Greyhound bus at 9:40am. We were on the bus about 5 hours and then arrived in Townsville, then we hopped on a ferry and came to Magnetic Island. We are staying at Base Backpackers, it seems really nice and we have little cabins again, although these arent as nice as our ones at Magnums! We walked to the shop and then made jacket potatoes, went into our room! And our friend from magums was in there! Tal was in our dorm for our girly night out and now shes in our dorm again! It's really weird, everyone is doing the same trip! We've hired our a little Moke buggy car (Lil and Rachel requested it in pink so it looks like a little barbie jeep!) for tomorrow, we'll explore the island and maybe do a bit of snokelling again!
I havent got long now, we're here for 3 nights, then we have 2 weeks in Cairns. Looking forward to seeing you all but will be sad to leave here, I think coming back to the real world will be a big slap in the face! From a sailing boat to the smelly tube!
Will try and upate again soon! Miss you all!
H xxx
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