Sailing

Ahoy from the Whitsunday’s!!

Made it back to Airlie Beach, Australia with the mates from the three day sailing trip. What a great time. The Derwitt Hunter is decked out for 18 people and we lucked out with only 9 of us on board. It was especially great. When we boarded the first thing they did was confiscate our shoes, as no shoes are allowed on deck.

The ship is a 64 year old tall wooden ship with 4 sails. We set sail when the wind was in our favor with all the mates on deck helping. (Well actually I was the historian taking the pictures-- someone has to do it.)

We started out with cloudy, rainy skies but after about a 3 hour sail to Hayman Island, where we snorkeled for the first time, no one cared as we were all going to be wet anyway. Bob and I prefer not a lot of sun so it was great for us. Despite the lack of sun it became an official vacation when Bob burned the top of his feet from not wearing shoes on deck and not applying any sun screen.

There were lots of fish to see including ‘Elvis’ a beautiful 2 1/2 foot pet fish that was easily called in up next to the boat. We snorkeled each day at different spots, one spot for the fish, one spot for the coral and we spent time on the whitest sandy beach, known by all in these parts. We all wore stinger suits for the jellyfish which we luckily did not see.

Bob slept on deck the last night and said it was his best sleep. It was rather warm below deck. The last morning we set sail to Black Island which was uninhabited and we had it all to ourselves for several hours where we saw Ospreys building their nests, beautiful beaches and interesting rock formations.

After lunch it was time to head back and bring this adventure to a close. The God’s were again with us with good winds and we were able to, once again, set sail back to Airlie Beach. Our captain said we were traveling at about 9 or 10 knots and that seemed fast to us letting us arrive early.  It was a great and peaceful time. Now it’s time to wash the clothes and get ready for Bali.

Our sailing ship

Raising the sails

Mary snorkeling

Beach beauty on the white sand

The skipper going to the crows nest

View from the crows nest

Sailing into the sunset

The Rain Forest

Cape Tribulation, Australia 

Muggy, muggy, muggy. That’s what the rain forest is like and we were there in the rainy season. In the three days we were there, there were several rain showers each day. We only got caught once in the showers but even without rain I was soaking wet after a 2 hour walk in the forest from the humidity. Our clothes never got dry and we were looking through the dirty clothes bag to find dry and somewhat clean clothes.

Of course it is lush green everywhere. We stayed at a very nice B&B that is on a exotic fruit farm. We had exotic fruit with our breakfast every morning, the most unusual was the ‘hairy man’s eye ball’ and was not as bad as it sounds. Our cabin was almost all windows which looked out into the rain forest but not enough of a breeze coming through. The cabin was ‘eco’ friendly and the electricity was solar powered, so no air conditioning, not even a fan and couldn’t even use our hair dryer. 

Mary and I talked about just getting in the car and driving around all day just to keep cool. But usually it was walks in the morning, naps in the afternoon and early to bed at night.

We did go on a night river boat ride to find crocodiles and other animals. It was the last night there and we had to put on wet clothes to go. We were saving one pair of dry clean clothes to leave on. The boat trip was great we saw some different animals and it was cool on the river and there was only a short shower.

When we left we put on our only clean dry clothes and as soon as we got in the car at 7:30 AM we turned on the A/C. Glad to be cool and dry..... but it was a great experience!   

Our cabin in the rain forest

Breakfast outside our room.

A big spider outside our room

Outback Camping

We spent 5 days camping in the outback in the center of Australia. It was a very interesting and a mostly enjoyable trip with lots of walks into the interior of the mountains  and around Uluru. We walked up Kings Canyon's "Heart Attack hill”--straight up on rocky terrain then walked for about 3 plus hours and most days did not get into camp until dark then fix dinner, eat, take showers (most days) and try to get to sleep. Wake up each day was before SUNRISE. We saw lots of sunrises and sunsets and they were extremely gorgeous. The sky was filled with stars at night and we slept all nights but one out in our swag (an Australian bedroll). The swag was comfortable except when it got cold because my sleeping bag was not very warm so I put on all my clothes and then it was OK.

Our best experience was when we went to see Craig an aborigine from the local area. He took us out in the bush and sat down brushed the sandy red ground and started drawing hieroglyphic symbols to tell the story of his aborigine belief in how his people and his clan, ‘the rainbow clan’, came to the area.

Most of our group swam most days but we chose to find places away from the group and just enjoy the quiet. One particular area was the Red Bank Gorge in the Western McDonnell Range. The Red Bank Gorge was one where you needed to swim back into to get to all the swimming holes. They say it was fantastic but we enjoyed just being..

We walked every day and the first 3 days were fairly strenuous  I thought I might lose some weight with all the walking and the camp food but don't think I lost that belly that I would like to.

When we got back to Alice Springs we decided to rent a car as it was less expensive to take in the sights of Alice Springs and also get to the airport. It was a good idea. We went to the Desert Park, the School of the Air and the Flying doctors. All of these really show  the Aussie ingenuity. 

We ate Emu, Camel, Kangaroo last night for dinner and it was all good--a good way to end our trip in the Red Center.

We bought some art aborigines  art, and mailed it backed to the states. It will be fun to unpack when we get home.

Me and the flies at Uluru

Sunset in the Red Center

Kings Canyon

Our aborigines story teller

Push starting our day

Early morning pack up

Mary at sunset

Kangaroo Island

We had a very busy time on Kangaroo Island, long days in a 4 wheel drive car on gravel, wash board roads, driving very fast, going from one site to another. It was very interesting and enjoyable but tiring. We saw many animals and some birds up close and personal. There were not large groups of Kangaroo's like I expected but many more wallabies groupings (wallabies are similar to kangaroo’s only smaller). The Kola bears were very cute but sleeping in the trees and not active when we saw them. Bob was able to get up close for all pictures as there are no predators here.

We had to cook, can you believe that. We had a small apartment with a full kitchen and they provided the makings for two breakfasts which we cooked. It was nice for a change. We still can not believe that they put instant coffee in the rooms.

We took an evening tour of the penguin nests. These are the smallest penguin’s in the world. They only come on shore at night, being small, they have predators waiting to snatch them. We could hear them outside our “apartment”. They come and nest under peoples houses and in their gardens in the evenings.

Mary and our guide outside our B&B