Dec 12th - 19th
04 Jan 2005

Dec 12th -> Airlie Beach
After a fabulous breakfast (made by Cole and Tricia) we headed up north. I felt really drained by the time we arrived, but resisted the urge to collapse. Instead we had some grub & rummaged through the hostel's movie collection. I selected "Finding Forrester" and a crowd of hostellers gathered to enjoy it with us.

Dec 13th - Sailing
At 7pm we were boarded on the Alexander Stewart & putting out of the harbor. It wasn't very rough until the sunset & we were out far enough to feel the breeze on the waves. At first it was thrilling, finally on a boat, but my excitement soon turned to concern. Not concern for my safety, but for my stomach. Even though I hadn't eaten dinner I was hungry & seasick. Bad combination. Unlike the rest of the passengers I headed for below deck to close my eyes and go to sleep. I only woke up to see Greg climbing into our miniture queen size bed.. more like a cofin box with the humming of a diesel engine in your ear. I woke at 4a.m. just before the sun rise, rubbed my eyes, climbed up to the deck & looked out onto the bay where we had found shelter the night before. Went straight back to bed before the cobbwebs cleared.

Dec 14th - Whitehaven Beach
No trip to Airlie Beach is complete without a trip to Whitehaven Beach. Fortunately, I had already made mine a week and a half before. Unfortunately for the rest of the passengers, it was too windy that day to anchor there. We ended up climbing up to the "lookout" and getting the most spectacular view of the beach and surrounding area, then took a swim in the beach directly below which is just as white & just as beautiful, just not called "Whitehaven Beach." Over the next few days I spent most of my time closing my eyes and laying down to avoid the feeling of motion sickness. I heard that the first night on the ship I was not the only one afflicted with this. Apparently, after I went to sleep there were a handfull of people hanging off the boat being sick or looking green. The diesel fumes being pumped into our cabins didn't help either. When the engine wasn't on, the a/c wasn't on and it was too hot and stuffy to sleep. I spent the 2nd night on the deck tossing and turning, hey it was better than laying in a pool of sweat, and I did have the prettiest view in the world. Did you know that the stars are different on the southern hemisphere?

Dec 15th - snorkeling
After a night of tossing and turning I woke up (like I did every hour at this point) at dawn and crawled down to the cabin. When the diesel engine started up next to my ear I knew breakfast was served. I stumbled out of bed, put on my bikini (like everyday on the boat) and spent all day on the deck. We stopped for a snorkel in Raven's Cove, but the visibility was so bad that we were lucky to see anything. At one point though I was startled to find a largeish sea turtle directly below me. I quietly just watched him as he nibbled on plants below & swam around. A few minutes later a fellow passenger belted out "HEY EVERYBODY!!! THERE'S A TURTLE OVERHERE!!!" My time was up, I surrended my find to 2 dozen snorkelers crowding into a circle. I don't blame them, there was nothing else to see.
After our breath-taking snorkeling there was about to be a mutiny. Christianne & I convinced the captain he needed to put the sails up for the first time since we got on the sailboat. Within an hour we (Greg, Christianne, myself, and a few others) were hoisting up the sails, supervised by the crew of course.

Dec 16th - return to Airlie Beach Another laid back & uneventful day on the boat ended about 3pm as we returned to shore. For everyone else, their day would consist of finding a good place to eat & getting a good night's sleep, but Greg and I decided that we'd drive a few hours south before stopping for the night. As we drove it was almost 5pm. I called the tour company for Fraser Island & we booked a tour leaving the next morning, 15 hours from then. We had a 12 hour drive ahead of us. Every 100km we'd stop, switch drivers, take a picture, and then continue on while the other one slept. Only stopping once for an hour nap. This made for some interesting photos.

Dec 17th - Fraser Island
Our Fraser Island trip started with a 50 minute ferry ride. When the ferry arrived we all climbed in the Unimog & 4WD'd out of there. We had the last 2 seats in the back, talk about bumpy. The "Texas Cyclone" http://www.sixflags.com/parks/astroworld/Rides/cyclone.html has nothing on the Unimog! How fantastic though! This was an amazing trip. Our tour guide, Rick, Would stop & show us plants, sometimes he would even get out & grab a few leaves & pass them back... some taste testing was involved.
We bumped around the idney Scrub Rainforest, stopped for lunch at Cathedral Beach, then south to Lake Wabby. Fraser Island is the world's largest sand island. Hiking around this place is hard-going because the ground beneath you is always moving. The whole group hiked about 3km in the hot sun across sand dunes to get to this oasis. Lake Wabby is a freshwater semi-clear lake with small Fish & possibly some turtles residing in it. Every few minutes the fish would think that your legs looked like food & start nibbling on you. Silly fish.
Before dinner we were alerted by the sound of birds going absolutely MAD! Turns out they were distraught over a baby python slithering away with a full stomach, probably full with bird eggs, onto the top of the roof. He actually got stuck trying to squeeze into the drain pipe.

Dec 18th - Champagne Pools & Worley birds
Bright and early we started out to the "Champagne Pools." These pools are shallow pools created by the tide washing over and swirling around. The bubbles even make it look like Champagne. The Unimog performed impressively as we blasted over these sandy inclines that would have been impossible for any other 28 passenger bus. It's incredible that we didn't have to get out and push or wait for help like my tour group in Belfast did.
A stop at "Indian Head" and we went south, this time to lunch. The group had an option to purchase a 10 minute helicopter ride. It was a bargain, so Greg and I were the first to jump on it. We got to fly over the Maheno shipwreck, Eli Creek & the Rainforest. The Rainforest looked like a huge head of broccoli, sanddunes the size of well, a very large backyard sand playpen. We also flew over Lake Aloom, not much different from a kidney bean amongst all the broccoli.
Lake Aloom was the color and temperature of lukewarm tea. Mellaluca trees surrounded the lake and we were told (never actually believe what tour drivers tell you) that the nutrients from the trees leek out into the water, creating the murky color. Regardless, the freshwater turtles loved it, it was easy for them to dissapear.

Dec 19th -> Noosa
We nicknamed the Mitsubishi "Unibishi" after the trip down to Noosa. It got a bit of an off roading adventure on the way.