Halfway through Oz!!!!

Whitsunday Islands

We started our Whitsunday Islands 3 day tour on the 2nd of march. It is a tour of the group of 74 small Islands off Airlie Beach on a sailing boat. On our first day we sailed into the protection of the islands where we stayed for the night. The water was so calm it was beautiful. We helped with the sailing and put the sails up, we actually learnt a lot about the boats we could so be skippers!!!!!! In the morning we went to whitehaven beach! This beach has been rated the second best beach in the world. The sand is pure white and is 99.9% silicone! This means it is as fine as flour and you can polish your silver jewellery with it! The sand also stays cool unlike other sand thats gets really hot this is beacuse it reflect the sunlight back up so when walking on it it squeeks and you have to be extra careful with suntan lotion as the rays are reflected back up onto us! The aboriginies call it whispering sands as the squeeking sound like it is talking to u! Clever sand!!! We had to wear stinger suits in the water as there were lots of jellyfish around and got in the sea for a bit but it was freezing! That afternoon we went to the most amazing snorkelling site Hook Bay, we saw hundreds of fish and the coral! It was very beautiful. The next day we also snorkelled at Mantaray bay which again was very beautiful but absolutly swarming with jellyfish and Natalie managed to get coral stuck in her knee. The skipper was really good though and got it out with tweezers!! We were really sad to leave the islands as we had a fantastic time. Laura and becki also booked a dive on the great barrier reef and nat came for the snorkelling after three attempts at gettin there (the boat had to turn around for two days as weather was to bad) we finally got there and the dive and snorkelling was amazing we saw a family of nemos with baby nemos so cute! We left Airlie beach for a town called Agnes waters the town of 1770. The town was named after the date that captain cook first arrived. In 1770 we done a wave sunset kayak whcih was so much fun its like surfing in a kayak whilst at sunset. We alsdo done a surf lesson the next day which was so much fun and harder than the surfers make it look! Laura and Nat also done scooteroo which was a tour of the town on harley davidson style motorbikes the tour lasted 4 hours and we watched the sunset on the beach. Very beautiful we also saw wild kangaroos on the tour. We left 1770 for Rainbow beach to start our Fraser island three day self drive safari. Fraser island is the biggest sand island in the world and a national park. On the first day (we had a group of 11 people and a four by four car) we visited lake mckenzie which is a fresh water lake. Its the highlight of fraser island the water is so fresh yu can drink it. We then set up camp. The next morning we visited a shipwreck which has been on the beach since 1935 and then went to Indian head where u can climb a cliff and watch out of shraks and mantarays. Fraser island is strictly no swimming as the water is shark infested. Unfortunately we didnt see any sharks but they were around as others did! We camped on the beach that night and had to cook burgers and sausages with water!!!! Was funny! On fraser island there are loads of dingoes which are wild dogs that can be aggressive. we had four come into our campsite that night and we had scratch marks on tent the next morning where they had tried to get into our tent!! Quite scary! On our last day we visited Eli creek which was pretty and rainbow gorge which is a sand dune which has loads of different coulour sands, black, white, yellow and orangey red sand. The next day after arriving back form Fraser island we were meant to do a kayak with wild dolphins but the sea was to choppy so it had to be cancelled.

We left Rainbow beach for noosa heads. In Noosa we visited Australia zoo home of the crocodile hunter! It was the most fun day the zoo is amazing and the tributes to Steve Irwin were so sad! He is a legend! We watched the croc shows in his famous crocoseum. There was a wombat called laura!!! (i see the likeness!!!!) The zoo has many workers who bring the animals out so people can touch and hold them they even bought tiger cubs for a walk. We loved the zoo!! We also done a noosa everglades canoe trip. It started well but about half way in our canoe to the camp site it absolutly poured down and didnt stop for two days!!!!!!!! We were drowned rats even our tent leaked so we were laying in puddles. On our second day we thought we would risk the weather and try and do a walk which led up to a sand dune where you could see a really good view. However again it poured so we ended up having a picnic in the toilets and heading back to camp again looking like drowned rats!! We thought our canoe would sink at one point as the back was flooded!! haha!! We did have fun though with our group just a shame about the weather! After leaving Noosa heads we went to Brisbane for 4 days. Here we met up with Rob and he told us all about his trip in western australia. We liked Brisbane but it is just a big city so not loads to do apart from shop!!! We left Brisbane fr surfers paradise which we all really loved! The beach is so pretty but surrounded by high rise buildings its quite strange to look at! Everyone is so friendly in surfers we really enjoyed it. We had another party bus night out there which was sooooo much fun!! The clubs in surfers are really good!! We went to wet and wild theme park which was really fun!!! We went to Byron bay from surfers paradise Yesterday we done a tour to a hippy town called NIMBIN it is the strangest town ever. It looks like it is stuck in time as all the buildings are wooden with old hippy men singing outside!! Nimbin in aus version of amsterdam!! We also visioted a hippy mans botanical gardens and Minyan falls which it a waterfall on top of an extinct volcanoe. Was really pretty. Today we are doing a lighthouse walk which leads the to the most easterly point of australia and tomorow we leave for sydney. Pictures will follow as this computer doesnt allow photos to be uploaded!! xxx