captain crankey and whitsundays!!

After an amazing nights sleep (?) on the greyhound we arrived in Airlie beach around 7am and headed for the YHA. We couldnt check in until 1 so after breakfast we decided to be productive and book our whitsundays sailing trip!!

Tina our booking agent had good and bad news for us!! The bad news was the weather was looking aweful at the end of the week, the good news was Tina had a boat leaving in two hours we could jump on to miss the bad weather and definately go to whitehaven beach. After much debate (slightly heated) we decided to go for the one boat on offer. We raced back to the YHA cancelled our booking, brought new towels (as we had lost our other towels at 1770) and showered, packed a weekend bag, dragged our other bags to storage, trekked over to the marina picking lunch up on the way and enough beer for the 3 day trip. We made it bang on time to meet the crew and other 23 passengers and head off out to sea on our home for the next few days the Habibi.

We had warning s from the crew that the weather was looking pretty aweful and we would need our sea sickness tablets so Mike downed a cheap tblet he'd bought in Thailand and when combined with loss of a nights sleep on the greyhound spent the rest of the day drawling on himself in a zombie like state, but atleast he wasnt sick!!!

The boat was pretty budget. We did get ourselves a double cabin which was lot more private than all the other bunks but did have a locked door into the smelly toilet, so we had the smell and sound of everyones bodily functions to look forward to as we lay in bed - the whitsundays were looking to be a truely romantic experience!!

Fortunately, Tina was right about the weather though. The first day was beautiful and we snorkelled over a couple of reef systems wearing our all in one black stinger suits looking like extras from a star trek episode!!??!! Slightly bad timing on a second front not only was it cyclone season so bad weather likley but it was also stinger season, deadly jelly fish season to you and I!!! We developed an unhealthy fascination with these little creatures over the next few days!! The captain had a few books so we educated ourselves on what to look for which proved to be a bit of a mistake. The deadly stingers can be as small as 1cm and not always visible to the naked eye, this combined with the budget stinger suits which did not cover the head nd had many large hles and gaps did not add to the enjoyment of snorkelling......and to think we were worried about the recent increasing shark attacks around the whitsundays!!??!! Sharks were the last thing on our minds!!

That night was early to bed everyone very tired after the first days excitement. It was an interesting night in the flee ridden bunk. Mike decided to partake in a little sleep walking and obviously didnt get far in the 6 x 6 cabin. After a couple of hours in the near cooking heat and smell Mike decided to sleep up on deck, and it was a gooooood sleep!!

The next day we awoke to the early call from captain cranky to "get our arses out of bed and down to breakfast"!! It would appear that someone had forgotten totell captain cranky that we were on holiday and not part of a paid crew there for him to vent his angers on!! After breakfast captain cranky got the maps out and weather print out and told us the news. The wind was looking to be blowing 40knots and the captain told us the weather would be hitting whitehaven beach therefore their was no point heading over there and he had selected a few sheltered bays for us to enjoy teh next two days!!??!! Obviously we were all disappointed but accepted our fate as we all agreed we would rather be safe!!

So we headed to our next snorkelling spot opposite some rich and famous resort filled with Brad and Angelina types. The captain herded us hurridly into the water as we were apparenty on a tight schedule. We enjoyed a short snorkel before we were surrounded by jelly fish and got the fear and swam back to the boat asap!! This was much to the captain cranky's annoyance. Even though he told us we only had a short time to snorkel and we had been in the water for 30 mins he was incredibly pissed off with us for not staying off the boat longer!!??!! He seemed to show no care for us being surrounded by stingers in the water but when asked why he wasnt joining us he confidently told us he never swims in stinger season!!??!! Good old captain cranky- damned if you do, damned if you don't!!

Next stop after snorkelling was a spit of sand that was only visible at mid to low tide. We set up a game of beach cricket with the other 3 brits and an ozy and Mike took them back to school!! Before leaving the boat we had another warning from cranky which really added to the enjoyment of the experience and further reminded us what a wild country we were in. Cranky showed us pictures of shells which we were not to touch as these little creatures fired a poison that would kill a man in minutes!! Great, another deadly ozy species to worry about, this time on the beach, our only safe haven in oz or so we thought!! What was more interesting was Mike had been collecting shell fish back on fraser island and prizing them open with a knife using them for bait only a few days earlier when fishing!! lol!!

The sand island also gave us chance to get to know the other people on the boat which was great and as it transpired we were not the only people to have developed a feeling that captain cranky should be made to walk the plank and we should take our chances with our own way home!! We also made friends with the local turtle who swam up and down the beach as we played cricket by the waters edge. Very cool but not much of a fielder, he droped every catch!!

We returned to the boat via the little motorised dinghy for lunch and some more moans from cranky that everyone was being too slow!! Little did he realise everyone was just enjoying time away from him and plotting his downfall!!

The winds were indeed picking up so we were taken to a resort island for the afternoon which was very relaxing. We took full advantage of the pool with swim to bar, jacuzzi and sauna's!!

We got to chat with the cook from the ship a littl more, Mel, a kiwi who was new to the boat and she was pretty cool!!

When we got back to the boat we were moored off of lovers cove, a beautiful spot for our last night on the boat. Captain cranky and his first mate (Dominion Dave, a real captain cranky in the making) were clearly very relaxed and suspiciously red eyed!! The BBQ was great and we sat around the table all 25 of us and had a great evening chatting and drinking into the night!! one of our drinking rules was no one can hold thier own drink. Matt and Jay the two Brits looked like they were enjoying this rule. laura told them "that is the gayest thing i 've ever seen" they said "no this is" and proceeded to pretend to snog with choclate cake in their mouths...very funny boys. We slept up on deck under the stars that night, so no toilet smells and luckily no sleep walking from Mike!!

The next day we were again awoken in the same fashion, had breakfast, snorkelled then headed back to harbour in the 3m swell with sails up and sea crashing over the front of the boat- good fun!!

We got off the boat, took some pics, and dragged our salty, sleepy selves back to the lagoon and counted our flee bites. We spent the rest of the afternoon in the lagoon pool with our shipwrecked mates!!

As soon as we got in we boil washed all our clothes to rid them of bed bugs. we had showers and cut eachothers hair. we were spruced up and ready for a good night out.

That night we got free pizza with our new pals in one of the bars, had a boogy to live music, and caught up with fraser island crew the Argentians, Liam and Tom. Whom had all made it into port!! We ended this night with a mad rain run...good times.