Ultra-Adventure in Queensland -- Spring Break 2010! -- PART 1

So this is the blog that I have been waiting to publish for about a while now.  For Easter break off from Uni, my friends and I planned the most EPIC adventure up through Queensland.  For this phenomenal 9-day trip, I channelled my inner adrenaline junkie as every day was literally an wild and crazy whirlwind adventure.

AIRLIE BEACH

Day 1:

The first leg of our trip was to fly into Airlie Beach on the coast, where our Whitsunday Islands sailing trip would embark from the next day. We were way amped!  Upon our arrival, we were greeted with angry windstorms and pouring rain.  At this point, our hype and excitement took a back seat as we grabbed our soaking wet baggage and listened to our sarcastic bus driver joke about how we had poorly chosen to come during Queensland's rainy season.  Debbie Downer himself also mentioned that it was also their stinger (jellyfish) season and that their beaches were ridden with salt-water crocs.  At this point we were nervous as to how our adventurous spring break would unfold.

Luckily, the rain calmed down for our first night in Airlie.  We stayed at Beaches hostel, which is known for its young backpacker atmosphere and base-bumping dance parties.  Airlie Beach was literally a street long and consisted of sailing companies, hostels, and of course a "Mackah's" (McDonald's).  After checking in with our travel agent for our sailing trip, we enjoyed many of the wild street performers and sights in Airlie. This included a scary tree woman mime, drunk Cookie Monster and Elmo, and even a suitcase jam-packed with boxed wine (or "goon" as the Aussie's call it) [See right]. We started off our night by checking in with our travel agent for our boat trip, and soon after we hit up the nightlife.  The rains were gone and the beach lit up.  We tore up the dance floor and celebrated being young adventurers.  We found a solution to the lack of beaches that night, but swimming in the manmade lagoon just across the street from our hotel.  Chicken fights, games of keep-away, and high fives were aplenty there.  Once the lagoon closed, we decided not to waste a moment and went right back to the dance floor in our swimsuits.  It was an excellent first night, filled with great music, great dance moves (not as great as Pete Galante's though), and great friends.  The night came to an end as we fell asleep in our creaky hostel beds.

WHITSUNDAY ISLANDS

Day 2: 

After spending a relaxing morning hanging by the lagoon and feeding potato cakes to   tropical birds in trees, we met the crew that would man our sailboat throughout the Whitsunday voyage.  Our lively crew consisted of Skipper Greg, Deckhand (or "dickhead" if you have a New Zealand accent) Phil, and two Aussie girl cooks.  Our stylish boat was named Habibi -- not to be confused with the hookah bar in Westwood.  What was interesting was that there was a strict no shoes rule, so we would be barefoot for the next three days.  Also, they had encouraged travelers to BYO (bring your own).  Considering we were college students on spring break in Australian islands, let's just say we came will prepared with "our own."

In no time we were way, way, way out to see after setting sail, and many of the travelers wasted little time before digging into "our own."  It was really awesome chatting with all of the other people aboard.  I met two cool blokes from Germany traveling on an 4-month adventure, a super smart and successful couple from the Midwest, fun explorer girls form England and Canada, and another small group of American exchange students.  That night the cooks served us a traditional Australian "barbie" (BBQ) of steak, sausages, and veggies.   It was so awesome, and it was really great to eat food that did not come from a college kitchen.

Now the sleeping arrangement is where it gets really interesting.  They had a few small rooms with bunks for about 3-4 people, but that did not accommodate everyone.  Everyone, except for six of us Americans, was called to sleep in one of those small bed cubbies.  Me and 5 other girls were directed to the "party room," the crew called it.  Basically, the party room was a GIGANTIC bed located at stern of the ship.  What a joke! We were dying of laughter at the ridiculousness that was the party room, and it was actually a pretty comfortable bed.

Day 3:

Whitehaven Beach: The skipper woke us up at the crack of dawn, painfully reminding us that we needed to get up to enjoy the day and that we had the rest of our lives to sleep in.  We all tiredly dragged out feet up the steep ladder to the deck, and were greeted with phenomenal clear skies and sunshine.  Of coure, this quickly snapped us out of our sluggishness.  It was beautiful and so awesome to overcome wrath of Queensland’s rainy season, even if only for a short time.  We spent the morning hanging, tanning, playing catch, burying people in the sand, and swimming at WHITEHAVEN BEACh.  Crystal clear waters and super smooth sands made up this paradise.  According to the skipper, the silky sands are made of a majority of silica, which comes from the defecation of fish that eat the reef.  He then continued by informing the girls that the smooth silica sand would be great for exfoliating the skin – although I don’t think any of the girls scurried off to give themselves a silica facial after learning about its source.  Now I’ve got to talk about our trendy stinger suits.  In addition to protecting us from pesky jellyfish, these spandex bodysuits were also great for performing various forms of acrobatics and aerobics (see left).  I accredit these luxurious pieces of water-wear for the fact that I can now hold a handstand for over 20 seconds.  All in all, the beautiful Whitehaven might almost beat Thailand’s Ko Phi Phi for the most incredible beach in my book.  It was totally unreal.

After Whitehaven and a bit of tea and biscuits (cookies), we sailed over to Hook Island, where we finally got to snorkel over some reef.  We went to two different snorkeling sights.  On the first one, we had fun donning our super cool stinger suits again, but this time with snorkels and fins too.   We spent about an hour checking out the radiant sea life.  Giant schools of fish would often startle us and you knew when they were coming, as people nearby would start screaming and flailing like wild baboons.  So funny!  The second snorkel sight was PHENOMENAL!  We were just hanging and observing the little tiny fish, when our deckhand Phil came over in a dinghy and started throwing turkey cold cuts into the water.  We were confused at first, but soon there were ENORMOUS fish swimming to the surface to dine on the meat.  Literally, they were like the size of a large microwave!  Phil told us to chill out and introduced us to his fish comrades.  First up were Elvis and his girlfriend Delilah (see right).  Elvis and Delilah were a enormous green fish, called Giant Maori Wrasses, that were super slimy and soft to the touch.  There was also the more intense-looking, darker, and sharp-finned Rufus.  Scary Rufus would often startle us, as he’d quickly dart through our group.  I have never been in the water with such monstrous fish and it was an extraordinary experience!

That night we played some interesting dinner games on the boat such as Bite the Box and the Awesome Foursome.  I cannot even do these games justice in description so you'll have to imagine those ones on your own.  We also learned how to speak Kiwi from our cook, Mel.  Now here's your lesson.  For the words "bid" and "bed" are switched in NZ language.  Also, "six" and "sex" are switched in Kiwi tongue.  Lastly ad most importantly, they do not eat "fish and chips," but rather "fush and chups" instead.  Hope you enjoyed that lesson!  To end the night, the Aussies taught us the popular Bushnut dance—check out the link below to learn this commonly known Aussie jig.  Also, the 4 of us Mary's kids performed our fresher dance on the bow hangout area of the ship.  Such good times and great memories!  It was an epic last night in the Whitsundays!

Nutbush Dance -- Best I could find on YouTube

Stay tuned for the next part of my tremendous Easter Break adventures through Queensland!