Whitsunday Islands

For my last weekend abroad I went to the Whitsunday Islands. The Whitsunday’s are a group of about seventy islands near The Great Barrier Reef in central Queensland.

We flew to the Whitsunday coast on Thursday afternoon after some hurried packing. For the three days leading up to our trip we were ninety-five percent sure it was going to be cancelled because Cyclone Wati (the one that followed right after Larry) was forcing all the boats to stay in port due to gale force winds and high seas. Fortunately Wati headed south just in time to give us some nice weather for our weekend. We spent the first night at Backpackers by the Bay Hostel on the coast. This is the view from the hostel’s patio; not too shabby.

The town we stayed in was Airlie Beach. It solely exists to be a base for all the boats that sail the Whitsunday’s and a place to shop for tourists before or after their trip. Despite its name the town has a very rocky coast and the only beach is at this artificial lagoon.

This is the boat we were on for our two day and two night voyage. It is the Apollo, an eighty foot racing yacht that won many famous races including the Sydney to Hobart race and one around the Hawaiian islands and back. It held twenty-six passengers and four crew; I went with twelve other Americans.

These were our sleeping quarters in the bow of the boat. I was the bottom left bunk. Luckily we anchored at night so none of us had to be strapped into our beds or anything. It was pretty fun to see the stars of the southern hemisphere from the deck of the boat.

On the second day of our trip we stopped on Whitsunday Island, the largest of the group. This is a view down to Whitehaven beach. The beach is enormously famous and popular considering that the only way to get to it is by a chartered boat. It has some of the finest sand in the world. In fact, the Australian government sold some of the sand to NASA to use for making the Hubble telescope mirrors. In addition to sailing and going to the beach we also spent some more time snorkeling in the coral. Some of my friends had disposable underwater cameras so I may post some of those pictures when I get the scuba diving ones form Cairns.

Here I am (with my crazy wind blown hair) at the helm of our boat. We were encouraged to help sail the boat if we wanted to give it a try. We weren’t really allowed to steer, but there was plenty of opportunity to hoist sails or be a grinder when things needed to be adjusted.

And finally, this is the view of the sunset from the deck of the Apollo. Not a bad way to end my trip in Australia. I'm back in Wyoming with my family and new puppy, Tiger, now. I'll be visiting Atlanta from the 10th to the 22nd. I only have one more post to make before I'm done documenting my trip. I'll finish up when I finally get all my underwater pictures of the Great Barrier Reef. I look forward to talking to everyone about my travels and showing the rest of my pictures and all my souvenirs.

Cairns

For our first free weekend based from Brisbane Blake, Emily, Mallory, Nikki, and I traveled to Cairns. Cairns (pronounced “cans” by the Aussies who have no concept of the letter “r”) is a tropical town in North Queensland. It is the most popular place from which to start a trip to the Great Barrier Reef.

This is the five of us doing our squinty-eyed Calypso backpacker’s hostel pose. The hostel was pretty fun and included a pool, bar, and grill.

We arrived early Friday morning which happened to be Saint Patrick’s Day. We spent the afternoon souvenir shopping and then had dinner and went out to celebrate Irish tradition. This is Blake and I enjoying our pints of Guinness. The night was also filled with Irish car bombs, River Dance, and terrible Irish accents. We spent the majority of the night at an Irish pub called Shenannigans.

Saturday was our trip to the Great Barrier Reef. We took a two hour boat ride out to a place where the reef almost reached the surface so it was perfect for snorkeling. We were also near a steep drop off from the reef so it was a good place to scuba dive as well. None of us were certified divers so we all signed up for a half hour introductory dive where the guide took four of us at a time and took care of everything for us. We rented an underwater camera to get pictures of the reef. They are sending us a CD of all the photos and I will post some of them when I get it. It will probably be my last post I make for the whole study abroad.

Sunday we went to Cape Tribulation about two hours north of Cairns. It is one of the few places in the world where the ocean and the rainforest meet. This is Mallory and Nikki walking the rainforest boardwalk. I enjoyed the visit even though it wasn’t quite the Amazon jungle I was hoping for.

We were scheduled to go back to Brisbane at 6 AM on Monday morning, but Cyclone Larry shut down the airport. My parents told me that it actually made big news in America too. It was a category five cyclone, but luckily there was no loss of life. We went inland about an hour to a mountain town to be safe, and this was the picture from our hotel room. There were trees, street signs, and power lines down all over the place. Despite Larry’s inconvenience, the trip was one of my favorites and we were able to make it back to Brisbane late that night. I only have one more weekend trip before it is time to go home. Luckily it should be one of the best; we're going sailing in the Whitsunday Islands. After that it is back to reality with class, finals, and the long flight back to Wyoming.

Brisbane

My last base of operation during my study abroad is Brisbane in the state of Queensland. It is quite a bit north of Sydney so it is noticeably warmer here. Brisbane is a lot more spread out then Sydney so it doesn’t feel like I’m in a big city as much now. The town does not have as much to do, but it keeps us entertained and it is closer to the Great Barrier Reef and some other tourist destinations.

My hotel is much improved from the last one; I actually have room to spread out. The one flaw is that I have to go to an internet café to get online here. That is why I haven’t posted in a while (That and the website wouldn’t let me post pictures even when I did go pay for internet!).

I have discovered that pretty much every town in this part of the world has a botanical garden. Brisbane has this one near the river that cuts through the city. This is one of the coolest trees I have ever seen and it was perfect for climbing. I also tried to shimmy up a very tall and thin palm tree with little success.

It is league rugby season in Australia now so some friends and I went to see the season opener in town. This was the Brisbane Broncos versus the North Queensland Cowboys. It was a big rivalry since they’re both from the same state. In contrast to America the Cowboys killed the Broncos in this game. All of the Americans have adopted rugby pretty well; it is an excellent game that we would like to see more of. Cricket, on the other hand, is an awful game. I’m embarrassed for the locals that pay to watch that nonsense.

This is a very trendy black light bowling alley that we went to one night after dinner. I broke a hundred, but it was ugly. Doug stole the victory from me with two strikes in the tenth frame.

The best part about Brisbane is how beautiful it is. It is right on the Brisbane river, and it makes for some excellent views. They pretty much had to build this highway entirely in the water. I stayed in the hotel Ibis on the far right in the picture.
Across the river from my hotel is this fake beach. Brisbane is quite a few miles inland from the coast so they ship in tons of sand from Morton Island every year to make this riverside pool look like a beach. It's a pretty cool place to go swimming late at night. Mike, Doug, Blake, and Emily went with me to explore this area.
A short bus ride from town is Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. They have over 100 koalas, a kangaroo feeding area, and lots of other Australian animals to see. It was pretty cool to have a ton of grey kangaroos hopping around right beside me.
They were very friendly and very used to human contact. You could feed them, pet them, or just chill out in the middle of a group of them. I even got to see a little joey stick his head out of the pouch.
The coolest part about visitng the koala sanctuary is that you can get a picture holding a koala. This is patch; he was about eight kilograms and one of the largest koalas in the sanctuary. That's about it from Brisbane. My next weekend trip is to the Great Barrier Reef; I can't wait!