Oh my gosh. Whitsunday's sailing trip was epic. Our travel agent was not kidding when she said Emperor Wings was the nicest ship in the harbour. It was totally worth the ridiculous amount of money I spent on it! It had a hot tub on the deck. The food was amazing, I swear I gained like 10lbs! our boat even had a slushy machine. sooo yum. There were 3 meals a day and like 8 snack times.
The people on the boat were pretty great. A few oddballs as per usual, but what can you do about that? One seriously crazy quebequois man. Super old and creepy. Oh well.
So the first day we got on the ship and went straight to Whitehaven beach because its wet season (who knew? I thought summer would be a great time to be in Oz but its definitely really wet). So since it was sunny and glorious the crew took advantage and took us to the beach. The sand was like talcum powder, in texture and colour! we played cricket, made a giant human pyriamid and walked around. i saw 3 little sting rays. it turns out there was only one other boatload of ppl that day on the beach and it happened to be Fran and Alice's boat! what are the odds? so it was lovely to see them again! we took some cheeky pictures. then we had a snack of veggies, crackers, sausage, cheese and dip. so good. we then got sparklers and watched the sunset. class.
we sailed for a a bit and then parked for the night. everyone got out their bevvies and we sat around the hot tub.
when Rox and I were shown our room, our mouths dropped. we paid 10$ extra each to get our own room, but we were in a double bed within a teeny tiny room that slept 7 ppl. it was like being in a coffin. horrible. stupid travel agent lied to us. but it gets worse, after 2 days on the ship someone in our room had left something wet in their bag and it started to smell like the worst mix of sweat, piss and dog. Awful.
But we pretty much spent no time in our room, just lay out on the deck or in the dining room.
day two we got up early to see a look-out, apparently its famous but I had never heard of it. beautiful for sure. we also sailed out to the outer great barrier reef to do some diving. It was amazing, there were only 4 certified divers so our group was nice and small. I saw so many cool things! turtles, barracudas, dolphins, reef sharks, sea cukes, clown fish, i could go on for ages.
the next morning there was a sunset dive but i decided to sleep and dive later.
My second dive was a bit brutal. I think I am getting a cold, so your aren't meant to dive. I decided to go anyway. Got massive sinus squeeze. it feels like your head is about to explode. I basically just went to 16.7 metres and was like i can't do this and went up to 8 metres . it was still cool and i got to stay under 47minutes because you use less compressed air when you are higher, but i like to go down further, you see bigger stuff. I saw a bunch of giant travelli though, they were sweet.
we sailed back to the whitsundays yesterday. that was wild. the waves were so huge they were soaking everyone on deck. it was awesome for a while. until people started getting massively seasick. Terry was on the nets and getting slaughtered by the waves, we were laughing hysterically until he started rolling over towards the ropes. we were like what is he doing? turns out he was puking his guts out. the captain had to come out and haul him to the back deck. one by one people were getting seasick and trying to walk to the back deck to vom. unfortunately as soon as you stood up you would be thrown to the floor of the boat. so people were crawling/puking along the side of the boat. its hilarious to look back on it, but at the time filthy. Roxy actually fell so hard she lost her top and gave the boys a bit of an eyeful!
It ended up me and 5 boys were the only ones to avoid seasickness. we sat in the spa and enjoyed the ride! eventually someone decided to go get a case of beer, but everytime a wave smacked us we got instant refills of saltwater! eww. eventually we got back to the whitsunday islands and the waves calmed down. we had delicous snacks. i got to eat a lot since like 20 people were seasick.
we were so lucky, our entire trip it was sunny and gorgeous. apparently the last 3 trips had only rain and ppl just stayed inside and got wasted. how lame is that?
So I woke us this morning with mad burned lips. my lips are so swollen it reeeally hurts. i can't smile or eat or speak without pain! Another guy burnt his lips as well, so at least its not just me!
I am staying in Airlie for another 2 nights and then off to the Kroombit Cattle station, should be fun! Then Fraser island 4X4 trip. I can't wait!
Love!
Oh, you know what that smell in your room was? I mailed you a pet dog to keep you company, and it must have peed itself and gotten really sweaty in the bag I sent it in. Sorry about that. Glad to hear it arrived safely. How weird is it that they mailed it to your room on a boat?
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