Our body clocks are losing reliability, we were 10 minutes late getting up, luckily not a big deal as we had nothing planned before 10AM. After breakfast we hung around in the somewhat neglected room catching up with minor things like bank accounts, credit card payments and most importantly making sure our snow removal service got their payment in time.
At the appointed hour we headed down to the marina to pick up our boat for the Whitsunday Islands. We encountered a small issue in that there were more cars than available parking spaces, luckily there was another car park we could use in an adjoining resort.
We checked in at the marina and as “grey nomads” we received a care package. Grey nomads are the equivalent of N. American Snowbirds i.e. old fogeys like us who tend to follow the warmth. We got a cloth tote bag and two oversize cookies! On board the boat was free tea and coffee, what more could we want. Looking out the window we saw some nice looking boats which I joked were the type we were going on.
As it turned out our boat was at the end of the dock, behind all the pillars, but similar to the one in the foreground.
A few pictures of the trip and the islands.
Just to make sure we behaved they sent two police officers along.
The boat was heading towards Hamilton Island where there is a six star resort and lots of rich people with houses and boats! For some odd reason, the local airport is located on the island and not the mainland.
It appears as though no private cars are allowed on the island, although there are mini tour buses and taxis. The islanders rely on golf carts
On the way across one of the crew said he’d come and give the four of us grey nomads who were aboard a personal commentary on what we were seeing. Unfortunately, ships business prevented him from doing so. On the way back, to make up for this we were all invited to the wheelhouse and had a great time talking to the captain, who also happens to be the owner of a 1963 Morris Minor! We were allowed to stay up there until after we docked. The only thing missing from the wheelhouse was the wheel. The ship could be controlled from a small lever built into the armrest of the captains chair. A couple of times previously, when we were docking I mentioned to Lyn how easy it was to maneuver these boats with their bow and side thrusters, and how difficult it would be without them. Well this boat had no such thrusters, all the maneuvering was done using differential thrust on the two engines. VERY impressive.
The boat above was a larger version of ours with twin V-10 engines giving 1500 HP and a cruising speed of 28 knots.
All in all we found the trip we wanted, and a friendly crew as well. Of course the question that hasn’t been answered is where did the islands get their name?
The Whitsunday Islands, more commonly known as ‘The Whitsundays’ is an island chain off the east coast of Queensland, Australia.
The Whitsunday Islands gained their notoriety and name in the late 1700s when Captain James Cook first sailed through the island chain on board Endeavour, a British Royal Navy Research vessel. Making his way up the coast after sailing around New Zealand he was charting the coastline and ‘discovering’ Australia for the rest of the world. After entering a large island chain, he came upon a unimpeded passage to the North, his direction of choice. While sailing through the then unnamed passage Captain Cook (who was Lieutenant at the time) proclaimed it ‘Whitsunday Passage,’ which it is still known as today. At the time, Captain Cook believed it to be Whit Sunday, a christian holiday that takes place 7 weeks after Easter. What the Captain didn’t know was that it was actually Whit Monday on the day they sailed through since the Endeavour had passed the international date line at the 180th meridian of longitude. And so the Whitsundays were discovered on a Whit Monday!
Once ashore we headed up a cliff road to look down over Airlie Beach.
In our quest not to cram too much into each day we decided to stop overnight in Bowen, about an hour up the road rather than drive up to Townsville about 3 hours away.
On the way we diverted off The Bruce to visit Cedar Creek falls, unfortunately someone had turned off the falls.
We resisted the urge to stay at the Bowen Arrow motel (think about it!) and headed for the Ocean View Motel instead.
We headed into Bowen for dinner but found little that appealed (Pizza Hut, MacDonald’s, Dominoes and a few other fast food joints) then Lyn spotted a hotel, so we tried that. We had a good meal sitting in an outside courtyard.