After our first week in the north, we said goodbye to Newell Beach and started our drive south.
On the first day we stopped at Cardwell and stayed at the Port Hinchinbrook Resort and Marina for a night. It was an odd location but the cabin and the pool were nice.
From Cardwell, we drove towards Townsville. We made a few stops along the way at some of the sleepy towns, but mostly we drove right by them. It was a wet day so we liked it better in the car! We stopped in at Ingram (which has a large Italian population) for breakfast. The cafe was run by two older women (my age!). The cafe wasn't completely full but I don't think they were used to it being even half full. They said to Fergus, "it's going to take some time for the 2 coffees, order of scones and toast as we are completely swamped"! And it did take close to half an hour but the food was perfect and worth the wait. The small town seemed busy but everyone was walking pretty slowly.
Townsville is the largest city in northern Queensland. It looked nice? We stopped there only to catch a 20 minute ferry to Magnetic Island (or Maggie as the locals call it). We went to Magnetic for 2 nights and we stayed at the Arcadia Guest House at Arcadia Beach. It was a very laid back place and despite the rain on second day, we had a great time there. The Townsville area is in a rain shadow and is known to be the sunniest place in Queensland (Maggie has an average of 320 sunny days/year!). Unlucky for us, we were there on one of the rainy days!
Arcadia Beach
Rock Wallabies at Bremner Pt on Arcadia Beach
Traveling in luxury - a rolls royce with sheepskin seats, floor and ceiling. We were picked up from the ferry terminal at Nelly Bay and it was grand way to travel!
BBQ area at the guesthouse
All aboard maties!
Jumping pillow at Magnum pub and hostel.
Alma Bay
Good food!
There is a fantastic gourmet food shop and cafe at Arcadia Beach - 5 minutes walk from the guest house. It was very good. The cafe had only opened 9 days previous so lucky for us!!
Horseshoe Bay
Travelling light by Mini-moke. Loud and smelly but fun.
The Forts Walk
We spotted 5 koalas in the wild during our 4 km Forts walk! Maggie is sometimes known as the "Koala capital of Australia". They are not easy creatures to spot and you get a sore neck from looking up at the trees but it is very cool when you do spot one! We saw a mom and a cub which the girls loved. Koalas survive solely on eucalyptus leaves and they eat about 2.5 lbs a day! They also sleep about 19 hrs. a day. Eat and sleep, that sounds pretty good!
The forts were built during WWII as Townsville had the largest concentration of US and Aussie soldiers during the war. The views were spectacular on the walk and it was a good day.
Picnic Bay
We left Maggie and headed down south towards our last stop of the Whitsundays.
We first had a toilet break with a big snake at Ayr. Gubulla Munda is a 60m carpet snake sculpture which is the totem for the Juru Tribe.
Bowen is famous for it's mangoes and tomatoes. We stopped at Horseshoe Bay for lunch.
the Big Mango at Bowen Information Ctr.
The Whitsundays - 74 Islands Out of the Blue
This is a major tourist attraction in Queensland and I can understand why. It is beautiful and if you love sailing and the water, you will love the Whitsundays. It is in the heart of the great barrier reef and midway along Queensland coast. Of the 74 islands, only 8 are inhabited. There are resorts and Club Med is at Lindeman Island. There are loads of sailing excursions but we decided the girls would not be up for that so we did another snorkeling tour! :-)
On the mainland, Cannonvale, Airlie Beach (backpacker capital), Shute Harbour are the communities that gives one access to the Whitsundays. We stayed in a 2 bedroom cabin at the Big4 Adventure Caravan park. The girls LOVED it. There were activities everyday (mini-golf, pedal karts, playground, jumping pillow, huge but cold pool) and night (outdoor movies - Charlottes Web, High School Muscial 1 and 2) and lots of other kids to play with. The girls met a lovely 9 year old from Adelaide named Holly. She was traveling with her parents for 2 months in Queensland.
Airlie Beach Apartments
Hair braiding for the girls
We wanted another day of snorkelling so we went on another reef tour and this time with Whitehaven XPress. On this tour, there were three activities. We first went for a short bush walk up to the Hill Inlet for some gorgeous views of Whitsunday Island, then a BBQ and swim at Whitehaven Beach (it is definitely the most beautiful beach in the world!) and a short snorkel at Mantaray Bay on Hook Island. We chose this tour because it also offered a glass bottom boat coral viewing. This gave Fiona an alternative if she didn't get her courage up to go in the water (which she didn't).
Again, we had an AMAZING day. We bought sea sick tablets the day before and we ALL took some! The waters were much more calm in the Whitsundays; all the islands must protect the waters. We were all fine on the journey.
Although, we liked the company and tour up at Port Douglas much better (the guides were MUCH nicer, the boat and equipment all better, there were more varied corals), we liked the different activities on this trip and the number of fish we saw were glorious!
The views from Hill Inlet were breathtaking. The only unfortunate thing is that there were heaps of tourists and we had to line up to get a photo. The walk to the lookout point is about 15 minutes but it was jam packed with people.
Hill Inlet beach was covered with coral.
The dingy that took us from the main boat to shore.
Whitehaven beach on Whitsunday Island really was beautiful. White white sand, clear clear blue water, it was wonderful. The bbq lunch was great as well. The girls met two wee Irish girls and had fun with them.
We had our BBQ lunch with a bunch of monitor lizards that were about 1 m plus long.
Snorkeling at Hook Island. We didn't have wetsuits here but the water seemed warmer. There were way more fish at this site. Hundreds of colourful fish of all sizes would come swimming towards us. It was so much fun!
Pair of parrot fish.
On Saturday morning, I went for a walk to Airlie Beach with a group from the Big4 to the Saturday markets. It was a 3km walk along the shore. The water was still and shimmering. What a beautiful area. The market was alright, nothing special. Later in the afternoon, I met the girls and Fergus at the Airlie lagoon.
Shute harbour
No comments:
Post a Comment