Whitehaven heaven!!

It’s becoming something that I am saying a lot, and I know there is only a limited amount of times that I can say it. I have just been to the most beautiful place on the planet (I wonder what the next one might be)

Perfection in Beach form

Whitsundays is a collection of islands of Airlie Beach. They have been classed as a ‘National Heritage Site’ which means that no building can be built on them, and the waters are policed heavily. The islands are surrounded by the Great Barrier Reef which only adds to the beauty of this place.

Driving yachts is fun!

From Airlie Beach, visitors jump on any number of boats for a variety of days and head over to the islands to take in the scenery. We ended up on The Hammer.

Luckily the weather was holding out (which we were told was not the case for the past couple of weeks) and we got clear blue skies the whole way round.

Our first stop was Whitehaven Beach. Which looks as if it has been brought in from a movie set. It does not look as though it should be real, but when you feel the sand under your feet (which is the softest sand I have even stood on) all you can do is look around and laugh. How the hell did I end up here??

The softest sand you will ever feel

It was on this day, that back at home, all my friends in the drama department at Exeter were donning their gowns and mortar boards for graduation. I had a very different picture, using my cowboy hat from Kroombit as my mortar board and an Australian towel as my gown with the traditional blue screen background being replaced by a view over the Whitsundays islands. Perfect.

Right now, we are out of the jelly fish season, so there is no serious danger, but the crew on the boats are still obligated to giving you stinger suits to wear before you go in the water. Standing on the most perfect beach in the world, looking at the clearest water in the world, with not a cloud in the sky, there is NO WAY that was going to be putting on what can only be described as a thin wet suit to go swimming. Besides, the crew weren’t even doing it either. Which is how I got my first ever jelly fish sting. Don’t jump ahead though, it felt as if someone had starched me pretty hard, and the sting that comes with it wouldn’t go away. James, one of the crew members, said that we would know if it was serious in 20 minutes was I might start feeling funny, I hope he was joking.

Like with Fraser Island, there is no light pollution around these islands. In fact it is even less so. Again, we were very lucky. There was not a cloud in the sky, which meant that for the first time in my life I got to see the edge of the Milky Way. Awesome stuff!

Whitsundays is one of the places that I wish I didn’t have to leave. I could sit on Whitehaven beach for my entire life and never get tired of the view both during the day and at night. But of course, we have to move on.

It’s getting even hotter now, and the scenery is getting more and more beautiful. 2 more days of Oz fun times ahead!

Matt M

STA UK WTI 2010

‘Ride ‘em Cowboy…’

The Oz experience is a pretty good way to get you up (or down) the East Coast of Australia. It’s a hop-on-hop-off service, meaning that you can get off wherever you want and stay there for however long you want, calling them up the day before you want to leave to get on the next bus out (of course do this sooner in high season or you might be trapped for a while. All of the people on the bus are like minded travellers, and the drivers try and make this as enjoyable as they can. Included in the price of the bus ticket (which varies depending on the kind of package that you buy) are several activities you can do as you go like surfing, lawn bowels (!) and the Kroombit Cattle Station.

Me and Pipsie

If anyone has watched any kind of cowboy film, then you will know what I am talking about. Kroombit is in the middle of nowhere (so remote in fact that in 1995 they found and downed WW2 plane that had been ‘missing’ since 1946, it was apparently not in any way hidden, it was just that no one walked past it in almost 50 years) and the people who work on this farm (made up of both locals and backpackers working for accommodation… as a cowboy!) spend their days moving goats around the enormous expanse of land they own and cracking whips.

When you come here, you get to share in that experience. I can now say that I can ride a horse!

The beauty of being a Cowboy

There are so many different things you can do at this place. Quad biking, Horse riding, Goat Mustering, Shooting and there is something called a goat rodeo, that everyone gets involved in at the end of the day, which constitutes of dragging a goat out of its pen, lifting and turning it over and simulating the branding on their arses (of course we were only using a rod painted red at the end). It’s a lot of fun!

Then the winners of the goat rodeo (depending on the time it took you to brand your goat) choose either ‘the circle of love’ or ‘the ring of fire’. For us it was ‘the ring of fire’, which turned out to be all twenty of us standing in a circle holding hands while our guide stuck a cattle prod into someone on the other side of the circle, sending 11,000 volts (apparently) through us all. I find myself wanting to know what ‘the circle of love’ my have included. He then asked for volunteers to have the rod put directly on them. Being who I am, I stepped up and he promptly stuck the rod on my bare stomach. Poor cows.

In the evening, there’s a buffet dinner (there’s a lot of these up the East Coast), whip cracking lessons and a Bucking Bronco. It’s hard to believe that just over a week ago I was in the concrete jungle of Sydney.

It’s starting to get hotter as well, and yet this is still winter over here. I can’t imagine what summer is like.

Matt M

STA UK WTI 2010

Breakfast with a real life Cowboy...