January 5, 2005 - Hamilton Island, Great Barrier Reef

We're hitting the high seas first thing tomorrow. So we won't be back online until Monday night. Then starting Monday we're staying on Hayman Island for a few days, which is also in the Whitsunday Group, but about 20 miles north of here. TTYS!

The Goldfinger's cabin, looking towards the bow. A little tight. And it's so hot, we'll probably be sleeping on deck anyway!

Meet the Goldfinger!

Hamilton Island marina. We're crashing here tonight (poor choice of words?)

G'day from the Great Barrier Reef! We caught our breath in Sanctuary Cove, but now it's time for some action!

This morning we flew another 1,000 km north from Brisbane to Hamilton Island. Hamilton is in a group of islands called the Whitsundays. All the islands are coral. If you're following along on a map, the closest city on the Australia mainland is Mackay.

We picked up the boat a couple of hours ago - it's a 9-meter Jenneau/Yanmar called the "Goldfinger." Not sure of the significance of that name yet, but I do have my own Bond girl on board. We're going to be on the boat Wed thru Mon. Since we have to be anchored by 4:45pm each day, it was too late to try to sail this afternoon. So we'll have dinner here at the harbour, sleep on the boat, and take off tomorrow morning before 8am.

We're more interested in snorkeling than sailing, so we have planned short sails to coral inlets every day. I think I'll rent a rod and reel so we can troll while we're sailing. We're basically going to make a huge counterclockwise circle around Whitsunday Island, which is a National Park. The island is about 12 miles by 6 miles. They say we won't see any sharks underwater, but there are jellyfish which sound pretty brutal. So we rented "jelly suits" which are like very thin wet suits that are supposed to discourage them and keep off the sting.

Here's the itinerary:

Thu - Sail to Chance Bay on Whitsunday for snorkeling
Fri - Sail around the southeast point of Whitsunday to Whitehaven Beach (world famous we're told), then snorkeling and overnight at Tongue Bay
Sat - Sail north up the eastern Whitsunday shore to Hook Island, for snorkeling and overnight in Macona Inlet
Sun - We’ll sail south down the western Whitsunday shore and may hit an island called South Molle, also a National Park, where you can hike up a mountain and see a nice view of all the Whitsundays. Then we'll try to make it back to the Hamilton marina before anchor time since we have to return the boat by 10am on Monday anyway.

Can't wait to show you the underwater pictures!!