Jeff's Study Abroad: Spring Break 2009 - Days 5-7 - Whitsunday Islands and Airlee Beach

From Undara we went to the Whitsunday Islands (via Airlee Beach).

On the way there, we passed the town of Bowen, known for its mangos and also for being the filming site of the movie Australia. It is so well known for their mangos (they are amazingly delicious there) that they constructed a giant mango as a town symbol. You can see a picture below and then laugh at how hideous it is... Just like we all did.

To give a brief explanation of how the Whitsundays formed, basically, way back around the time of Pangea (when all the bodies of land where one, continents hadn't formed yet), Australia was a really mountainous region. When it split, it shifted away and was still quite mountainous. Then, all the glaciers melted, raising the world's water level by a lot of water. This flooded most of the valleys in the mountains, and made the Whitsunday Islands (so a better name may be the Whitsunday Sunken Mountains but that doesn't really look good on a postcard...).

The Whitsunday's may be my favorite place on Earth, they're that beautiful.

When we went, we went on a 2-day live aboard boat cruise run by a company called the "Southern Cross." If you ever want to see the Whitsundays, look them up, go on a boat called the British Explorer, you'll have the time of your life. I swear.

So, the Whitsundays have a lot of islands (Big Island, Whitsunday Island, Mole Island, North Island...), about 74 in all if I remember correctly. They're all beautiful. It's nice. It's warm. The water has a really really young coral reef and LOTS of fish. If you want to see a lot of fish in a condensed area, this is probably one of the best places in the wild.

You can also see Whitsunday Beach, rated one of the top 10 beaches in the world (I believe it's #4?). What makes it so amazing is that the sand there is 99.8% silica, making it fantastically white. It also is fantastically good for making sand castles since it sticks together really well. One of our boat crew stated that it was impossible to take a bad picture at Whitsunday Beach and I would have to say that he was right, it is that pretty.

The boat cruise was fun. It rained a little but it was fine. We got to go sailing which was quite the experience. Needing to run from one side of the boat to the other to not get eaten by the water, very fun. You also can lean at ridiculous angles to the water (since the British Defender was a racing boat at some point in time). The crew said that it could turn 118 degrees without tipping over, which is crazy to think about.

After the boat cruise, we went to stay in Airlee Beach for a little. It was extremely nice there, and very pretty, but it also signified the end of my trip :(

I flew back to Sydney, got in bed, and prepped for the beginning of school again!