Wild Maggie

We got an early start today and were the first customers to Townsville’s information center this morning. Estelle and Gaila – two lovely elderly ladies wearing bright pink lipstick who volunteer at the tourist info center – stocked us with books, warned us to be croc wise, told us some funny stories and sent us on our way.
After a quick stop at McDonald’s for our WiFi fix we hopped yet another ferry to Magnetic Island, or “Maggie” as it is known by the locals. Twenty minutes later, armed with sandwiches and our snorkeling gear, we were on the shores Maggie ready for our day’s adventure. Yet again our camper had to stay on the mainland (only a few lonely hours this time) so we were at the mercy of public transport (gasp!) and our feet to get us around the island. We hopped off the bus at a lovely swimming beach, but decided to start our walk before getting wet. We crossed a well manicured field by the beach and came upon an echidna – nature’s cross between a porcupine and an anteater. About the size of a bowling ball, this spiny critter was shoving his long nose into the ground searching for (we think) bugs or ants or some such deliciousness. We were able to get pretty close and he seemed wholly unaware that he was the subject of our photo shoot. (We may have been the equivalent of crazy foreign tourists who take pictures of squirrels, but we didn’t care – the little fella’ was so neat!) 80 photos later, we commenced our walk up the island’s hills. We followed a walking trail that was for sure ridden with Death Adders and other scary things that could kill us, and ended up on a cool path where we spotted wild koalas in the trees. They are so interesting! Frankly, they don’t do very much other than look cute, and their furry grey bums are quite hard to spot, but we enjoyed the search nonetheless. We eventually made it down to Arthur Bay – beautiful blue waters emerging from giant boulder fields on the side of the protected cove. There was great snorkeling in the fringing reef just offshore. We saw lots of corals and colorful fish and snorkeled till it was too cold to do anymore. We hoofed it back up a serious hill, spotting a rock wallaby (like a mini kangaroo) en route and caught a bus to the ferry back to the mainland. A great day!

The brave wildlife photographer frames his subject

Not-so-cuddly echidna (E-Kid-Na)

Check out his weird little snout - he kept digging it into the ground!

"eagle-eye" Sarah spots another one

sleepy koala

A different kind of wild creature - this one came right out of the sea!

Whitsundays (and Mondays)

Let us start off by saying that Australia has fantastic tourist information centers and they are in most towns. There is only one problem - if you venture in to the center you WILL come out with no less than 20 pamphlets, five maps and no idea what to actually do next… After a near disaster at the first Whitsunday region info center we drove to Airlie Beach (gateway to the Whitsundays) and had a nice lunch which calmed our frayed nerves. Let me tell you, it’s work over here...you would think that our total lack of schedule or obligation would be relaxing BUT picking your tropical island resort location can be quite a stressful task! Australia does not have readily available internet however, they still have many travel agents (Krista, they may know Stephanie). So after going through the pile of pamphlets we went to the local travel agent/info center to book a standby rate at a very cushy resort island (sadly, the very cushy Toyota LandCruiser was not able to join us).
[Note: The Whitsundays are Australia’s Tahiti – 74 tropical islands surrounded by calm turquoise waters, fringing reef and a menu full of water sports. Because of the stunning back drop and serene waters, one of the most popular things to do in the area is to take a sailing trip. After careful review of our own negligible sailing abilities, we decided to forgo it this trip reserving it for a future adventure]
We had a fantastic time on Hamilton Island where the main mode of transportation was a “buggy” AKA American golf cart (left drive but driven on the wrong side of the road). Sarah and I went kayaking for a bit and I “had a snorkel” and found two giant clams both bigger than a basketball! Sarah sipped cocktails by the pool and had a taste of what a typical honeymoon destination might be : )
We watched the wild and very obnoxious birds (sulpher crested cockatoos for you birdies) fly back and forth from balcony to balcony squawking all the while. We closed the night with prawn pizza and a cocktail from the balcony!

View from our hotel balcony



On our balcony