Airlie Beach and Daydream Island - 15th July

See photo - Riley at Island Gateway caravan
park bird feeding.

Here we are in Airlie Beach, it is a tropical 21 degrees, overcast and scattered showers so the kids hit the caravan play park and we hung around for the 4pm bird feeding. We weren't disappointed by the birds, soon enough we were covered in Rosella's, at one point Bell had 5 on her arm and I had 4 with one screeching in my ear!, The boys had a blast, later that night we finally decided to book our trip (as we with most of our plans, last minute) to the Daydream Island Resort for 5 nights, even though we weren't sure about the weather!

See photo - Aiden with a 'live coconut'.

Saturday morning we awoke to showers and squally winds, so the only thing to do was to head out fishing, we managed to find a pretty good fishing and diving store where we got a tide chart and bought a crab pot..........hey it's Queensland, everyone's got a crab pot!. The bloke in the shop gave us directions to a bush track near the inlet of a creek across the other side of town and we were off ....... we managed to find the track and some mangroves where we baited up the trap and threw it into the mangrove ( tide wasn't full so it was a training mission ) and then we both threw in a line while the boys tried to cover every part of there anatomy in black mangrove dirt.......... which they almost succeeded. ( i cant wait until there old enough to clean the car!! ) We decided to leave the pot in for a while and went for a walk towards the coast to checkout the boats, we found a wrecked boat (Cyclone Yasi ) and a beached catamaran. it was here we also found our first coconut (full that is) cause all the time we found them they had huge holes bored in "em by the rats the moment they fall off the trees. We collected 4 and headed back to our fishing spot. We cracked the first one open and it was a beaut, nice and fresh, Aiden then managed to roll the second one down the bank and into the water (good one). We pulled the pot.......... nothing (better to wait for a high tide and leave them in for the evening) and the lines and headed for the caravan. We dropped off the coconuts outside the van and Bell went shopping for food while i cleared up the van as we will be storing it while we are away at Daydream Island, we then went into town to explore the Esplanade and then home to wash the car and pack for our trip. When we returned we found around 12 Sulphur crested cockatoos around our caravan, they had found our coconuts and were having a ball, they managed to chew there way into them and were wrestling over who was going to get a drink of coconut milk! Bell got one coconut and held it up while a couple of cockatoo's took turns drinking as she poured the milk onto their beaks. By 7 we had the van done and ready for our 5 days away, and the boys were in bed....yay!.



See photo - Coral beach - near Fish Bowl.

See photo - Riley with Dad, wanted to go
out every day on the catamarans.

We got up early emptied the fridge and hooked up the van and moved it down to the storage site ($10 a night) , we grabbed a taxi and headed for the ABLE PORT and marina, where we boarded the ferry and managed to get a seat upstairs ( something to do with the rain and wind ) the trip was only a short 25 minute cruise across to the island. We arrived and had to wait until 2pm to check in, so it was off around the island for some sightseeing, we found the Kids playground ( instinctive for the short ones ) all the pools the restaurants and then the rainforest's track which traverses the island form end to end via a dirt track. Some of the views were fantastic even though it was at time to time overcast. We found ourselves back at Lovers Cove on the back of the island which is a beach entirely covered in coral washed up from the reef, there is no sand! We then made our way back to the reception and checked into our room, the boys got changed and we headed for the pools where we found the HEATED SPA! Little did we know it was to be our home for the next 5 days! Later that evening the wind died and we had dinner in the restaurant overlooking the bay and a spectacular sunset!

See photo - Aiden - realises he can breath
through a snorkle for the 1st time.

Monday morning we awoke ( we all are sleeping in one room with the boys sharing a sofa bed) to clear skies and no wind!, we headed for brekkie and then it was down to the pool like a German Tourist to stake our claim on the sun lounges! Smack bang in front of the heated spa, and a place we would be very familiar with by the end of our trip! We spent the day checking out the activities on the beach for us and the boys, and spent most of it relaxing around the pool until dinner time.

The following 4 days we managed to cover almost all of the activities which were on offer, these included Boot Camp, Surf cats, Ocean Kayak, Fish feeding, Kite flying, Coconut Bowls (don't ask! ), Play park, Kangaroo Feeding ...... the list goes on! But like all good holidays part of our day had to revolve around the pool and heated spa!

See photo - Start of our Living Reef fish feeding tour.

See photo - Doug - Shovel nosed ray.

See photo - We all had a hold of this little guy, he
can survive up to 1 hour out of water.

On the Thursday we went on a guided fish feeding with the Marine Biologist, Ollie ( Daydream Island has the largest open air aquarium in the southern hemisphere ) during the tour we got to hold a baby shark in the Shark Nursery, touch and feed Pancake & Pikelet the huge infamous Stingrays along with Doug the Shovel nosed ray. This was one of the highlights of our stay due to the great presentation from Ollie the local marine biologist along with his enthusiasm and patience with the young ones this tour is a must if you ever visit! This also marked our 3 month point in our trip around Australia, can you believe we are half way? ...... we can't!

See photo - View from Mermaids restaurant on Daydream Island.

We managed to score the best weather while we were on the island, it was mid / high  20's and light breezes the entire time, there wasn't a single cloud for the duration of our stay. On the Friday we awoke to blustery winds and cloudy skies......... but we were leaving at 0930am so for us.... all was good! We also met two beautiful families that we hope to meet up with again as we continue our trip south to Victoria.

We arrived back at Airlie Beach by 11am and headed south for the Sunshine coast and Brisbane!

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