Checking the book “One Hundred Magic Miles”, a wonderful companion to the Whitsundays.
F & Ruth
Diving under
Self Portrait
Feeding Frenzy
Yesterday, we talked to our Skipper about changing the plans a bit so that we could spend a little more time at the snorkeling areas, so we had a leisurely breakfast of Bacon and Eggs and then headed out to snorkel again. The sun was out and it was glorious. We stayed out for about 1-1/2 hours and thoroughly enjoyed seeing the coral and fish again.
There are several large charter companies that bring large groups of people in to snorkel and dive. The snorkelers would float on foam noodles which helped to give them buoyancy and also helped the charter drivers to find the people that they were responsible for.
We returned to the boat for morning tea and then motored about 1 hour to Butterfly Bay which was about 2 coves away. There were plenty of moorings so we were able to go to one that was fairly sheltered….hopefully no rolling tonight.
After lunch, Michael and I donned our snorkel gear and hopped over the side of the boat and headed to shore to check out the coral again. We ended up swimming about 500 yards away from the boat and had a wonderful time just floating and enjoying the ocean floor view. The coral was not at all spectacular, but there were tons of large clams that were very interesting. You could find them by looking for a rock coral that had a smile….the clam would bury down in the rock or sand and all that you could see was the opened mouth. We also saw something that we are assuming are sea slugs which were long and cylindrical and looked like they were made of a dense foam. Some were colored, but most were black or brown. As we swam close to the shore, we saw Mangrove trees and loved the look of their roots coming out of the water. In this area, we also found some interesting vegetation….not a coral, but more like a green plant.
We swam back to the boat again and had our usual deck showers. We found that it was easier to wash hair and rinse off (with bathing suits ON) using the deck shower on the stern of the boat. It is fun to sit there and do all of your ablutions.
After afternoon tea, Danny and Ruth decided to drop the Tender and do a bit of Sticky Beaking around the island and other boats. As we were dropping the boat into the water, Michael said “There seems to be a lot of water in the bottom mate”. We looked and realized that the plug (called a “Bung” here) had been pulled out, so we had to raise the boat again and put it back in so that they wouldn’t sink!!!……Good times to send your captain out in a Bungless boat!!!!!
We spent a quiet night without much boat rolling