Airlie Beach - Final broadcast

"Where are you heading to in Queensland? Cairns? Townsville?" said the man in the British Lolly shop in Kings Cross "Airlie Beach" I told him "aw yeah thats a little slice of heaven right there, now get out of my shop" he said jokingly jealous. Whenever we told any aussies we were going to Airlie Beach on the Whitsunday coast they immediately gave us the thumbs up, as in "Good choice". We got here last monday from Sydney via Brisbane. It took a couple of hours and weirdly we are an hour behind Sydney despite being further to the right of it. I still can't work this out. Anyway, we've been staying in a place called Sunlit waters which is at the top of a very steep hill that Emma hasn't enjoyed climbing once or twice a day but most of this area is hilly and sweeps down to sea so blue they have to use the word blue in different languages to describe it.



Our apartment was very spacious which was very welcome having stayed in a cubby hole in Manly for 2 weeks. Also it had a pool which is good as although it's called Airlie Beach there is no actual beach but there is a big lagoon which is pretty. The major reason we came up here was to visit the Great Barrier Reef. There are loads of boat trips out there but we picked one called Reef World which is a pontoon built out at Hardy Reef. It's a 2 hour journey out there and the trip gets pretty choppy once you get out to the coral sea past the islands and there were a lot of people being sick on the way out and back. Once out there we had to put on stinger suits in case we encountered any jelly fish while snorkelling. They are not very flattering but everyone had to wear them. Emma was away like hell into the water but I had to sort of edge myself after almost dying the last time I went snorkelling. No offence to Colum but I felt a lot safer out here as there were ropes and buoys surrounding the area we snorkelled and the pontoon was gonna move away either. The water was so shallow that the reef looked like a miles of sand along the horizon and when we were in the water it was literally within touching distance from the surface. The fish were swimming right up into your face and the reef was white in the sun. I saw lots of fish, the ones that stick out were Turkish Harlequin Wrasse which had the same colours as a rocket ice lolly and Five Striped Damsel Fish which had a flat body and and a tiny little puckered up mouth. The divers saw turtles and eels but i was delighted just to be able to go out at all. I am terrified of not being able to put my feet down so it was something of a victory for me. I could have but my feet down on the reef it was that shallow but you don't want to go destroying it with your big flipper feet. I think it's really durable otherwise it wouldn't have survived all these years. It's the largest living thing on earth, almost 3000 kms long. Incredible, I kept thinking to my self as I was looking at it "Great Barrier Reef! woo-hoo".



We went out another day as well around Border Island which is one of the Whitsundays and had a bit of snorkel round there as well. Not as shallow and very murky but you could still see fish and reef. I didn't feel as safe at this one but I had a go anyway and could swim to the shore if I wasn't confident which was quite often. Again Emma had no problems although she forgot to take her watch off before she got in but it didn't break it. I told her I didn't buy her crap! The last stop on this trip was Whitehaven Beach which is supposed to be one of the most beautiful beaches in the world. It is amazing white silica sand and crystal blue water but we didn't get much time there. Emma was back in the water there as well, making up for all the time she spent out of the water everywhere else. It started raining while we were there as well but because it's the tropics the rain is warm and it cools everything down as it is very hot here. There have been loads of torrential down pours but they don't last long.



Apart from that we've just been relaxing and trying to get a tan befitting of people who have been in Australia for a year. We've seen every season Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter as well as the Dry and Wet seasons they have here. We' ve witnessed the outback and the city life. We've visited every state on mainland Australia as we made an N shape across the country through Western Australia, Northern Territory, South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland( Canberra is a territory of its own but is tecnically in New South Wales). Didn't get to go to Tasmania but got to see Tasmanian Devils, didn't get to do New Zealand but met a lot of Kiwis and did very little of the east coast but we've been told by people who have travelled around Australia all their lives "You can't do it all". We're delighted with what we've managed to pack into a year and maybe we'll get a chance to do some of what we missed out on another time. We've been through almost every emotion possible and haven't had one row (yeah right). It has been fantastic to be able to share this experience and it's something that we can always look back on. For all our complaining and slagging off, Australia is the most amazing place with the most diverse, friendly, generous, patriotic and funny people, a great climate and so much to see and do. The whole place is a little slice of heaven.

Thanks for reading. We look forward to seeing you all when we return. We leave tomorrow and 29 hours later we arrive in Dublin. Hopefully we bring some half decent weather back with us.