The sun sets on our Winter's Sojourn

As the sun sets over the western skies here at Hope Island Marina on the Gold Coast, I am sitting back having a Buddie or two and reflecting on my recent 6 month hiatus up in north Queensland to get away from the cold winter months.

Airlie Beach hasn't changed much since I lived up here back in 2007-2009. The main street, Shute Harbor Road has been streetscaped, which I like, as I knew the person responsible for designing it, Steve Moss of UPlan. Well done Steve.

But the things that have changed, besides the streetscape, was that there was a lot of businesses closed due to the beating Airlie copped from Cyclone Debbie. The Lagoon, above, and the famous Airlie Beach Hotel, at left, were simply destroyed. The Hotel is not likely to open for another year, but has opened a couple of smaller areas like bottle shops etc & the lagoon was still closed when I left. Many other businesses are shut and are not expected to reopen. A real Shame!

But somethings don't change due to the resilience of the locals. The Whitsunday Sailing Club being only just one.

It was here that we, Bob & Kerry and I, would arrive nearly every day and tie our tenders to the pontoon before heading into Airlie to do the shopping. . . and upon returning, having a few beers  due to the tiresome 200m walk to Woolies, (another new addition to the main shopping area).

We had only been in Airlie a couple of days and already the local Whitsunday Times newspaper had caught Bob, myself and Billy Gleeson at the club having a coldie or two on the balcony one Sunday afternoon.

Billy and his mate Graeme Wilson would end up assisting me later in our stay and I am, and will always be, greatly appreciative for their unquestioned kindness.

Whilst in Airlie, Rob & Kerry's son, Ben, and granddaughter Amira visited and here they are on Errant prior to coming over to Fete later in the day for a couple of coldies. I think Rob said that they were getting Amira used to being onboard as they planned a family outing over to the islands the following week.

Below is a couple of pics of Ben & Amira on board Fete that day.

Somehow I feel that Rob's fears that Amira may not like the water were unfounded as you can see from the look on her face in these two pics.

I mentioned earlier that Airlie hasn't changed much since I lived up here, but at left, Port of Airlie was just under construction and now it is a vibrant community with eateries, bars, marina, bus terminal & ferry hub.

It has come a long way in the last 8 years . . .

It has been almost 5 months since Cyclone Debbie ravaged this place and still bits and pieces of boats can be seen. I am told that there were some 40+ boats that disappeared and have never, or will never be found again.
I guess the only way we would see them, like the piece that floated passed Fete, at left, one afternoon, will be like this.

We have been here a couple of weeks or so, now its time to head out into the 74 beautiful islands surrounding us to see more and experience new things.

Tomorrow we head over to Hook Island, only 15nm away and stay a couple of days in Nara Inlet before moving on to see the rest of this beautiful place.

0900 hrs Tuesday 18th July - On turning Fete out to Pioneer Point, we were passed by the Derwent Hunter, at left, which is owned by a long time mate and Beaujolais whom we 1st met back in Mackay.

Our destination for today as stated earlier is Nara Inlet and as you can see from this pic above, is beautiful. Actually the little bay in the center is Refuge Bay which is a great anchorage in all winds. (This pic came courtesy of Whitsunday Tourism website).

We entered the Inlet at around 1100hrs and went all the way to the top of the inlet to find a good mooring. The anchorage was very rolley but we decided to stay put as the tide was due to change in an hour so we decided to give it a go.

The inlet soon started to fill up with other boats but it didn't take Rob and Kerry long to get back out chasing fish for dinner (see pic below)

After chasing the illusive fish around for a couple of hours, they joined me on Fete for some sundowners and left just on sunset.

A few moments later I had an accident and damaged my eye and had to call on Rob for assistance . . . well to cut a long story short, I was later medevacked back to Prosperine for some treatment which took several days.

Upon release, I knew due to my unstable condition that I needed to get Fete back to the Gold Coast until I could sort things out.

Once again, I had to call upon a couple of trusted friends to get Fete back to the Gold Coast, and Ian (Grumpy) Knight, above and Ian (Russell) Waymouth, at left,  put their hands up to help me out. There was a third person who also wanted to help, Lee Sutherland, a friend of Rob & Kerry's, who just happened to be in Airlie, so the crew were all set.

Sunday 31st July, I sat in the cabana next to the Whitsunday Sailing Club and watched Fete, at left, head out back to the Gold Coast. Their journey, at right, would take 6 days with one stop at Roslyn Bay before arriving at Hope Island Marina tired and exhausted and looking for a good nights sleep.

I wish to thank these guys for all they did and to everyone else that made the last 6-7 months a great trip and I will surely be back again for a new adventure soon . . .

So until then, as always Cheers!