We left Airlie Beach and drove a short way north to a hidden
gem called Hydeaway Bay. It is not a
very big town but again the views are spectacular. After booking into Hydeaway Bay Caravan Park
for 3 nights, we went for our drive to see what is around. We found a great little resort called
“Montes” right on the beach and it looks across at the most northern of the
Whitsunday Islands, Gloucester Island.
After having a few drinks at Montes
we walked out of there and booked a night via National Parks to camp at
Gloucester Island for the night. Being a
deserted island, we would have to take all our supplies over there via our
tinny. The nearest public boat ramp is
quite a way away at Dingo Beach so while at Montes, Josh arranged to come back
for dinner that night if we could use their boat ramp – and it worked, true
Josh style. Upon coming back to the van,
we met another couple also travelling Australia, same way as us! Mark and Sharon are doing it in true style,
by Harley Davidson and towing their supplies in a small trailer. We are hoping to catch up with them again at
Bowen horse races this Saturday. Back at
Montes we witnessed an absolutely stunning sunset and then enjoyed a fantastic
seafood platter for two… living the unemployed high life!!
The following morning Josh was in full swing and on a
mission. He was in packing mode for our
journey across the seas. We were
travelling via our little tin boat which meant we had to try and pack light. It’s a bit hard to do when you need to take
shelter, food and water, not to mention the snorkelling gear and stinger
suits. Once everything was packed into
the car we headed to Montes to get it all on the water. The boat was off, the motor attached, and all
our other gear was piled in. We even had
room for the kids! Across we went to the
island and it was a relatively smooth ride.
We got across to Bona Bay on the island and unpacked everything and
carried it up from the beach and set up our little home for the night. The kids were a bit on edge to start but that
was probably from the fear we had instilled about crocodiles and even worse,
the stingers. We got back in the boat
and headed around the bend to go snorkelling as there was nothing along the
beach where we were camping. Josh did a
bit of snorkelling on his own and was hoping to get some use out of his spear
gun (but no luck and no fish for dinner) and the kids and I spent quite a while
trying skip small rocks across the water before having a bit of a snorkel
ourselves. After having lunch back at
the campsite we thought about having a game of cards but the wind would have
just blown them about so instead we tried our hand at fishing off the
beach. The one thing left behind in the
car though was the tackle box so we didn’t have any luck with that. Later in the afternoon, we saw a lovely big
old sailing boat come into our bay (of course it was “our” bay as we were the
only people on the island) and anchor.
Back in the boat, we were headed out for another snorkel, but Josh first
went up alongside the sailing boat,
“Escapee”, to see if there were pirates on board. A lovely couple came out on the deck and we
had a quick chat. They offered for us to
come on board for a drink so we took them up on their offer after going for our
last snorkel for the day. On board their
boat, Eileen and Ralph showed us around their second home and made the kids and
us feel right at home. We enjoyed a
lovely chat, a glass of home-made whiskey and another glorious sunset with them
before heading back to the beach before it got too dark. Upon cooking up a storm (well ok, it was just
a quick pasta) we scoffed down some food and then decided to go fishing in the
dark hoping for better luck - especially seeing as though Eileen and Ralph had
supplied us with some more fishing supplies.
It took a little while but we all caught at least one fish except for
Sami and she wasn’t happy about it, in particular as she was the one always
nagging to do some fishing. We had
packed up and thrown all our remaining bait into the sea and Sami had her line
still dangling in the water and yippee…
she pulled in her first fish. We
have no idea what fish we caught but they were all relatively small so we
didn’t keep any of them. It was a great
end to the night!
Thankfully it was nearly midnight that we got to bed as we
didn’t have any home comforts sleeping on a few mats. Zoe and I in one tent and Sami and Josh in
the other – right next to us! Josh
cooked us all bacon rolls as we each woke up and it was a nice few relaxing
hours. Instead of going snorkelling and
then going back to the mainland, the wind was picking up and we decided to skip
the snorkelling and make tracks. After
loading everything back in the tinny, we hit the waves, and boy did we hit
them. It was pretty rough out there and
I was glad to be back safely on the mainland… not that we were in any trouble,
it was just an extremely rough ride and our supplies were bouncing around the
boat. We loaded everything back into and
onto the car and came back to the caravan park to unload and wash up. It certainly was good to have a hot shower and
get the salt out of our hair and clothes.
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