At Wit’s End
I arrived in Airlie Beach in the morning and was immediately drawn away from the bustop by the beatiful lagoon and surrounding marina filled with boats that had really tall masts. I walked around for a bit and concluded that everyone who comes to Airlie Beach must love to lay in the sun all day. The park by the water was filled with sunbathers and people swimming in the artificially created beach. I layed in the sun for a bit and then went to my hostel to check in for my room and my sailing trip for the next day. I piled the sunscreen into my bag, having experienced how intense the sun is on land let alone the reflective waters of the ocean. I kicked around Airlie Beach for a bit but bored of it quickly because it is just a bunch of t-shirt and shorts shops one after another, mixed in with more travel agencies than I could count. I walked around the boardwalk for a bit until dusk and then headed back to the hostel to go to sleep (since I didn’t get good quality sleep on the bus).
The next day I had to wait until 12:45 when the sailing boat would leave, so again I went to the lagoon and lounged around there. I headed over to the pier and met all the people I would be sharing a boat with for the next two days. There were two (surprisingly) nice French people, two Germans, a couple and their daughter from Chicago, and one Japanese girl who didn’t seem to know a lick of English. It was awkward because she didn’t listen to any of the safety briefings given by the skipper and he kept saying “Emi, DO YOU UN-DER-STAND?” and she would say yes but nod her head “no”. The crew were making our afternoon snack and one of the girls asked Emi if she was a vegetarian and after asking her threee times to no avail, Emi did the same mixed yes and no answer. They asked her if she could swim and she said “a little” and then proceeded to ask if we were going to be able to dive on this trip! I’m thinking how can she even be wanting to snorkel if she can barely swim?! Anyway, she went up to the front of the boat and slept or meditated (we weren’t sure which because she did it frequently) until evening.
We stopped at False Nara, the place where we were to do our first snorkel. I put on my stinger suit and we jumped into the water, which was suprisingly cold. We saw a lot of neat coral formations. Some coral looked like gigantic mushrooms while others looked like unfolding heads of neon green lettuce. The fish were not many but the ones we did see were very brightly colored and interesting. I saw an eel that was sticking only its head out of a crevice in the coral. Eventually we got really cold so we got out of the water and headed to Whitehaven Beach. There was a full moon so it fully lit the bright white sands of the beach. We dropped anchor and Adam (the skipper) took us out to the beach. We were the only ones on the beach and we layed in the sand and sifted it through our hands, marvelling at how the 97% silica sands felt like flour. It was unlike any sand I had ever seen. We chatted about French, German and American cuisine and funny quirks about our languages (it always seems to be that way). And I discovered that I know more French and German than I thought!
Tags: 1
transcendborders
Leave a Reply