UPDATE 1ST MAY 2011

Left Cid Harbour on Friday morning after having a struggle to get the anchor up as it was well buried after 5 nights of 25 knot winds . Had to cross the Whitsunday passage between Hayman and Molle islands to get to Airlie. Winds were about 30 knots and 3 meter swells, so not very pleasant. Arriving at Airlie to Able Point Marina we were given our berth number and thank god the winds died as entering the Marina. Yacht Screensaver was already there as they left after us but are much more adventurous than we are in the bigger winds and flew past us doing 10.8 knots of boat speed as we were doing the driving miss daisy option which was under motor and a little headsail doing roughly 5 knots.

A nice and cosy berth and plenty of room. Parked safely once again so thats always a good thing. So only 2 nights here, the price was $85 a night which is outragous but what do you do. However Alan from Screensaver had sent us an email telling us that he had secured us and himself a 50% discount for the 2 nights as a one off, god love that man. So that enabled us to go out for a dinner and not kill our budget. A great night sleep after 5 nights of sleeping with an ear on alert and one eye open in the winds, rain and an anchor alarm that is only a visual not audible. (Thanks for that Simrad)

Only 48 hours here so we had little time for site seeing and most of time had to be spent washing, food shopping, washing the boat etc . Food shopping is fun as it starts with a 2.5km walk past the shopping centre hidden by trees then to have to jump over the school fence across a playing field and over another fence through a creek, over the main road to the closest Coles then the shopping part starts, then finding a cab that will take us back and not get the shits because of all the bags, beer etc. Then once back at the marina finding a trolley to laod all our shopping in then load it all onto the boat, " I,m tired just writing this. Elaine did about 8 loads of washing which cost us about $80 and I think drove here crazy sitting in the Laundry for about 9 hours in total. Well she can't complain she doesn't get any "ME" time how much space does she need!!!!!.

Went to the marina Italian restaurant on the Friday night for dinner to have a long awaited pizza, and on the Saturday night to the one and only Chinese restaurant. Since we havn't been out to dinner for a while so it was worth it. We hadn't had a pizza since we left Sydney 7 months ago so it was a long awaited treat.

Final bits and pieces included a swap and go gas bottle, some new sailing shoes for Elaine (real ones this time but still HOT PINK) some dive weights for me as the rocks I had collected weren't doing the job as I couldn't find boulders to fit in my pockets, and a small anchor for the Tender for when we go to the beach as we were sick of finding rocks to tie it to.

Sunday morning we untied from our Marina Berth and cruised out of Able Point Marina and headed for Stonehaven Anchorage where the snorkelling is supposed to be good and there is supposed to some moorings to pick up so we won't have to anchor. About 3hrs later we found a vacant mooring and picked that up which will ensure us of a good nights sleep.

We launched the dingy and headed of to the shore having to navigate through all the coral shallows we ended up rowing half the way. Met a Couple on the beach who were off a yacht called My Way . Terry and Rhonda from Townsville. They 2 are cruising around with no plan attached.

So for now we are to cruise around the Whitsuday Islands for the next 10 to 14 days before heading back to Airlie Beach for more provisions. Hopefully we will do some snorkelling here tomorrow and have a lazy day, "as if most of our days at the moment aren't much the same"