Another day like yesterday – challenging for sailing. We left Nara Inlet and hoped to be able to sail up to a place called Butterfly Bay at the top of Hook Island. It is supposed to have very good snorkelling there. However by sailing north, we were sailing in the same direction as the wind and swell and we were getting rocked around too much. We didn’t feel confident to continue in that direction, so headed back south towards a place called Cid Harbour on the NE side of Whitsunday Island . It is quite a protected harbour, especially from the strong S/SE winds we were getting. We pulled up here around lunchtime and the kids had a swim off the back of the boat. After lunch, Michael and Bethany had a bit of a nap while I took the older 3 kids in the dinghy over to the beach (Sawmill Beach) and had an explore on the rocks. Sam actually drove the dinghy as he had been practicing for the last couple of days. We then went in the dinghy to the next beach around the point (Denham Beach) and had another explore. We saw some loggerhead turtles surfacing to take a breath a few times. We also saw a group of flying fish jump out of the water right in front of the dinghy. The bay around Denham Beach had a lot more fringing reef in it and so we had to be careful we didn’t take the dinghy straight over some coral only a few centimeters under the water and damage the motor. It was bit of a maze, trying to dodge the coral and, at one point, we did go over some and the motor struck the edge. We had to manouvre off the coral without the motor and then reverse up. Sam did a great job staying cool through the whole episode. We then headed back to the yacht. Bethany had been disappointed she had had to have a nap while we were away, so Michael had said he would take her on an ‘adventure’. So following some afternoon tea, her and Michael headed off to Denhams Beach while the other kids and myself did some reading up on coral and reefs, and also read some more from The Story of Australia book. When Bethany came back with Michael, she was all excited to tell us about the little octopus she had seen in a pool of water on the beach. How exciting!
We sang some songs with the guitar that night and watched the sun set over the water to the west.